Qin Official

An hour later, at the salt field at the mouth of the Weishui River, this was the first time Qin Shihuang saw the sea. The wind with the smell of seaweed blew his beard and hair. Looking around, the blue ocean occupied most of the field of vision, and the waves surged. It seemed as if the sun, moon and stars were all out of it. When I first saw this scene, I felt it was so spectacular that it swept away the block in my chest!

But his eyes did not stay on the sea for a long time. Soon, Qin Shihuang was attracted by the salt fields on the beach, which were connected with each other and divided into fields.

"Let's talk." Qin Shihuang looked at Heifu and pointed at the salt fields: "What's going on?"

Heifu reported: "I was ordered by His Majesty to rectify the salt administration in Jiaodong, and found that the salt produced in Jiaodong was not half as good as that of Tian Qi! There are two reasons for this."

He began to point out the problems one by one: "First, the harassment by pirates made the seashore restless. The saltworks craftsmen were separated from their subordinates, and the scale was not as good as before."

"Second, the people of Qi have been boiling the sea to make salt for nearly a thousand years, which has led to the depletion of firewood along the coast. Firewood has to be transported from farther hills, and the cost is extremely high..."

Heifu is right. Sea salt these days is basically obtained by boiling it. It is said that the person who first discovered this was called "Susha" and he was a Laiyi king.

Heifu imagined that Mr. Su Sha was a foodie. When he was cooking clams in a clay pot at the beach, he accidentally boiled the water dry. As a result, he got a layer of crystallized sea salt at the bottom of the pot. He reached out and tasted it, and then he opened it. At the gate of the New World, the locals worshiped him as the "Salt Sect" and became the supreme god of the Salt Party.

Heifu still remembers what he saw when he first came to the seaside salt field a few months ago after pacifying the Tian family rebellion in Yeyi: There were ditches that introduced the seawater during the tide into the large dug pool, and the concubines were Carrying wooden buckets, he carried buckets of seawater to the frying and brine stove. There were two rows of buried stoves with pottery cauldrons on them. People kept bringing firewood to cook the sea day and night. The whole seaside was full of fire. With billowing smoke...

The method is similar to that of boiling sugar. First, boil high-concentration brine in a large cauldron, and then transfer it to a small cauldron. Finally, you will get a white hemisphere, which is the fried pot salt. Then break it into pieces and break it up to become sea salt sold in bulk. .

The prime time for making salt is from October to January every year. During this period, there is a slack period for farmers. Almost all the people on the seaside will be mobilized to cut firewood, carry water, and boil the sea into salt. In three months, it can be made Got thirty-six thousand bells of salt!

This number tripled when Tian Qi arrived, with an annual output of 100,000 bells. Jiaodong's output was about 50,000, but the price became more and more expensive because too much wood was consumed.

Heifu continued: "Salt is a government business. After removing the capital, it imposes heavy taxes, so the price of the official salt produced is as expensive as molasses!"

Brown sugar from Nanjun is still considered a luxury product. This metaphor shows how expensive sea salt is. Of course, the reason why it is so expensive is that the court has to bear the blame for the heavy salt tax. By the same method, the price of private salt is one-third or even one-fifth of the official salt. The common people are not stupid and would rather buy it secretly. Private salt.

Costs are increasing day by day, and sales are being squeezed out by private salt. Naturally, expanding the reproduction of Jiaodong's official salt has become empty talk. This is also the reason why Jiaodong's official salt production is becoming increasingly sluggish.

Qin Shihuang nodded. Heifu's analysis hit the mark. Not only Jiaodong, but also other coastal counties had such problems to a greater or lesser extent. The Qin Dynasty's salt and iron official system was in trouble in these places.

There are two solutions given by Heifu. One is to increase the crackdown on pirates and private salt; the other is to reduce the cost of official salt so that its price can be slightly lowered before it can be profitable.

"Then I thought of the method of making salt in Huamachi, Beidi County. There is no need to boil it, it can be made directly by sunlight and wind..."

In Heifu's imagination, salt is inherently soluble in water. Once the sea water dries up, wouldn't layers of salt precipitate out? This is the sun-salt method widely used in later generations.

But it is easier to think about than to do. The ancients were not fools. How could they ignore the simple and easy method of drying salt and use the method of boiling salt to make 1 hour of salt, which consumes about 400 kilograms of firewood?

After conducting on-site inspections and asking the craftsmen, Heifu found out that boiling sea salt was a last resort. The salinity of seawater is far less than that of the brine in Anyi Salt Pond and Huama Pond. It takes too long to dry the salt, and the intensity of the sun is low in winter, making it impractical.

After asking about it, he discovered that in fact, some salt fields in Jiaodong, due to the increasing shortage of wood on the seaside, have adopted half-drying and half-boiling: imitating the well salt of Bashu, after autumn, the brine is stored and dried to increase the concentration, and then fried in winter. Cook, thereby reducing fuel and reducing costs.

