preface
In 60 BC, that is, during the reign of Emperor Xuan of Han, a major event occurred in the Han Dynasty.
In this year, the Xiongnu's Richao king, with tens of thousands of troops under his command, directly surrendered to the Xiongnu.
In previous history, the Western Han Dynasty had also accepted the surrender of more than one Xiongnu king. The earliest one can be traced back to the time of Emperor Jing of Han. It is said that at that time, there was a great controversy among the high-level officials of the Han Dynasty about the surrender of the Xiongnu. Emperor Jing of Han advocated acceptance, while Prime Minister Zhou Yafu advocated extermination.
Because of this incident, Zhou Yafu also had a very unpleasant fight with Emperor Hanjing, and later indirectly caused Zhou Yafu to starve to death.
Later, during the time of Emperor Wudi of Han, after the large-scale war between the Han Dynasty and the Xiongnu, more Xiongnu kings surrendered. For example, when Huo Qubing attacked the Hexi corridor, he directly forced all the local Xiongnu kings to surrender. The Xiongnu kings who did not surrender were basically killed by Huo Qubing.
Therefore, after experiencing many similar incidents, the Han Dynasty was already commonplace for the surrender of the Xiongnu king. The people of the Han Dynasty at that time did not feel that this was a particularly important matter. But from the perspective of later historical developments, it seems that this is not the case.
The surrender of this king of the day is actually a landmark event. Since then, the once powerful Xiongnu can no longer face the Han Dynasty. Over the next two hundred years, the entire Xiongnu began to gradually surrender, and then gradually assimilated by the Han Dynasty. Even later, at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, the internal chaos in the Central Plains was in shambles, and the Xiongnu were at most temporarily independent.
But after the founding of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Eastern Han soon suppressed the Xiongnu again. Later, most of the Huns could only surrender completely. A small number of Huns who were unwilling to surrender could not continue to live on the steppe. Then they left the country, gradually moved west, and finally went to Europe.
And the fall of the Xiongnu, strictly speaking, actually began with the surrender of the king of the day.
Why, then, did the surrender of a Hun king have such a big impact on the Huns? Under what background would this Xiongnu king surrender to the Han Dynasty? Why did the Han Dynasty, which had previously exhausted its national strength and failed to completely subdue it, completely submit to Emperor Xuan of Han?
This story, in fact, has to start from the end of the Battle of Mobei that year.
During the reign of Emperor Wudi of Han, through several large-scale wars, he eliminated a large number of Xiongnu main forces. Finally, under the leadership of two top generals, Wei Qing and Huo Qubing, the Han Dynasty army finally entered the old nest of Mobei, almost completely solving the Xiongnu problem.
But it was almost impossible. In this battle of Mobei, the Han Dynasty actually had a huge regret, that is, it could not capture the Xiongnu Shan Yu.
This matter is actually to blame on the famous flying general Li Guang. At that time, the Han Dynasty was generally divided into two routes, one under the command of Wei Qing, and directly attacked Shan Yu's headquarters. The other was led by Huo Qubing, who fought Zuo Xian of the Xiongnu. Needless to say, Huo Qubing not only defeated King Zuo Xian in the end, but also sealed the wolf Juxu, and finally penetrated the entire territory of the Xiongnu.
On Wei Qing's side, although it also achieved a big victory, it severely damaged Shan Yu's headquarters. However, at the time of the final encirclement, because the flying general Li Guang was lost, the original encirclement was not completely sealed. So in the end, the Xiongnu fled through this gap.
Because he did not capture Shan Yu, after the end of the war, the Xiongnu still had the backbone on the side, so they began to shrink to the north and restore their strength. On the Han Dynasty's side, two years after the end of this war, Huo Qubing died. After Huo Qu's death, the Han Dynasty could no longer find a second general who was good at leading a large cavalry corps and conducting large-scale and deep interspersed operations.
Therefore, after Huo Qubing's death, Emperor Wudi of Han could only temporarily give up fighting against the Xiongnu. Because after Huo Qubing, it was difficult for the Han Dynasty cavalry to enter the depths of Mobei. In this way, in the next twenty years, the Xiongnu naturally had time to shrink in the desert north and continue to recover.
When the Han Dynasty and the Xiongnu fought the battle of Mobei, at this time, on the Xiongnu side, it was Yi Zhixian who reigned. After the end of the Battle of Mobei, within a few years, this Yizhishan Yu died.
