Historical problems in Han dynasty

It is an intriguing question whether the Western Han Dynasty and the Eastern Han Dynasty should be regarded as two different empires or a complete dynasty in history. The Han Dynasty lasted about 200 years in BC and AD respectively, and was interrupted by Xin Mang 15 years. If it is counted as a dynasty, it lasts for more than four centuries, which is the longest dynasty since Qin Shihuang went down to the Qing Dynasty for two thousand years. It is said that the population of China suffered great losses after Wang Mang, but gradually recovered after the rest of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Official statistics are often inaccurate. By the end of the Han Dynasty, it was estimated that there should be10 million families in Zhong Changtong. Under normal circumstances, the total population of the Han Dynasty should be between 50 million and 60 million, and there is no significant difference between BC and AD. As far as territory and military power are concerned, there are few changes between the Han Dynasty. The foothold of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty on the Korean Peninsula can also be maintained in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Cross-toe rebellion, Ma Yuan pacified. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty also tried his best to attack the Huns. After Wang Mang, nomadic people were divided into north and south forever, which gave Dou Xian an excellent opportunity in the Eastern Han Dynasty. In 89 AD, the Northern Expedition went to three thousand Li, and the ministries surrendered 200,000 people. His men even pursued five thousand miles, so that North Khan "didn't know where to go". Zhang Qian in the Western Han Dynasty communicated with the Western Regions, and Ban Chao in the Eastern Han Dynasty broke the record. Ban Chao planned that "soldiers can be self-sufficient in food without China". He was led by China, but there were more than 1,000 volunteers, and only 800 soldiers helped him later. He can "control foreign countries with foreign countries." When he attacked shache, he sent twenty-five thousand troops. In 94 AD, 70,000 soldiers from eight countries in the Western Regions were recruited to crusade against Yan Qi. It's just that there was a frontier problem in the Eastern Han Dynasty, and its thorny degree in the Western Han Dynasty is unknown. This is the Qiang people in Qinghai grassland area. These Tibetan nomads have no unified organization, and the tribes live in harmony. Sometimes Han Chinese bully them, causing vendettas between the two sides. Wars often happen, with thousands of casualties on both sides every time. Grassland can't be occupied, and immigrants in the Eastern Han Dynasty are also very expensive. In other words, recruiting Qiang people's subordinates is not only ineffective, but also has future troubles. Before the Han dynasty, Dong Zhuo's support was self-respecting, that is, relying on the army compiled by the Qiang people. This kind of troops, only he can command, others can't control. But even so, in the eyes of people at that time, Chang 'an, the capital of the Western Han Dynasty, was considered as a land transport ship, so yellow was the most important, and Luoyang, the capital of the Eastern Han Dynasty, was a fire transport ship, so the clothes of the towel flag were mainly red. In fact, there is only one dynasty. Liu Xiu, Emperor Guangwu, is a Miao descendant of Han Jingdi, the ninth grandson of Liu Bang, the ancestor of Emperor Gaozu. After rebuilding his ancestral temple in Luoyang, he only worshipped the monarch of the Western Han Dynasty until Yuan Di. Because for Guangwu, it still belongs to his father, while Emperor Cheng is his brother, Emperor Ai is his nephew, and Emperor Ping is his nephew, and they are not in the ancestral hall. Guangwu even suffered from Lv Hou's defiance of the high-impedance will. Although it was 200 years later, she was taken out of the coffin and replaced by the spiritual teacher of Emperor Wen's biological mother, Empress Bo. Therefore, since the founding of the People's Republic of China in BC, he himself has been the heir from the paternal line to the maternal line. Therefore, Liu Xiu is called "the Lord of ZTE" in history. Archaeological discoveries in recent decades have given us the opportunity to experience the daily life of the Han Dynasty. These materials also give some answers to the above questions. Unearthed cultural relics, including all kinds of materials of food, clothing, housing and transportation, have model drawings without physical objects. So as small as stationery seals, as big as toilet stoves, as big as pavilions, you can see it at a glance. In the Han dynasty, people thought there was not much difference between life and