"Under the nest, there are eggs?"
From ancient times to the present, people's pursuit of power is endless. In ancient mainland china, the position of the emperor made countless people crazy, in order to compete for the throne, many dynasties have had the tragedy of father and son killing each other, brothers fighting each other, and in the same room.
In order to compete for the throne, it is common for the king of the clan to raise troops, but from ancient times to the present, only one king of the clan has successfully raised an army, and he is Ming Chengzu - Zhu Di.
As we all know, before the Battle of Jingnan, the reigning emperor was Emperor Jianwen, the son of Zhu Di's eldest brother Zhu Biao, and Zhu Di ended Zhu Yunxiu's life because of a fire in the struggle for the throne. So after Zhu Di ascended the throne, how would he treat the wives and children of the eldest brother Zhu Biao?
The chaotic deep palace is out of Haojie
Zhu Yuanzhang had a total of 26 sons, and Zhu Di was Zhu Yuanzhang's fourth son. At the time of his birth, Zhu Yuanzhang had not yet established the Ming Dynasty, and at that time he was just a warlord who divided one side.
In order to broaden and consolidate his territory and power, Zhu Yuanzhang had been busy with war, so when Zhu Di was born, Zhu Yuanzhang did not give him a name, and did not even have time to look at him more, so he hurried to the front.
It was not until he became famous and established the Ming Dynasty that he officially named the seven-year-old Zhu Di and six other sons at the ancestor worship ceremony.
Zhu Yuanzhang
Zhu Yuanzhang started from a peasant, step by step, and went through countless hardships to establish the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, after he ascended the throne, he was very strict with his sons.
He sent his sons to the barracks to train with the soldiers, and instead of giving them any special treatment because they were princes, he let them start with the most basic and harsh military training. He also often came to the barracks himself to check on his sons' martial arts.
In addition to paying attention to the physique of his sons, Zhu Yuanzhang also attached great importance to their cultural education, and he spent a lot of money to hire many Confucians and well-educated people to give lectures to the children.
From an early age, Zhu Di had heard about the heroic deeds of his father Zhu Yuanzhang in fighting the world, and he also knew that his father was a monarch who aspired to the world, so he followed his father Zhu Yuanzhang's example from an early age.
But Zhu Yuanzhang, as the king of a country, has every opportunity, although he cares deeply for his sons, but there are too many children to take into account everyone.
And Zhu Di himself also understood that he was a well-known prince, and if he was not outstanding, it would be difficult for him to be noticed by his father.
Zhu Di
Therefore, he was extremely hard in military and cultural studies, the emperor did not pay off, and he soon stood out among many princes, and at a young age, he was named the King of Yan by Zhu Yuanzhang, and the fief of Beiping was.
Therefore, at the age of sixteen, Zhu Di left Nanjing, the capital of the Ming Dynasty, for Beiping. Zhu Di knew in his heart that his father's move had the purpose of consolidating his rule on the one hand; on the other hand, it was also an expectation for himself.
And Zhu Di also lived up to the expectations of the public, and at a young age, he shouldered the heavy responsibility of eliminating the desert. At that time, there were still some old Yuan Dynasty troops in the north, but during the period when he was guarding Beiping, there was no large-scale disturbance on the border.
When he was thirty years old, the Yuan army had been coming to harass him. In order to maintain the stability of the Ming Dynasty's border, Zhu Di led his troops to march to the desert, attacked the enemy army in the snow, and relied on his powerful military and political means to make the enemy surrender, eliminating the northern desert in one fell swoop.
After hearing Zhu Di's triumphant report, Zhu Yuanzhang couldn't help but exclaim: "Purge the desert, the King of Yan!" ”。 It is precisely because of this battle that Zhu Di is more dependent on Zhu Yuanzhang.
But with the passage of time, Zhu Yuanzhang has already entered old age, and the glory he once had is no longer there. Although Zhu Yuanzhang began to grow old, there was already a good candidate for the heir to the throne, that is, Zhu Biao, the eldest son of Zhu Yuanzhang.
After Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty, he made Zhu Biao the crown prince and placed high hopes on him from an early age. And Zhu Biao did not live up to Zhu Yuanzhang's high hopes, and he had both civil and martial arts skills, and has always been diligent and diligent to assist Zhu Yuanzhang in supervising the country and administering the government, which is deeply loved by the courtiers and kings.
Unfortunately, in 1392, Prince Zhu Biao was ordered to go to Shaanxi, and when he returned, he contracted wind and cold, and finally died. A small wind chill actually took away his most beloved son, and Zhu Yuanzhang was heartbroken.
In the Battle of Jingnan, he held the power of life and death
After Zhu Biao's death, the position of crown prince was vacant. For a time, the kings began to calculate the position of prince. Zhu Di was second only to Zhu Biao among the kings, and he naturally did not have such thoughts when Zhu Biao was there, but now that Zhu Biao was dead, he also wanted to fight for his future after thinking about it.
But at this time, Zhu Yuanzhang's heart did not have a suitable candidate, and with the aging of his body and mind, his suspicion became more and more intense. He knew that all the kings coveted the position of prince, so his heart was very uneasy.
He was afraid that a history similar to the Xuanwumen Revolution would happen again, and he did not want to become a Taishang Emperor like Li Yuan. At the same time, he was very fond of his eldest son, Zhu Biao, so he could not choose a suitable candidate for the next monarch for a while.
Zhu Yuanzhang film and television image
In the end, Zhu Yuanzhang made a decision that shocked all the kings, and he made Zhu Biao's second son Zhu Yunjiao the emperor's grandson as his successor. This decision was made on the one hand to cut off the kings' coveting of the throne, and on the other hand, because Zhu Yunjiao was young and weak at that time, and could not pose much of a threat to himself.
So why did you choose Zhu Biao's second son? The reason is very simple, the royal family at that time attached great importance to the inheritance system of the eldest son, and Zhu Biao's eldest son unfortunately died at the age of eight, so in order, the succession to the throne was handed over to the shoulders of the second son, Zhu Yunjiao.
Zhu Yuanzhang's selection of a young imperial grandson as his successor was not without guarantees, he left a group of powerful assistants for Zhu Yunjiao before his death, and severely restrained the kings in the last period of his life, not only reducing their strength, but also leaving a will when he died: "Without the emperor's summons, the kings are not allowed to enter the capital at will!" ”
Zhu Yunjiao
Even though Zhu Yuanzhang made a lot of preparations for Zhu Yunjiao, the young Zhu Yunjiao was still unable to convince the public after he ascended the throne. Compared with his father, Zhu Biao, he lacked political wisdom and political experience. In order to consolidate his rule, he hastily accepted the advice of his courtiers and began to cut down the domain.
In just one year, a number of clan kings were abolished, and at this time, Zhu Di had heavy troops, and seeing that the other princes had ended up like this, he knew in his heart that if he did not act, it would soon be his turn.
Therefore, Zhu Di raised an army in the name of "Jingguo difficulty, Qing Jun's side". Zhu Yunjiao, the emperor who had lived in the deep palace for a long time, was a rival to Zhu Di who had been fighting in the north for many years. Zhu Di led the warriors all the way south, like a bamboo, and after three years of fighting, finally the soldiers came to the city of Nanjing.
The Battle of Jing
When he entered the city, he sent someone into the city to invite the empress dowager, Lü Shi, to the military camp, told her that he also had to suffer from the army, and also let him go into the city to persuade Zhu Yunjiao to reconcile.
However, before Lü Shi returned to the city and went to the palace, he learned that there was a fire in the palace, and the emperor Zhu Yunjiao and the empress both disappeared with the raging fire.
Soon, Zhu Di entered the city of Nanjing with his army and announced his ascension to the throne shortly after.