In the history of the Xiongnu, this Yizhi Shan Yu can be described as a real turning point. Before him, the Huns had been going uphill. From the time when he unified the Xiongnu, it took a hundred years for the Xiongnu to change four singles. But after his death, in just over twenty years, the Xiongnu changed five Shan Yu!
Such frequent exchange of orders is naturally very detrimental to the restoration of the strength within the Xiongnu. Moreover, during this period, there were also doubts about the Lord and the Young Kingdom within the Xiongnu. The emergence of these situations naturally further accelerated the division within the Xiongnu.
You know, on the Xiongnu side, the implementation of the system of division and sealing was originally implemented, which was probably equivalent to the system of the Western Zhou Dynasty. Under this system, the cohesion of the Xiongnu regime was originally inferior to the grand unification model on the Western Han side. In this model, once the Xiongnu royal court declines, just at a young age, the various Xiongnu kings within the Xiongnu will naturally have independent ideas.
Therefore, in the later years of Emperor Wudi of Han, after years of hard work, the Han Dynasty accumulated a large number of war horses. At this time, the Han Dynasty actually had the opportunity to carry out a state-destroying attack on the Xiongnu. But the problem is that at this stage, the good luck of the Huns seems to come.
Because after this, the commander of the Han Dynasty was replaced by a man named Li Guangli.
Compared with Wei Qinghuo's illness, Li Guangli's commanding ability is undoubtedly not a level at all. So, twenty years later, when the Xiongnu finally recovered a little, they once again went out of Mobei and fought with the Han Dynasty. The Xiongnu suddenly found that the combat effectiveness of the Han Dynasty at this time had dropped by several steps compared with twenty years ago.
The strength and weakness of the Han Dynasty on the Xiongnu side is obviously huge.
Before Li Guangli led the troops to go to war with the Xiongnu, the Xiongnu side had already changed five Shan Yu in a row. Shan Yu, who reigned at that time, was called Shan Yu. Before the war again, this Marquis Shan was afraid of the Han Dynasty. Even when this Marquis Shan had just ascended the throne, he took the initiative to release the Han Dynasty envoy who had been detained before, wanting to show favor to the Han Dynasty.
It was precisely because of this Shan Yu's initiative to show favor that Emperor Wudi of Han sent a mission to the Xiongnu side to restore diplomatic relations. And the head of this mission is Su Wu, the Su Wu of Su Wu Muyang.
However, to everyone's surprise, after the mission arrived in the Xiongnu, not long after, civil unrest broke out in the Xiongnu. At that time, a man named Yu Chang planned to command his subordinates to kidnap Shan Yu's mother and assassinate Shan Yu by the way. Interestingly, there were only more than seventy people under Yu Chang at that time.
So later, Yu Chang felt that he had too few people under him, so he contacted the embassy, hoping that the mission could help him assassinate Shan Yu together. After that, this assassination plan was exposed in advance, and Shan Yu directly ordered everyone to be arrested. And Su Wu, who was the main envoy of the mission, was later detained by the Xiongnu.
This seizure is a full nineteen years.
Everyone is familiar with this story of Su Wu Muyang. But from this story, the weakness of the Xiongnu side can also be exposed. You know, at that time, there were only more than seventy people under Yu Chang's hands, and they dared to prepare to assassinate Shan Yu! This kind of thing, when the Xiongnu were strong before, could not have happened in any way!
And then, because the Xiongnu seized the Han Dynasty mission, the Han and Hungarian sides fought again. In the course of the battle, Li Guang's grandson Li Ling, with 5,000 infantry, directly entered the hinterland of the Xiongnu. Moreover, relying on these five thousand infantry, Li Ling blocked the attack of tens of thousands of Xiongnu cavalry head-on.
This would have been almost inconceivable in later history. In the history of several later Central Plains dynasties, if you want to block the attack of tens of thousands of cavalry, the Central Plains Dynasty must take out at least hundreds of thousands of border troops. However, in the Han Dynasty, Li Ling insisted on using 5,000 infantry to complete this achievement.
In this regard, we can only say that Li Ling's command ability is indeed relatively strong. But at the same time, this also proves from the side to what extent the Xiongnu declined at that time.
Such a weak Xiongnu, if he had changed to Huo Qubing to command, he should have easily destroyed the country. But what is outrageous is that because Li Guangli's command level is too poor, in the following years, the Han Dynasty not only failed to destroy the Xiongnu, but continued to lose troops and generals. And in this way, the Xiongnu side became more and more excited.