death. Although there are snakes and ghosts in the underworld and strangers want to sacrifice to the dead, there is no need to repent, be grateful and turn over. Because of this, the tombs of the Han Dynasty lack the symbols and decorations that we think are religions today, but are engraved with the themes of daily life. These tablets look inward at the coffin, as if they were appreciated by the dead. Some of them quoted historical stories, such as Jing Ke stabbing Qin Wang and getting a tripod in Hanwufen, while others carved chariots and horses palaces, courtyard kitchens and stables, farm work, market transactions and even acrobatics in Ji Fang. Its breadth and real performance have opened the eyes of people who study history. From these materials and historical proof, we can say that cultural life has made great progress in the Han Dynasty for more than 400 years. In many ways, there is no significant difference in the life of families above the average level compared with the last century. Chinese and foreign scholars unanimously attributed this achievement to the agricultural policy of Han Dynasty. The government not only tried its best to cultivate small farmers, but also sold iron smelting, making the Western Han Dynasty as a whole and the Eastern Han Dynasty the master, and the standard farm tools were widely used by ordinary farmers. Moreover, local officials often build water conservancy projects and discuss crops, as described in "Han Shu Hou Han Shu Official Biography". From these aspects, it is not entirely without benefits that China's initial reunification was imposed on vast areas with simple and similar legal systems. At the same time, under this primitive policy of attaching importance to agriculture, there is indeed a connection between the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Western Han Dynasty. If not, its population and territory will hardly make up for each other. However, this question can still be asked in reverse: If the Han Dynasty really comes down in one continuous line, why are there such great differences between the two historical societies? Today, when we read the history of the Western Han Dynasty, we will find that there are many exciting, frightening, lamentable and surprising places in it. This feature is hard to see in the history of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Even Denis Twitchett, editor-in-chief of The History of China in Cambridge, once told me that no book of the Later Han Dynasty was satisfactory to read. Where is this truth? From a modern point of view, the Western Han Empire is still in its infancy, that is, the rule of the literary world, the utilization of Emperor Wu by Dong Zhongshu's thought, Huo Guang's authoritarianism and Xuan Di's "Zaba" are all inseparable from an experimental nature, which can arouse readers' curiosity. The monarch of the Eastern Han Dynasty did not have this kind of creative opportunity. The main reason is that it is impossible to legislate after the rough embryo of the empire is stabilized. Monarchical power cannot be divided, nor can it be rationalized according to the actual situation, as long as the symmetry and balance of each place can be maintained. This situation once led Zhong Changtong to say that the three fairs are nominal, and in the end they are still oligarchs. At the same time, the organization of bureaucracy, from top to bottom, is only dominated by criminal law, without the support of civil law. The law cannot develop at the same time, the private economy has developed to a certain extent, and the government is technically unable to deal with all kinds of complex problems in society. The power struggle between the DPRK and China is still carried out in the name of morality. The empress dowager, consorts, eunuchs and cronies are mixed among them, and public and private affairs are confused. It is difficult for today's history readers to analyze the true face of the problems behind them, and it is even more difficult to judge who is right and who is wrong. Strictly speaking, only the first three monarchs in the Eastern Han Dynasty or the Later Han Dynasty can make a difference. This is the "resurrection" of Guangwu Emperor Liu Xiuzhi and Liu Zhuang. They consolidated their empire with harsh laws, mystified and refined the monarchy with various buildings and ceremonies, and reiterated the Confucian purpose with Zhang Tan to strengthen the administrative support of moral power. In fact, only ZTE is a pioneering work. Recognizing "Zhongxing" means the unification of the Western Han Dynasty and the Eastern Han Dynasty. In this way, it is not surprising that the history of the Eastern Han Dynasty was poorly written. A country's legal system has not been substantially improved for more than 400 years, and its administration