Spoiling History: Starting from the Three Kingdoms

[Ten months after moving to Shangyang Palace, Emperor Wu Zetian died of illness here.

At the last moment of her life, the old lady may have finally looked away and formally issued the last edict in her life.

The content of this edict is quite simple. The title of Queen Zetian is retained, and the rest of the messy imperial titles are removed on the initiative.

The descendants of the Wang and Xiao clans, as well as Chu Suiliang and Han Yuan, who were affected in the incident of deposing Wang Liwu, were pardoned for their old crimes and ordered to resume their careers.

As the most significant political struggle in Emperor Gaozong's reign, the deposed king and established military forces involved the struggle between imperial power and prime ministerial power, the struggle between the royal family and nobles, and the contradiction between the centralization of monarchy and the politics of nobles, which fundamentally determined the imperial power politics in the feudal era of ancient China. trend, and it was also the beginning of Wu Zetian's rise.

Therefore, the Supreme Emperor Wu Zetian did indeed do another good deed. After all, Li Xian may not be able to remember these people, and he may not be able to pardon them if he does.

In May of the following year, Wu Zetian was buried in the Qianling Mausoleum with Gaozong as empress, ending a life that was difficult to judge.

A Wu died. What we talked about the most before was the old lady’s luxurious ostentation. So setting aside these clouds, what does the real Wu Zhou look like under the control of a female emperor?

In a nutshell: civil governance is far stronger than state affairs, and state affairs is far stronger than martial arts.

What is worthy of recognition during the Awu period is the inclusive attitude towards culture in society. The three schools of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism developed unprecedentedly. Gao Zong went further in the selection of literary talents. It was also because of the unprecedented emphasis on literary talents that a series of flourishing events in the Kaiyuan Dynasty were born. Tang poetry.

But if we continue to peel back the surface of this cultural prosperity, there are still a few pimples underneath that are quite eye-catching.

Limited by the inherent deficiencies in the legal system of women in the feudal era, Awu chose to support Buddhism to strengthen his own momentum. After ascending to the throne, he increased his efforts to support Buddhism, and finally raised a deformed behemoth.

The most eye-catching thing is the rapid increase in temples: According to the edict of Awu's accession to the throne, Dayun temples are required to be established at the state and county levels to enshrine and explain the Dayun Sutra that calls her the reincarnation of Maitreya.

Although the Dayun Temple built at the border of the country like the Four Towns of Anxi has indeed played a positive role in spreading culture and stabilizing the border, the establishment of Dayun Temple in the 300 states in the entire country is still a huge sum of money for Wu Zhou's finances. expenditures.

These state-run temples also expanded at an unprecedented rate during the Wu and Zhou Dynasties, and the harm they caused to them was quite clear in a memorial written by Di Renjie, who returned to Beijing to serve as prime minister.

Being extravagant and strong, painting and silk craftsmanship to the fullest... without harming the people, what else can you ask for? ...The rich and beautiful property can be obtained twice as much; the water-milled manor is not small... The unknown monk, who has tens of thousands, has gone down to check and collect, and has already obtained thousands.

The extremely luxurious temples were definitely not built by ghosts and gods. The expenses will eventually fall on the common people. Moreover, the monks in the temples have properties and manors. If you just search Luoyang, there are thousands of escaped monks, which is something the whole country would not even dare to think about.

During the Wu and Zhou Dynasties, the temple economy also prospered along with the Jianghuai money economy.

During the last hundred years of the Tang Dynasty, the contradiction between the country's rapidly prosperous economy and the productivity of making money has always existed. The Jianghuai area was far away from the center and had a prosperous economy. From the time of Emperor Gaozong, bad money had been banned repeatedly. Later, Emperor Gaozong's Awu Fengchan Taishan came back and there was not enough money. There have also been waste money measures to compete with the people for profit, making bad money even more popular.

When Awu officially came to power, he made a stupid move. In order to control bad money, he ordered people to hang formal money in the market. If the money did not comply with the regulations, transactions would be banned. As a result, transactions were stagnant.

As a last resort, Awu once again issued an edict to remedy the situation, saying that as long as the bad money was not too excessive, it could be used, and the money with rough workmanship was not allowed to be withheld.

As a result, this edict allowed bad money to break away from its gray status and gain official endorsement, turning it into regular money. Big Jianghuai households even regarded coining money as a living, causing the proliferation of bad money to an unprecedented level.

Throughout the Wu and Zhou Dynasties, evil money circulated in all aspects, making the prosperity of the market no longer related to the official state.

During the Kaiyuan period, Xuanzong spent a lot of energy on controlling bad money. Even Prime Minister Song Jing had to pay for it but with little effect. No matter how the blame for bad money was divided, Awu still had three-thirds of the credit. 】

I also understand. I don't know if the Tianshu Bronze Pillar has convinced all the nations. Killing yourself with a knife is a real thing.

Ma Chao muttered while eating the fruit.

As one of the former leaders of Yongliang, Ma Chao is no stranger to money.

When I was young, I went to Chang'an and saw the prosperous trade between the two cities. In my prime, I was a handsome man and I also saw the difficulties of bartering in Yongliang.

Even the evil money that the people in the Central Plains look down upon is somewhat handsome in Yongliang.

Therefore, it is very difficult to judge at this time. On the one hand, millions of pounds of copper are used to cast dead things, and on the other hand, bad money circulates in the world, leaving endless poison.

Zhang Fei paid attention to another aspect: This martial arts can be said to be the best, but what should martial arts be like...

