Spoiling History: Starting from the Three Kingdoms

"Since there is Emperor Yang in this temple, it must have nothing to do with Chongba."

Empress Ma made a simple and reasonable guess, and then ignored it, just looking at the picture called "Record of the Opening of the River" on the screen and exclaimed:

"This painting is really good."

Zhu Yuanzhang didn't say anything, but looking at the lifelike working people painted on the paper, he suddenly had another idea:

"Next month is the New Year, why not just call the second and third sons back to celebrate together."

"Then... find someone who is good at painting, and draw the scene of our family reunion on a picture."

"In this way, if my sons leave the capital to guard the Ming Dynasty in the future, I will have a thought when I think of it in the capital."

This idea is not groundless, because just listening to the unfortunate things that the young man said that he didn't want to experience, the emperor suddenly woke up:

He not only took it for granted that his son could handle government affairs energetically, but also took it for granted that his family was harmonious and his wife was healthy.

Empress Ma was tempted when she heard this, but she was still a little hesitant:

"But Xi'an and Taiyuan may be busy with government affairs..."

The emperor waved his hand:

"Right now, the Hu Yuan are hiding in the north and are in a state of panic. Xi'an and Taiyuan are not strategic points. What are they busy with?"

"Go down the river at full speed. It will take at least ten days to reach Yingtian Prefecture. It will be no problem to catch up with the New Year's Eve banquet. We can return to Xi'an and Taiyuan after the Lantern Festival."

Since that was said, Empress Ma happily agreed.

Later generations said that she died suddenly and her husband said he would change her fate. These words did not touch Empress Ma herself.

When she was young, her family fell into decline. When she was young, she knew about righteous military affairs. After she reached the age of 15, she promised to her beloved. Later, she fought in the north and south with him and finally became the mother of the country.

She had no regrets about what she had experienced and gained. If there was anything she was worried about, it was her husband who was still a hero in thousands of years of history.

She didn't know whether she could successfully avoid the original bad luck, but for now, it should be right to accompany her husband and son well.

Zhu Biao didn't think about it for the time being. This smart prince just looked at the attitude of praising the working people on the screen, and vaguely felt that the future generations might not approve of some of his father's behaviors.

[The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal did promote the further prosperity of Jiangnan, and this prosperous name spread to the sea route through maritime trade, and finally objectively promoted the publication of "The Travels of Marco Polo".

Generally speaking, most historians also regard "The Travels of Marco Polo" published around 1300 AD as the event node when Europe began to formally understand China.

It can be inferred from this travelogue that Marco Polo was born around 1254, the last year of Emperor Lizong of Song Dynasty, and arrived in China with his father and uncle around 1275. About sixteen years later, when Kublai Khan's daughter Kokozhen was going to the Ilkhanate to get married, the fleet took Marco Polo back to Venice.

But Marco Polo was unlucky enough to encounter a fight between Venice and Genoa a few years after he returned, and he was directly caught and thrown into prison.

The days in prison were very boring, and the only entertainment was that the prisoners told each other about their past experiences to relieve boredom and make fun of them. Marco Polo's story attracted the praise of Rusticiano, an Italian merchant in the same cell, who thought that this story could become popular and make a lot of money!

So under the instigation of Lao Lu, Lao Ma dictated and Lao Lu wrote, and the Marco Polo Travels involving the customs and customs of more than ten countries in the Middle East, Central Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa and other regions was completed.

Although the book covers many countries and regions, China undoubtedly occupies the most important space. The book has four volumes, and two of them are about China and Kublai Khan, which occupies half of the space.

But what we have described above are all speculations from the records in Marco Polo's Travels. In fact, whether Marco Polo himself arrived in China is still an unsolved case.

On the one hand, Marco Polo's description of some contents in China is very detailed, such as currency, salt production, tax system, and justice.

The chapters on Suzhou and Hangzhou are even more generous in praising the scenery of West Lake, from pavilions and terraces to urban operations, from trade processes to scenic spots in Suzhou and Hangzhou, and the description is detailed to how many bridges and squares there are in Hangzhou. The above records are even more detailed than the "History of Yuan Dynasty".

But on the other hand, Marco Polo also used a considerable amount of space to introduce how Kublai Khan liked him, and gave him money, official positions, and servants. It stands to reason that such a favored Semu person must have left a record in the history books, but neither the "History of Yuan Dynasty" nor the folk history at that time mentioned that there was a person like Marco Polo who was "simply in the emperor's heart".

The most unreasonable thing is that Marco Polo claimed to have lived in China for sixteen years, but he did not leave a single word in his travel notes about people's livelihood, such as tea culture, chopsticks, Taoism, Chinese characters, education system, foot binding, etc., as well as the Great Wall that had been across China for more than a thousand years at that time.

So we have talked about a saying in the past that some scholars believe that Marco Polo may have just made a long voyage, and all the things in China were heard from the Yuan Dynasty sailors at that time. After all, for the locals, there is really no need to introduce the common people's livelihood.

But now looking back, it doesn't matter whether Marco Polo has ever been to China in person. What matters is that "The Travels of Marco Polo" has indeed played a role in promoting the times.

About twenty years after the publication of Marco Polo's Travels, another Italian merchant who traveled east, Odoric, also published "Travels".

The common point of the two travel notes is that they praised China's prosperity at that time with great praise, almost like a mythical country. This caused some Europeans at that time to be half-believing and half-doubting, while others were fascinated. In the end, the baton of finding a rich China was passed to Portugal as expected.

Portugal still has two copies of Marco Polo's Travels purchased by the Portuguese prince when he visited Venice in 1428, which shows its guiding role in Portugal's shipping industry. More practical are other records left by Portugal.

In 1502, Portugal drew the first map with the equator and the tropics of capricorn, which clearly marked how rich the area was after passing through the Strait of Malacca, and speculated that most of the treasures came from China.

In a letter written by the King of Portugal to the Catholic King in 1504, it was stated that the Portuguese fleet successfully discovered the rich East where "a bottle (porcelain) is worth a hundred gold".

In 1508, the Portuguese king issued a lengthy order to the fleet commander, asking them to find out all the information about the "Qin people", including the size of their fleet, the number of artillery, the religious sect they believed in, whether they were pagans, etc.

Subsequently, in 1510, Portugal seized Goa in India by force, declared it a Portuguese territory, and established a trading post called "Chinese Fortress".

The following year, the Portuguese fleet occupied the Strait of Malacca, and the Far East route was completely opened.

From this year on, the Portuguese began to go to the East in an endless stream. In the past fifty years, works such as "Records of the Situation in China", "History of the Thirty Years", "Geography of the East", and "Road to China" that detailed the situation in the East were published one after another. These works became the best supplement to "The Travels of Marco Polo", and the Ming Empire at that time also gradually faded from the mysterious veil in the eyes of the Portuguese.

After reading these works, the Portuguese did whatever they wanted in the South China Sea, and they constructed the initial impression of the Ming Empire in the West at that time:

Rich, weak, and defenseless.

And eventually triggered a formal collision between the East and the West. 】