In Chinese history, what does "breaking into Guandong" really look like?

More than 300 years ago, a wave of "breaking into Guandong" swept through Shandong. The farmers in Qilu pushed carts, carried burdens, and used their two legs to open up a road full of blood and tears to "cross the Guandong". The word "Chuang" inflamed their lives and shaped their characters. When time gradually dilutes this period of history, a TV series "Crossing Guandong" reawakens people's dusty memories. The protagonist Zhu Kaishan seems to be a figure from their era.

Why is there such a craze in history for entering Guandong?

The Guandong in Breaking Through the Guandong specifically refers to the three provinces of Jilin, Liaoning, and Heilongjiang. The three eastern provinces are named because they are located east of Shanhaiguan.

Guan refers to Shanhaiguan. Shanhaiguan City Gate is separated by a pass, defining the outside of the pass and the Central Plains. However, in the hundreds of years from the Qing Dynasty to the Republic of China, Shandong people who had left their hometown began to travel to Guandong. The Guandong mentioned specifically refers to the three provinces of Jilin, Liaoning, and Heilongjiang. The three eastern provinces are named because they are located east of Shanhaiguan. The number and scale of the people who entered Guandong can be regarded as one of the largest population movements in human history.

The Qing Dynasty implemented a system of ethnic hierarchy and segregation when entering the customs, and strictly prohibited Han people from entering the "Longxing Land" in the Northeast for cultivation - a customs ban order was issued. Shunzhi once warned the Manchu nobles to retreat to Guandong. The Manchus invaded Guanzhong, and the population of Guandong dropped sharply. On the pretext of "the place where the ancestors made their mark and prospered the king" to protect the "benefits of visiting the mountains and Pearl River", they implemented a long-term ban on Guandong. Beginning with Shunzhi, more than a thousand kilometers of "wicker edge" fences—the Northeast Great Wall (wicker edge wall, willow wall, willow city, and tiao edge)—were built in sections all over the country. It was completed in the middle of Kangxi. The Liutiao border from Shanhaiguan to the south of Fengcheng via Kaiyuan and Xinbin is called "Laobian"; from the northeast of Kaiyuan to the north of Jilin City is called "Xinbian". Therefore, among the people, there are terms such as "Bianliren" and "Bianwairen".

Although the ban is becoming increasingly severe, it cannot completely prevent people from entering the Northeast. Due to the increasingly heavy life pressure and successive natural disasters, more and more farmers from Shandong and Hebei provinces are either smuggling across the sea to Liaodong, or privately crossing the Great Wall to western Liaoning, flocking to the fertile wilderness of the Northeast, which is still sleeping. These immigrants were all carried out under the conditions of the Qing government's ban policy, so they were called "crossing the Guandong". The word "Chuang" is enough to highlight the hardships of this road.

The Shandong people's invasion of Guandong was essentially a spontaneous, unstoppable and tragic movement of survival by poor farmers on the verge of death. From the perspective of the removed land, on the one hand, there are natural disasters, including drought, floods, hail, insects, and epidemics. On the one hand, there are man-made disasters. The Second Opium War, the Eight-Power Allied Forces' invasion of China, the Taiping Rebellion, the Nian Army, the Black Flag Army, and the Boxer Rebellion all swept through the provinces of North China. The Zhi-Wan War, the two Zhi-Feng wars, and the melee between old and new warlords continued every year, and the war spread to all provinces in North China. Military disasters and banditry were frequent, which increasingly increased land rent, tax burdens, corvee work, and additional apportionments. More and more bankrupt farmers, disaster victims, and refugees have to go to the Northeast to escape famine and seek refuge.