The Great Wall of China▼
From the Qin and Han dynasties to the Ming and Qing dynasties, many of China's rulers built or repaired the Great Wall, and you might think that the Qing Dynasty did not repair the Great Wall. In fact, although the Kangxi Emperor of the Qing Dynasty issued a well-known "no border wall" order, but the scale of the Qing Dynasty's construction of the Great Wall is quite grand, and the geographical span is unprecedented, not only in the traditional farming, nomadic demarcation line near the construction of the Great Wall, and even due to war, people's livelihood and other reasons, the Qing court had to build a number of Great Wall in the interior, such as the late Qing Dynasty heavy ministers Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang in Shandong and Jiangsu built similar great Wall fortifications in many places, some even up to seven hundred miles. Like the long wall of the canal built in the fifth year of the reign (1867 AD).
During the Qin and Han dynasties, it was the first period of large-scale construction of the Great Wall in China, and although many Great Walls were built before (there are divided into the North Great Wall and the South Great Wall), the scale of the Pre-Qin Great Wall cannot be compared with the Great Wall built in the Qin and Han Dynasties.
In fact, the construction of the Great Wall does not mean passive defense, throughout the annals of history, whether it is the Qin Emperor Han Wu or the early Ming Dynasty, it was built after taking the initiative to defeat the enemy, or after gaining an overwhelming military advantage over the northern nomads.
In addition to military use, the construction of the Great Wall can also enhance and promote the development and construction of border areas, such as the immigration policy of the Han WuDi Emperor, the immigrants and the soldiers guarding the Great Wall, while sticking to the frontier, they also actively reclaimed wasteland for farming, which not only made the economic development of the border area faster, but also saved a large amount of military expenditure for the empire, greatly reduced the pain of long-distance transportation, and at the same time spread Chinese culture far and wide.
Jiayuguan▼
Its practical walls dividing empires and barbarians were not exclusive to Chinese, and there were defensive structures built for the same needs in other parts of the world. For example, the Goryeo Dynasty in the East of China built a high wall to resist the Khitans (the Great Wall), the Roman Empire also built the Great Wall on the island of Great Britain to distinguish foreign peoples (Hadrian's Wall), and the walls around the famous religious city of Jerusalem have witnessed the competition for interests between different nationalities and different faiths throughout the ages.
These are all familiar great walls of the world, but few people know that there is a great wall in Iran today that is the second largest in the world in length - the Gorgan Great Wall. In fact, there are many lesser-known Great Walls, such as the Roman Empire built the Antony Wall in the British Scotland region and the Germanic Great Wall (also known as the German Great Wall) built in hesse, Bavaria and other four states.
Until the 1990s, Iranians living near the ruins of Gorgan's Wall had no idea that their ancestors, the Sassanid Persians, had left such a legacy.
The Great Wall of Gorgan was built around 600 AD, and like the Purpose of the Great Wall in China, it was to resist the invasion of nomadic peoples in the north, except that Chinese resisted the Huns, while the Sassanid Persians resisted the White Huns. After all, the tribes of the Arabian Peninsula at that time were not yet religiously integrated as they were more than a hundred years later, and the focus of the Sassanid Persian defense at this time was still the north (white Huns) and the west (eastern Rome).
Although there are two main enemies of Sassanid Persia, its main enemy is still Eastern Rome, not to mention that the strength of Eastern Rome is above the White Huns, and the Persian land on the border between the two countries is richer and flatter, and the dangerous place of Sassanid Persia in the west - the Anatolian Plateau is shared by both countries, which leads to Sassanid Persia having to deploy a large number of troops in this area, which naturally leads to the lack of troops in the northern border area of Sassanid Persia, fortunately there is the existence of the Elbor Mountains and the Caspian Sea. Only then did the Sassanid Persians have a unique natural danger, and on this basis, the Great Wall of Gorgan was established.
Gorgon's Wall▼
However, the Great Wall of Gorgan was not built on the dangerous terrain of the Erbürs Mountains, but was built in a flatter area to the north. The main reason for this is that the land in this area is too fertile, similar to the Hetao Plain in northern China.
The Gorgan region, where the Gorgan Great Wall is located, is extremely important, not only as close to the frontier region of the White Huns, but also to the west is the world's largest saltwater lake, the Caspian Sea (about 14% of the total area of the world's lakes).
The Gorgan region, which is adjacent to the Caspian Sea, has a milder climate throughout the year than much of Sassanid Persia, and its soil is more fertile, which is not only suitable for agricultural development, but also a fertile grassland valued by nomadic peoples. In addition, there was a large number of people living here, for Sassanid Persia it could collect large taxes, and for the White Huns, in addition to plundering riches, it could also capture a large number of Persians to carry out the slave trade.
Officially, the Gorgan region has long been the focus of contention between Sassanid Persia and the White Huns. Before the construction of the Golgan Wall, the White Huns often crossed the Erbulz Mountains and plundered the heartland of the Sassanid Persian Empire.