At this time, Hou Shan Yu probably understood a truth: it turned out that it was not that our Xiongnu were too weak, but because Wei Qing and Huo Qubing were too strong before! Now that these two cowmen are gone, the Xiongnu are naturally invincible in the world again.
Therefore, in the later years of Emperor Wudi of Han, the Xiongnu re-emerged from northern Mobei and began to expand again. At the end of the reign of Emperor Wudi of Han, because of the scourge of witchcraft in the upper echelons of the Han Dynasty, the Han Dynasty further stopped its foreign wars. These things have allowed the Xiongnu side to recover better.
In this way, during this period of history, Marquis Shan completed the restoration of the Xiongnu and resumed the war with the Han Dynasty. He then died within a few years, and his son Fox Lushan took over. This fox deer Shan Yu was also more capable of fighting, that is, during his reign, the Xiongnu defeated Li Guangli and completely annihilated the 70,000 Han elites under Li Guangli.
Since then, there has been a fault in the inheritance of cavalry on the Han Dynasty side. The old foundation that Wei Qinghuo brought out of the disease was basically beaten.
In the history of the Xiongnu, this fox deer Shan Yu should be regarded as a lord of Zhongxing. It was during his reign that the Xiongnu once again moved out of northern Mo, occupied southern Mo, and began to re-approach the Hexi Corridor. The only pity is that there is no habit of recording history on the Xiongnu side. Otherwise, the story of this fox deer alone should also be very legendary.
However, even the most powerful ZTE lord cannot change the decline of a regime. This is true on the Central Plains side, and it is also true on the Xiongnu side. This fox deer may be able to completely annihilate the 70,000 Han family elite led by Li Guangli on the battlefield. But he was unable to solve many problems within the Xiongnu.
For example, the separatist tendencies of the major Xiongnu kings and the growing class contradictions. On the Xiongnu side, because it was still a slave society, the main body of contradiction was the contradiction between slaves and slave owners. Although the Xiongnu won the Han Dynasty on the front line, the results of the war went to those Xiongnu kings and Xiongnu nobles.
And those ordinary Huns will not get any benefits. Not only did they not get benefits, but they also had to fight hard with the Han Dynasty for those high-level Xiongnu officials.
So next, the cohesion within the Xiongnu is getting worse and worse. On this side of the border, many Xiongnu and small Xiongnu tribes also began to gradually have the idea of surrendering to the Han Dynasty.
This laid a foreshadowing for the later division of the Xiongnu. In this way, in the late reign of Fox Lu Shan Yu, Emperor Wudi of Han died. Two years after the death of Emperor Wudi of Han, the fox Lu Shan Yu also died, and then the Xiongnu side replaced his son Hu Yan Shan Yu in the reign.
For this pot Yan Shan Yu, there are really not many records in the history books. Because the Xiongnu side did not have the habit of recording history, and the Han Dynasty had been resting and recuperating during this period, there was little communication with the Xiongnu side.
However, during the reign of this Hu Yandan, the Han Dynasty miraculously restored diplomatic relations with the Xiongnu. That is, during his reign, the Xiongnu side released Su Wu, who had been detained for many years. Moreover, there was a certain amount of trade between the Han Dynasty and the Xiongnu.
In this regard, later historians believe that it should be within the Xiongnu at this time, and the contradictions have reached a new height. In the face of these contradictions, Hu Yan was unable to solve them. In this way, he was naturally unable to start a war with the Han Dynasty. At the same time, in order to resolve internal contradictions and solve internal trade needs, the Xiongnu could only bow to the Han Dynasty and establish commercial exchanges with the Han Dynasty.
This situation, in fact, is not only a problem of the Xiongnu themselves. Later northern nomadic regimes had similar situations. Because the production structure of the steppe civilization is relatively single, and things like salt, tea and silk cloth, they do not produce there!
These materials are also necessary for the steppe civilization. Therefore, when the steppe regime is strong, it can solve the problem by going south to plunder. And when the steppe regime declines and cannot afford to rob, then it can only bow to the Central Plains regime and obtain materials through commercial trade.
As for not robbing or buying, completely remaining independent, excuse me, the Huns will definitely not be able to do this. Because these materials are all necessities of life, and can even be said to be necessities of life. Without these things, the Huns could not live. At that time, there was no need for the Han Dynasty to fight them, and the Xiongnu themselves would collapse.