cannot show activity and vitality, which can only be said to be inevitable. The Book of Hanshu in the Western Han Dynasty provided information on criminal law records, food records, and gully records, while the Book of the Later Han Dynasty in the Eastern Han Dynasty did not have any information at all. Instead, there were many narratives about women, snakes, crowns and safflower. This is related to the historian's vision (the later Han Dynasty, like the Han Dynasty, was not written by one person), but there is another key point. From a long-term historical point of view, the later Han Dynasty has gone too far from the previous generation, and can only continue to enrich a primitive empire with small yeomen as the backbone, without finding a new situation in China. In fact, the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Western Han Dynasty are the historical names of later generations. During the Western Han Dynasty, Emperor Gaozu Liu Bang founded the country, which led to the establishment of the Western Han Dynasty, but was destroyed by the minority dog Rong. Later, Emperor Guangwu and his descendants established the Han Dynasty in the south of China, known as the Eastern Han Dynasty in history. The strength of the Eastern Han Dynasty is not as good as that of the Western Han Dynasty, so it is impossible to achieve reunification. Then there are many military separatist forces. These military separatist forces continued to fight and local unity emerged. The Eastern Han Dynasty also slowly rolled out the historical stage, and finally only three military regimes were left. I think everyone who has seen the Three Kingdoms knows it! The Han Dynasty (202-220 BC) was a dynasty that appeared after the Qin Dynasty in the history of China. It is divided into two historical periods: the Western Han Dynasty (202-8 BC) and the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220 AD), which are collectively called the Han Dynasty. The Western Han Dynasty was founded by Emperor Gaozu Liu Bang, with Chang 'an as its capital. The Eastern Han Dynasty was founded by Liu Xiu, Emperor Guangwu of Han Dynasty, with Luoyang as its capital. In the meantime, there was a new dynasty of Wang Mang (8-23 AD) which was briefly independent. In addition, some parts regarded Shu Han as a continuation of the Han Dynasty and classified it as a part of the Han Dynasty, so that the Han Dynasty died in 263, but most of them classified the Shu Han regime established by Liu Bei as the history of the Three Kingdoms. The Han Dynasty was a powerful empire and created a splendid civilization. Together with the later Tang Dynasty, it was called "Strengthening the Han Dynasty and Prospering the Tang Dynasty". Han Empire, Roman Empire and Indian Peacock Dynasty were the most advanced civilizations in the world at that time. The social and political system established in the Han Dynasty continued into the 20th century. China people still call themselves "Han people", and the tribes in the Central Plains, which are dominated by Chinese people, are gradually called "Han people", and their writing system is also called "Chinese characters". At first, in the Han Dynasty, Emperor Gaozu Liu Bangshi judged Zhengshuo as Shuide according to the five virtues, and it was revised as Tude when Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. It was not until Wang Mang established a new dynasty and adopted Liu Xiang and Liu Xin's father and son that he thought that the Han Dynasty belonged to Huode. After the restoration of the Han Dynasty, Emperor Guangwu officially acknowledged this statement, and from then on, it was established that the orthodox moon of the Han Dynasty was a fire virtue, which was adopted in the historical books of the Eastern Han Dynasty and later, such as Hanshu and the History of the Three Kingdoms. Therefore, the Han Dynasty was sometimes called "Han Yan", and it was also called "Yan Liu" because the emperor of the Han Dynasty was surnamed Liu. After the demise of the Western Han Dynasty and the Qin Dynasty, Xiang Yu and Liu Bang launched a four-year battle between Chu and Han. With the help of Xiao He, Han Xin, Sean and others, Liu Bang defeated Xiang Yu, the overlord of the western Chu Dynasty, and formally proclaimed himself emperor in 202 BC, establishing the Han Dynasty. Although Liu Bang proclaimed himself emperor in 202 BC, in order to link up with the demise of the Qin Dynasty, historians called himself "Hanwang" in 206 BC when calculating the years of the Western Han Dynasty, and took October as the first month of the first year of Emperor Gaozu. After Emperor Gaozu Liu Bang ascended the throne, he adopted the advice of his uncle Sun Tong, restored the etiquette, set up three ladies, appointed Xiao He as the prime minister, and implemented the policy