Sassanid Persia, which was attacked on both sides, deployed its army as far west as possible while successfully resisting the White Huns' invasion of the South, the Sassanid Persian ruling class ordered the construction of large-scale fortifications in the Gorgan region and stationed about 30,000 soldiers to defend it.
Gorgan region▼
After all, the Gorgan region between the Caspian Sea and the Elborz Mountains was a rare area in the eastern part of the Caspian Sea where the climate was both humid and watery, and it would pose a more serious threat to Sassanid Persia if it was occupied by the White Huns.
In order to make the Gorgan Great Wall play its due value as soon as possible, the imperial craftsmen of Sassanid Persia adopted a standard assembly line production method, which can also be seen from the fact that there is almost no deviation in the size and shape of each brick of the Gorgan Wall, in fact, there is another advantage of this, that is, when the Great Wall is completed, it can continue to produce spare parts for repair in time when the Great Wall is damaged.
And according to the archaeological excavations in the Gorgan area, even near the Gorgan Great Wall, the site of the brick kiln specializing in the production of the Great Wall has been found. In fact, this is very normal, after all, local production can save a lot of time and reduce transportation losses, and can also meet the needs of local economic development with bricks.
While the Caspian Sea has brought a large amount of water resources to the Gorgan region, it has also brought convenience to the construction of the Gorgan Great Wall.
In order to build fortifications as soon as possible and facilitate the subsequent transportation of soldiers and grain and grass supplies, Sassanid Persia was full of infrastructure skills, and a large number of canals were dug south of the Gorgan Great Wall, and even a canal was built directly into the interior of the Great Wall, as part of the Gorgan defense system (somewhat similar to the Song Dynasty Water Wall), after all, the ditch could also stop the speed of the nomadic cavalry march. In addition, it can also ensure the water problem of the military and civilians in the border plug, and even use water to speed up the production speed of brick kilns.
However, the inability of the soldiers of Sassanid Persia to adapt to the climate of the area, as well as the backward medical conditions and institutions at that time, led to a large-scale typhoid outbreak among the soldiers guarding the Great Wall of Gorgan. Not to mention that the method of warfare usually used by the White Huns is to attack in a broken section, gathering a large number of soldiers to carry out simultaneous attacks in multiple locations, and will also attack in batches in multiple time periods, this method of warfare also allows enough soldiers to maintain physical strength, and the combination makes the already overstretched Gorgan defenders more miserable, and even when the White Huns come to attack, the soldiers suffering from diseases still have to go into battle to kill the enemy, and it is inevitable that there will be no problems in the long run, and this is what the White Huns are happy to see. When the white Huns waited for the soldiers to be slack and sleepy, they immediately poured out of their nests, and even if these soldiers survived, they could not escape the reprimands and whippings of the officers.
Sassanid Persia.▼
In particular, in 644 AD, there were 23,000 soldiers guarding the Great Wall of Gorgan, and in the winter of that year, when resisting the attack of the northern nomads, medicine and food could not be delivered in time, so that 6,000 soldiers could only fight the enemy in the dilemma of hunger and disease, and most of them eventually died at the hands of the White Huns.
And this is not the most tragic, these Great Wall guards due to the White Huns invasion too frequently, coupled with insufficient manpower, so that they can not see their families except when the arrival of major national holidays (if they encounter an invasion, they can not even go home to see), they can no longer see their families. This was undoubtedly a pain and a torment for the Sassanid Persians, who believed in Zoroastrianism (Zoroastrians, who attached particular importance to the family).
In addition, their treatment was also the lowest, after all, they could only passively defend, which led to their inability to obtain military merit, not to mention that the resources of the entire Sassanid Persia at that time were tilted to the west of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine direction). It is worth mentioning that the soldiers of the Six Towns of the Northern Wei Dynasty at the same time and at the same latitude faced the same dilemma as the soldiers of the Great Wall of Golgan (the soldiers of the Six Towns were better in the early stages, quite similar to the Night's Watch Legion in the Song of Ice and Fire), but the direction and result of the two were completely different.
In 558 AD, with the white Huns defeated by the combined Sassanid Persians and Turks at the Battle of Bukhara, the invasion of the Gorgan Wall by the northern nomads, which had long caused headaches for Sassanid Persia, gradually reduced (heading west), and when there was no great threat to the northern steppes, the Great Wall was eventually abandoned and never built again.
After that, although Sassanid Persia no longer had to worry about the threat of the White Huns, Sassanid Persia eventually perished, and it was the Arabs they had long despised who destroyed them. However, it is interesting to note that it was the Persians who ultimately avenged the Sassanid Persians, their allies against the White Huns. In 1250 AD, the Beheli Mamluk legion, composed of Chincha people (descendants of turks), officially seized power from the Ayyyubid dynasty, the Arab kingdom, and Egypt began the Mamluk era, but this is another story (previously described in articles).
The Range of The White Huns was squeezed
For the construction of the Great Wall, there is a new (Kai) Ying (play) (laughs) theory is that the Xiongnu are the biggest promoters of the construction of the Great Wall between China and Sassanid Persia, and some people have commented that the Xiongnu are really the promoters of the Great Wall.