There are no eggs under the nest
After Zhu Di ascended the throne, the people began to have many gossip about him, and in the face of these gossip, Zhu Di also took many measures to suppress them, including many measures against Zhu Biao's wives and children.
Zhu Di invaded Nanjing in 1402, and the first thing he did when he ascended the throne as emperor was to change Zhu Biao's nickname. After Zhu Biao's death due to illness, Zhu Yuanzhang gave him the nickname "Prince Yiwen". After Zhu Yuanzhang's death and Zhu Yunjiao's succession, Zhu Yunjiao ordered Zhu Biao to be posthumously honored as "Emperor Xiaokang". However, Zhu Di did not agree with everything Zhu Yunjiao had done, so after he ascended the throne, he changed Zhu Biao's nickname to "Prince Yiwen"
So why did Zhu Biao do this? On the one hand, it was to show that he did not recognize Zhu Yunjiao's posthumous honor; on the other hand, it was also to show that his throne was inherited from Zhu Yuanzhang's hands, and had nothing to do with Zhu Biao and Zhu Yunjiao.
After taking the title of his eldest brother Zhu Biao, Zhu Di also stripped Zhu Biao's wife, the "Empress Dowager" of the Lü clan, from the title of "Crown Princess Yiwen", and then ordered Lü to take Zhu Biao's 11-year-old younger son Zhu Yunxi to live next to Zhu Biao's mausoleum and be responsible for guarding Zhu Biao's mausoleum.
Naturally, the mother and son did not dare to disobey Zhu Di's will, so they built a small house next to Zhu Biao's mausoleum and lived there. Unfortunately, one day four years later, the mansion where Lü and Zhu Yunxi lived suddenly caught fire, and Lü and Zhu Yunxi were both killed in the fire because they could not escape
Zhu Biao's third son Zhu Yunxi and fourth son Zhu Yunxi were given the titles of King of Wu and King of Heng respectively when Zhu Yunxi was emperor. After Zhu Di ascended the throne, he renamed the two as the King of Guangze and the King of Huai'en respectively, and moved them to Zhangzhou and Jianchang.
The site of Zhu Biao's mausoleum
However, Zhu Di was always worried that Zhu Biao's two sons would make a comeback in the future and cause trouble. Therefore, half a year after being crowned king, Zhu Di was impatient to recall the two brothers to the capital, reducing them to commoners on the grounds of "knowing themselves and being suspicious of themselves", and then imprisoning them both in Fengyang in the name of protecting their brothers.
I thought that the two brothers would be able to save their lives after being reduced to commoners, but this was not the case.
In 1417, Zhu Yuanzhang's eleventh son, Zhu Chun the Prince of Shu, and his son Zhu Yuexu fell out over some family trivia. Therefore, Zhu Yuexi gambled and ran to Changsha and defected to his uncle, Zhu Yuanzhang's nineteenth son, Zhu Xun the Prince of Gu.
Zhu Xi had helped Zhu Yunjiao resist Zhu Di in the city of Nanjing during the Battle of Jingnan, and later because Zhu Yunzhao lost power, he was good at annexing, so he opened the Jinchuan Gate and let Zhu Di enter the city.
Therefore, after Zhu Di ascended the throne, he was also very grateful to him, so he did not question his guilt, but let him live in Changsha. After Zhu Xi came to Changsha, he acted recklessly by helping Zhu Di, oppressed the people, and did many bad things. And because of Zhu Di's relationship, many people dare to be angry and dare not speak.
Because of Zhu Di's long-term tolerance, over time, Zhu Xi also began to become blind and insatiable. When Zhu Yuexiu went to defect to him, he thought of a "good way" that he thought was ingenious, and he dressed Zhu Yuexiu as the unaccounted for Zhu Yunjiao to prepare for rebellion.