But counting on the sun the whole time? The weather at the beach is unpredictable. Maybe when the brine is thickened and the work is about to be completed, it suddenly rains, and then all the previous efforts are wasted.

Heifu needed to find the most effective and fastest way to create the salt-drying method. He did not study science and engineering in his previous life and knew nothing about these things. So a notice was sent to deceive the alchemist who specializes in studying the changes of yin and yang, who works with cinnabar and other substances every day, purifies dew, refines pills, and conducts physical and chemical experiments. But they brought most of the people to the seaside and asked them to work with the craftsmen to figure out a solution.

The alchemists were immediately dumbfounded. They originally wanted to seek "the way to immortality" for the emperor, but now they were working with lowly craftsmen and ministers, dealing with seawater, cement and sand all day long. Of course they were unhappy, but as several protesters were Heifu was detained for disobeying orders, so they could only do things honestly.

The Three Stooges defeated Zhuge Liang. After several months of study, the alchemists and craftsmen really came up with a good idea!

"Your Majesty, please go this way."

Hei Fu led the way and took Qin Shihuang to the depths of the salt fields on the seaside. The first things they approached were potholes, but they were not used for drying salt, but for making mud...

These pits dug on the beach were now filled with sea water left by the last high tide. A group of concubines stood barefoot in the fields, raking the ground with toothed wooden rakes in a criss-cross pattern, removing the sea water and sediment. Mix it and turn it into hardened blocks under the sun, and then send it to the rear piece by piece.

Heifu said: "This is the first step in making salt."

The ministers were confused, because it seemed that those hardened black mud had something to do with the white salt.

Heifu then led them to several parallel ditches and pointed: "This was built by Jiang Qi over hundreds of years in order to use the tide to pour seawater into the reservoir through the ditches. It’s so convenient to get water for cooking.”

The group of people followed the ditch and walked to the huge pond. The seawater here was divided into shallower salt ponds. After several days of sun exposure, the water level dropped slightly.

"This is the second step in making salt."

Next to each salt pond, there is an animal-drawn waterwheel. A blindfolded donkey keeps turning in circles, driving the waterwheel to continuously extract seawater from the pond and transfer it to the next stop: the filter.

The shape of the filter resembles a terrace. Each outlet is equipped with several layers of bamboo mats, which are supported by fixed bamboo baskets and lined with bamboo slices and thatch. A hard mud board containing a large amount of salt is placed in the middle. After the seawater brought from the reservoir enters the filter, it flows from high to low. Before entering the next layer, it is filtered through the water level difference first, and then goes back and forth, until it reaches five or six filters. The entire time , as short as one day, as long as two days.

Heifu said that this process is repeated and long, but after one to two days of filtration, brine with a higher concentration can be obtained in the lowermost filter tank! You know, if you only rely on wind and sun, this process will take more than ten days!

"Wait a minute, Da Shangzo said that this sea water has become saltier and saltier after being filtered a few times?"

Ziying, the accompanying five masters, became more and more confused as he listened. This was contrary to the common sense he knew. A descendant of the Qin Dynasty must have meritorious service and must not belong to the family. Although Ziying is the son of Chang'an Jun Chengqi, his father rebelled against the country in his early years. Ziying's background is actually very embarrassing. , he was promoted to the fifth doctor by Zhuo because he had made some achievements in the army. He often saw his soldiers drinking raw water, but he liked to filter it through linen cloth to make it look clearer.

Ziying knew that the turbid the water, the clearer it would be after filtering. In his opinion, the taste should also be lighter. Why is it that at this filter, as the position goes down and the water is filtered many times, the water becomes clearer and clearer, but the taste becomes salty?

"What the Jiaodong County Magistrate said is correct, it is indeed getting salty."

Zhang Cang didn't believe it when he and Heifu came over to check, but after taking a sip of water from the top and bottom filters, they found that the former was just ordinary salty, while the latter almost killed him, so he had no choice but to Don't believe this fact.

He also thought about the reason and seemed to have some understanding, but Heifu asked Zhang Cang not to say anything. Here, he also wanted to dig a small hole for the alchemist...

Faced with this problem, the ministers looked at each other, and the emperor also had doubts.

But Hei Fu smiled: "It's not surprising, why do you call it a magical method?"

Immediately, he looked at Lu Sheng and Han Zhong who were following at the end of the team, and said:

"This method was thought up by scholars from Jiaodong Province after brainstorming. I don't know the reason for it. Maybe it's the mystery of the changes in yin and yang and the five elements? Mr. Han Zhong, who is good at transforming things, why not ask him to help us resolve our doubts?"

…

ps: I tried my best, but after checking the information all night, I only wrote one chapter. It was so slow that I wanted to cry. The second chapter will take about 1:30 to finish. If you can wait, just stay with me.

This method of drying salt is different from modern times. It uses the five-step ancient method from Jiechi and Hainan, which seems to be more reference.