of "sharing interest with the people and governing by doing nothing". Encourage production and ignore taxes. Politically, Han Xin, Chen Yi, Peng Yue, Ying Bu, etc. He was first enfeoffed as king, and after the regime was stable, his title was cancelled on various charges, and he was executed one by one, and Liu's clan was renamed king, and he swore that "unless Liu is king, the world will be * * *". At this time, due to years of turmoil and weak national strength, when Liu Bang attacked Xiongnu, he was besieged by Xiongnu in Deng Bai, that is, the siege of Deng Bai. Since then, the Han Dynasty has implemented a pro-marriage policy, exchanging marriage and treasure for peace. After Liu Bang's death, Emperor Liu Ying succeeded to the throne, but during this period, it was actually Lv Hou who was in power. Lv Hou took Cao Can as the prime minister, followed Liu Bang's political policy of Huang Lao, and achieved the effect of "the government can't leave the government, and the world is natural", which was praised by historians. However, Lv Hou also appointed consorts to suppress heroes, resulting in "the chaos of all roads". After Lv Hou's death, the chaos of various roads was eradicated, and ministers welcomed Emperor Liu Qi of China. During the reign of Emperor Jing of Han Dynasty, he and his son Huang Lao continued to take measures to govern by doing nothing, implemented a frivolous and generous policy, and shared interests with the people. Kindness and kindness have restored the great damage caused by years of war and reduced the burden on the people. Although the only turmoil in this period, the "Seven Kingdoms Rebellion", occurred during the reign of Emperor Jingdi (BC 154), it was put down by Zhou Yafu in just a few months and did not affect the Han Dynasty. While maintaining peace with Xiongnu and South Vietnam, we are also accumulating national strength and actively preparing for war through Ma Fuli and other measures. This period, known as the rule of cultural scenes, is the first time that China has been respected by traditional historians since it became a unified era. After Jingdi's death, his son Liu Che ascended the throne as Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. During the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty (14 1-87), he adopted a series of reform measures and made great progress, which made the politics, economy and military of the Han Dynasty stronger. Politically, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty strengthened the imperial power, adopted Zhu's suggestion, and carried out favor orders, which weakened the power of the princes. Since then, the power of the vassal king can no longer pose a threat to the central government. Later, more than 100 titles were cancelled on the grounds that the contributions made by the governors were impure, which was called "the loss of Hou" in the history books. After the second incident, centralization was greatly strengthened. Culturally, the idea of "Huang Lao talks about doing nothing" in the Han Dynasty was abolished and the country was actively governed; And adopted Dong Zhongshu's suggestion of "ousting a hundred schools of thought and respecting Confucianism alone", making Confucianism the mainstream thought in China after two thousand years. Militarily, actively respond to the biggest foreign enemy invasion in the Han Dynasty-Xiongnu. During this period, talented generals such as Wei Qing and Huo Qubing appeared in the Han Dynasty, and finally defeated Hun Khan, making "there is no Wang Ting in the desert south". It also annexed South Vietnam and conquered North Korea, making China the hegemon in East Asia. Diplomatically, Zhang Qian made two missions to the Western Regions, opening up the Silk Road. Liu Xijun, Liu and the great powers in the western regions were ruled by Er Weng's family, in order to alienate the western regions and Xiongnu, and then control the western regions. However, the Han Dynasty experienced many years of war, and the exultation of Emperor Wudi had a great impact on the economy, which led to the weakness of the national strength of the Han Dynasty and the squandering of the savings of the previous dynasty. Therefore, in his later years, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty published the famous "Imperial Decree of Luntai", hoping that he would no longer be militaristic and that the Han Dynasty would not be defeated. In order to save the economy, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty put coins and salt and iron under the central management, strengthened agricultural production, implemented harmony and legality, dug white canals, established equal loss leveling policies, stabilized prices, competed with the people for profits, and strengthened the role of the state in the economy.