Zhu Di film and television image
After Zhu Yuexiu learned of Zhu Yue's plan, he knew the seriousness of the matter and did not agree with it, but he was weak in Changsha, where was Zhu Yue's opponent. So he could only superficially express his approval, and then sent someone to secretly run to tell his father Zhu Chun the news.
Soon, Zhu Yuexiu's father, Zhu Chun, learned of Zhu Yue's rebellion, and he immediately went to Beijing to tell Zhu Di about it. Zhu Di was shocked to hear this, and immediately sent an army to Changsha, arrested Zhu Xi, who was trying to rebel, and demoted him and his son to the rank of Shuren, and then sent Zhu Yuexi back to the Shu King's Palace.
Zhu Chun
Although this incident did not cause too much turmoil, Zhu Di couldn't help but worry, he was worried that he would raise tigers for trouble, afraid that in the future, someone would use Zhu Yunxi and Zhu Yunxi, who had been imprisoned for 15 years, to make a fuss and plot a rebellion. That is, a dozen days after Zhu Di began to worry about this matter, the soldiers in charge of surveillance came to report that Zhu Yunxi and Zhu Yunxi's brothers were both violent...
At this point, Zhu Biao's wives and children have all passed away...
The Yongle dynasty under Zhu Di
Zhu Di was the king of the clan, so when he first ascended the throne, his position was not very stable, and in order to avoid the recurrence of the rebellion of the king of the clan, he took the means of differentiation against the clan kings.
First, he would implement a preferential treatment policy for the weaker clan kings, and the second was to move the stronger clan kings to poor places to weaken their strength, and finally, he would also order that the clan kings who had been cut during the Jianwen Emperor's time be restored to their old titles. And the kings of the clan were no longer able to compete with the imperial court under his divisive measures.
Although he was the king of the clan, Zhu Di still had his own insight into governing the country. After he ascended the throne, he began to consider moving the capital.
In order to move the capital from Nanjing to Beijing, Zhu Di prepared for more than ten years, and he sent people to immigrate to Beijing from all over Shanxi and Jiangnan to promote the development of Beijing; he also sent people to dredge the Grand Canal and open up the transportation line between the north and south of the mainland. Finally, Yao Guangxiao was put in charge of building the palace in Beijing. And this palace is our current Forbidden City.
Since the beginning of Yongle, Beijing has gradually become the political, economic and cultural center of the mainland, and it can be said that Zhu Di laid a solid foundation for the construction of Beijing.
He also sent an army of 800,000 to pacify Annam with the power of destruction and decay, so that Annan was brought under the territory of the mainland. He also conquered Mongolia five times, which greatly consolidated the frontier of the mainland.
In addition to his great military contributions, Zhu Di also had great innovations in political culture.
In the first year of Yongle, Zhu Di ordered Xie Jin to be responsible for compiling the Yongle Canon. In order to compile this book, Zhu Di summoned more than 3,000 literati from all over the country to participate in the compilation of the canon, which took five years to compile.
This book has a total of 22937 volumes, 11095 books, the total number of words in the book reached more than 3,700 million, which is the largest book in my ancient history, and the "Yongle Canon" preserves a large number of precious documents from ancient times on the mainland, which has high historical value.
Yongle Canon
The story of Zheng He's voyage to the West must have been heard by everyone, but there may be many people who do not know that Zheng He went to the West seven times in his life, the first six times were in the Yongle years.
When Zhu Yuanzhang was alive, he explicitly banned overseas trade, but Zhu Di dared to break the old rules. Zheng He was ordered to begin his voyage to the West, visiting more than thirty countries in Southeast Asia, South Asia, and Africa along the way.
And Zheng He also always adhered to Zhu Di's instructions of "internal Peace and Huaxia, external assistance to siyi, equal treatment, and sharing peace", actively mediating contradictions between various countries along the way, and also carrying out overseas trade, spreading traditional Chinese culture and virtues, greatly enhancing the prestige of the Ming Dynasty, and also demonstrating the excellent spirit of the Chinese nation of openness and enterprising, peace and friendship...