Wang Weijun: The ancients cheated by hook or by crook in the imperial examinations.

As the saying goes, where there are exams, there are cheating, even the college entrance examination, which is famous for its fairness and justice, is no exception. From the biggest group fraud case since the resumption of the college entrance examination in Jiahe, Hunan Province in 2000 to the industrial chain of high-tech cheating equipment in recent years, all kinds of college entrance examination fraud incidents have emerged one after another. In June last year, the reporter undercover investigated the college entrance examination substitute organization in a southern province and once again pushed the college entrance examination fraud to the public. In the same year 1 1 month, the new criminal law amendment added "cheating in prison", and cheating in the college entrance examination can be sentenced to a maximum of seven years in prison. Therefore, the college entrance examination today and tomorrow, as the first national examination since the implementation of the new law, is called "the strictest in history" by the media.

Not to mention the final result of the "strictest" college entrance examination in history, to say that this kind of cheating in the national examination has a long history in China. Since the birth of the imperial examination system in the Sui Dynasty, the common people finally had a bloodless road to the upper class, so there was a scene of rushing to Beijing to catch the exam. The group crossed a real wooden bridge. Take the Qing Dynasty as an example. After fifty-four years in Qianlong, only 96 people passed the exam every three years, and the population of China has reached 300 million. As the saying goes, there is no such thing as not cheating. If more people take part in the imperial examinations, there will be cheating. To sum up, there are four main cheating methods in the imperial examination: asking for help, replacing guns, entrainment and impersonation.

The so-called "asking for help" is to get through the relationship, get through the joints and seek admission. This is the most convenient and easy way to succeed. Generally speaking, it is a means adopted by the children of powerful people. As the saying goes, "money depends on the situation, money depends on money, and relatives depend on feelings."

The trend of "asking for help" prevailed in the Tang Dynasty. At that time, the imperial examination system was not perfect, and the examiners were forced to refuse because of their power and status. During Xuanzong's reign, the examiner Tahiti declared that he was afraid of the pressure of his uncle Yang and admitted his son as the first in the Ming Dynasty. During the reign of Emperor Gaozong, Dong Sigong, the invigilator, accepted bribes from candidates and leaked the examination questions of Jinshi.

"Please help me" is bound to be accompanied by the examiner's favoritism or fraud. After the incident is exposed, if there is no one on it, the examiner will often end up miserable. For example, Dong Sigong, mentioned earlier, was beheaded in court in the joint trial of the three divisions (Dali Temple, Ministry of Punishment and Yushitai) after the incident was exposed. Later, Dong Sigong participated in exposing others' sins and meritorious deeds and was sentenced to exile in Lingnan. In the Tang Dynasty, the examiners who cheated in the imperial examinations were punished severely, while the candidates who cheated were punished lightly, with a maximum of three years' imprisonment. A small sentence means that the cost of cheating is small. Therefore, in the late Tang Dynasty, in the face of the increasingly prosperous imperial examination room, the tried and tested poet Du Xunhe lamented: "There are chapters in the sea, but there are no relatives and friends in the DPRK."

As the name implies, "changing guns" is to find a master to impersonate the exam. The substitute is also called "gunner" or "knife catcher" This secret code originated from Wei Wu Cao Cao's visit to the Xiongnu Ambassador, pretending to be a bedside knife catcher, and was called a true hero by the Xiongnu Ambassador. Generally speaking, the candidates who choose to "change guns" are all people who have certain family wealth, but their family wealth and power are not enough to "ask for help". If their writing level is not good, they will find an expert in writing to take the test instead.

There are two kinds of "gun generation", one is "hospital prosthetic hand" and the other is "whole body generation". The so-called "hospital fake hand" means that candidates and gunmen are admitted at the same time and write down each other's names on the test paper; The "whole body name" was taken home to rest the candidates, and the gunman entered the stadium to kill people. If "Full Body body double" and all subsequent activities are for gunmen to participate, it will have to wait until the official release. In view of the importance of the imperial examination, excellent gunmen are bound to be sought after by the market. For example, Wen, a famous poet in the late Tang Dynasty, was a "sharpshooter", who often tested eight people at a time. Hu, one of the early leaders of the Kuomintang, earned 6,200 yuan as a gunman in the 28th year of Guangxu (1902).