Lu Su also frowned at the light screen's simple statement. He turned around and saw Kong Ming looking at him with a smile, and his heart skipped a beat as soon as he spoke:

The five baht coins in Jiangdong are gone, right?

Kong Ming said it simply, but Lu Su also understood instantly that this good money should be compared to the bad money, which refers to coins of regular size and sufficient copper content.

After pondering for a moment, Lu Su asked:

All merchants in the Jianghuai River obey Jiangling's orders?

In fact, what Kong Ming said is correct. It is difficult to find a single piece of real money in Jiangdong today.

But what Kong Ming probably didn't expect was that there wasn't much bad money left.

Nowadays, people in Jiangdong still use bad money to survive, and merchants mostly use Shu brocade and Shu sugar to pay for their purchases. These two items are sold north to Cao land without any hindrance.

In addition, there is a golden ticket that Lu Su has seen with his own eyes. It is said to be made by Liu Bei. It can be used to blend dozens of ship baggage in the official market of Jiangling, and is very popular among Jiangdong surnames.

At least as far as Lu Su knew, everyone in Jiangdong Haoyou was trying to imitate the golden tickets, including Sun Hou.

When Lu Su asked this question, Kong Ming laughed dumbly and said:

What Zijing said is quite unreasonable. It is difficult for Jiangling merchants to do business, let alone merchants in Jianghuai.

Lu Su did not care about the truth or falsehood of what Kong Ming said, but continued to ask:

In Kong Ming's opinion, how can we stop the proliferation of evil money?

For a man like him who is well-educated in the state affairs, the predicament in front of him is like the best test paper. Only by talking about strategy can one show his talents.

As for the temple issue, Lu Su didn't even bother to talk about it. It was just a matter of good deeds and deeds. Once Awu was gone, as long as the emperor did not worship the Buddha, the danger would be solved. The two problems were not of the same level of difficulty.

Kong Ming laughed when he heard this, and said as follows:

If you want to get rid of the evil money, you need to establish officials to govern, you need to control the copper industry, and you need to develop money minting. Only then can you get rid of the evil money.

If you want to control evil money, you must first control the border cities and then rectify the capital city. At the same time, you must also impose strict penalties. Private mining of copper mines and coinage are all punishable by laws and regulations.

Regulate by the government and the market, and regulate by the people and the market. If good money is sufficient, bad money will not flourish.

Pang Tong on the side looked at Lu Su's astonished face and smiled:

Kong Ming and Liu Zichu discussed money matters for a long time in Chengdu.

…

Sun Wuji, the eldest man in the Ganlu Palace, was also making a similar statement, and what he saw was similar to Kong Ming’s:

“...Therefore, we can learn from the money policy of Emperor Kaihuang of the Sui Dynasty in the past. If we need to severely punish the evil money, we must also exploit copper mines and cast money widely.”

I thought...

Speaking of this, Changsun Wuji carefully phrased his words and said carefully:

In the Tang Dynasty, there were warehouses set up to provide relief to the hungry. If there was a surplus of copper, one could be set up to regulate coins.

If money is cheap, money will be collected and put into the ministry; if money is rich, money will be put into the market...

It's just that the words became less audible the further they went. Li Shimin, who was listening carefully, understood that at first glance, this idea seemed good, but when you think about it more carefully, there are questions everywhere. In what name should you collect money? If you want to lend money, in what form?

And the biggest problem was if copper is abundant, he smiled bitterly when he thought of these four words, it was too difficult.

But when it came to money, Li Shimin couldn't help but turn his head and look at the big map. The Japanese country across the sea from the Tang Dynasty was a little more attractive at the moment.

But he still clearly remembers that the younger generation said that there is 30% of the silver mountain here that can be used by the world.

Since there are such rich silver mines, what about copper? What about... gold?

His breathing became heavier involuntarily, but he finally put his thoughts back for the time being, nodded towards Changsun Wuji and said:

What Shicai said is polished with pen and ink, and presented in tabulation form.

Changsun Wuji was overjoyed and quickly nodded in agreement.

[Another obvious problem during the Wu Zhou period was household escape.

There is no need to go into details about how the household escapes occurred. After all, Di Gong also said that the various lavish expenses during the Wu and Zhou Dynasties will not harm the people, what will they do?

At that time, the people in Guizhou not only had to face temples occupying their land, but also had to endure the exploitation of property by big families using bad money as weapons, so it was normal to run away.

However, household escape was a problem that persisted throughout the feudal era. The root of this problem was the land annexation problem brought about by the rentier class in the feudal era. There is no solution unless we transcend the times.

Therefore, there is no need to be harsh on Awu on this issue. It can only be said that she got a failing grade in the face of fleeing her household, but it is still much better than getting a blank test.

Regarding the seriousness of Wu Zhou's escape and the negative effects it brought, Wei Sili's first chapter made it very clear.

Today I have registered as a registered permanent resident, more than half of them have fled, the rent has been adjusted to reduce consumption, and the state has insufficient funds.

The annexation of land by wealthy landlords caused the main tax payers to flee, which directly led to a sharp reduction in rents and taxes. Above, Awu has been carrying out large-scale construction projects, and the money is enough to make a fool of himself.

Therefore, after Awu finished his addiction to becoming emperor, he also tried to solve this problem. Starting in 698, he spent five years doing a census, which is what history books call Kuohu.

There are two main problems with the failure of this census.

One is that it is very sloppy. Many people who have been dead for 20 or 30 years are still registered, causing the census population to be false.

One is that all those who have been traced as fugitives are repatriated to their place of origin regardless of their actual circumstances, causing even greater conflicts. 】