"Entrainment" is to bring the examination materials into the examination room, also called carrying, which is the most common means of fraud in the imperial examination, and search is also the main task of the imperial examination. In imperial examinations in many dynasties, it was stipulated that scholars were not allowed to bring rhyming books such as "rhyme" into the examination room (that's because different dialects can be used to unify the rhythm when examining poetry and fu), and other books and words related to the examination were not allowed to be brought into the examination room, otherwise they would have to take them with them. Once they are searched, they will be taken out of the room and punished.

Perhaps it is because the information is opaque and open, and there is a lack of exchange forums for the failed experience of cheating in the imperial examination. Although the imperial examination system has strict prohibition on carrying, there are still desperate people who enjoy it. They usually take the following common means to carry them: hiding them in clothes, stuffing them in shoes and hats, and even hiding them on their bodies.

Feng Menglong wrote a story in "An Overview of Ancient and Modern Times": During the Wanli period, the examiner found a coin, wrapped the cheating materials with waterproof oil paper, tied it with thin thread and hid it in the anus. Seeker had a hard time pulling the thread out. The Guo-zi-jian diploma was pushed off by the previous candidate. The examinee in front argued, "if I throw it away, how can I throw it directly into your anus?" Even if I lost it, why did you just lift your ass so high? " It can be seen that candidates are really cheating at all costs.

Later, as the inspection became more and more strict, cheating candidates sewed interlayers on clothes, shoes and hats and sewed items in the interlayer. In order to prevent entrainment, the government issued relevant policies, stipulating that all candidates' clothes, shoes and socks must be single-layered, leather clothes must be stripped of cloth, and felt clothes must be stripped of lining. But there are policies on the top and countermeasures on the bottom, so bold candidates simply write a lot of words on their clothes. The Palace Museum still retains an underwear with four books and five classics, which is a must among cultural relics.

"Fake citizenship" is a fake place of origin, also called "fake citizenship questioning", similar to the current college entrance examination immigrants.

Since the Song Dynasty, the quota system, the system of taking scholars by districts and the system of taking scholars by provinces have been implemented, so that each region has a fixed number of places to choose from, which gives candidates from the well-educated Jiangnan region the motivation to flow to the remote areas in the north and southwest where education is backward. For example, Bai Juyi, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, once went to Xuancheng, Anhui Province to take a postgraduate exam.

During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the phenomenon of impersonation was particularly serious. In the twelfth year of Jiaqing, Taihe, deputy envoy of the General Political Department, said that in recent years, many southern students in Shanxi have taken exams and many have been admitted. Emperor Jiaqing pointed out that it is not only a province in Shanxi, but also in many parts of the country.

Liu Guangdi, a famous scholar in the late Qing Dynasty and one of the "Six Gentlemen of the Reform Movement of 1898", and Zhang Jian, a scholar in the late Qing Dynasty and a great industrialist in the Republic of China, all passed the questioning by deception. Because of the process of "examination", it is not only the candidates who know the inside story, so once they pass the examination, it often means giving people a handle. Zhang Jian, for example, is a rich peasant family. Because his father led a cross-examination exam and was blackmailed by his neighbors. In just five years, the Zhang family has fallen from a rich peasant family to a poor peasant with debts of more than 1,000 yuan.

In the face of endless cases of cheating in the imperial examination, governments of past dynasties have also made a lot of efforts, whether severely punishing or strengthening inspections, but from the results, it is still impossible to fundamentally solve the phenomenon of cheating by candidates.

For example, the paste name system that appeared in the Tang Dynasty is the embryonic form of modern examination papers. The names and native places of all candidates on the test paper are pasted, and can't be opened until the marking is over. This system is good, but it still can't stop the examiners who read papers and specialize in handwriting recognition.

For another example, the embryonic form of modern admission tickets appeared in the Song Dynasty-"floating tickets". However, because it is impossible to make portraits, the "floating ticket" only roughly describes the height and beard style of candidates in a few words, and it is still difficult to prevent candidates with similar bodies and beards from changing.

Of course, the government also has some clever tricks to crack down on cheating, such as taking a bath before the exam and then putting on the prepared clothes. This can prevent candidates from being entrained. However, it is still difficult for the government to fundamentally solve the forms of fraud in the imperial examination process, such as bribing examiners or staff, changing test papers and buying questions in advance ~