From this point of view, the reconciliation with the Han Dynasty is probably also a helpless move.
In this way, Hu Yanshan reigned for eighteen years. It was during his reign that Huo Guang, the powerful minister of the Han Dynasty, took full power. Then, Emperor Han Zhao died, and later Huo Guang supported Emperor Xuan of Han. And in the year when Huo Yanshan died, on the side of the Han Dynasty, Huo Guang also died.
After Huo Guang's death, on the side of the Han Dynasty, the next main line of history was that Emperor Xuan of Han cleaned up the Huo family and then returned to power. From Huo Guang's death to Emperor Han Xuan's killing of the Huo family, in fact, less than two years passed. However, after killing the Huo family, Emperor Xuan of Han actually spent several years to clean up the ministers that Huo Guang promoted one by one and completely eliminate Huo Guang's influence.
And after Emperor Xuan of Han completely sat on the throne, it was not long before Western Qiang in the west rebelled. So after that, the Han Dynasty spent nearly three years to completely solve the Western Qiang problem. Although the time for direct fighting during this period was not long, it still took a lot of time for the Han Dynasty to communicate before the war, as well as the post-war settlement and management issues.
Because there have been a lot of things during this period of the Han Dynasty, it is unlikely that the main army will be drawn up to attack the Xiongnu head-on. So next, the Han Dynasty began to use normal defensive and divisive strike strategies against the Xiongnu side.
It was also in this historical context that the script of the Xiongnu split gradually began to play out. After his death, he was not succeeded by his son, but by his younger brother. This newly ascended Shan Yu is called Void Quan Quan Shan Yu.
To say more, on the Xiongnu side, there is no so-called 'primogeniture system'. The steppe peoples believe in strength as respect, so many times, Shan Yu's sons and brothers actually have the right to inherit. As for who will inherit in the end, it depends on who has the bigger fist.
Of course, in order to ensure that the Xiongnu will not fight for inheritance rights, the Xiongnu side also invented a very interesting succession system, which is the system of left and right virtuous kings. Under this system, although Lao Shan Yu would not appoint a prince, he could make his favorite heir as the King of Zuoxian.
Of all the kings of the Xiongnu, the left and right kings were the strongest. These two kings controlled only the people themselves. Therefore, within the Xiongnu, the fists of the left and right sage kings are second only to Shan himself.
Under this system, although the Xiongnu's old Shan Yu did not make a prince or the like, he could designate his favorite heir to serve as the left or right wise king. Under normal circumstances, the strength of the left sage king will be higher than that of the right sage king. So later, King Zuo Xian became the 'alternative prince' of the Xiongnu.
But at the same time, Zuo Xianwang's candidate is not necessarily the son of the Xiongnu Shan Yu, but also the younger brother. After all, if the Xiongnu let his son be the king of Zuoxian, and Shan Yu's son happened to be relatively young and could not manage the people. In this way, Yu alone is equivalent to digging a hole for yourself.
In short, when he died, it may be because his son was relatively young, or his seniority was relatively shallow. The person who served as the king of Zuo Xian was not his son, but his younger brother.
Therefore, after the death of Hu Yan Shan Yu, the last person to ascend the throne was his younger brother Qiu Quan Quan Shan Yu.
This situation has not happened in the history of the Xiongnu before. For example, Yi Zhi Shan Yu, who fought against Wei Qinghuo back then, came to the throne as a younger brother. Moreover, that Yi Zhi Shan Yu only officially ascended the throne after leading his people to defeat his brother's eldest son.
If it is placed on the side of the Central Plains, this plot is actually equivalent to Zhu Di's later robbery of Zhu Yunjiang's throne.
Because of this kind of thing, it has happened several times. So the Xiongnu aristocracy at that time was also more acceptable. But for this result, there is one person who is very dissatisfied.
This person is the wife of the former Shan Yu. On the Central Plains side, the emperor's wife is called the empress. On the Xiongnu side, Shan Yu's wife was called the Zhuanqu Yan clan.
So, the next plot is roughly like this. The older brother died, and then the younger brother took over. But in this way, the sister-in-law is unwilling. Because for the sister-in-law, the sister-in-law definitely wants her son to take over.
But at the same time, there is a special tradition on the Xiongnu side, that is, after the death of the elder brother, the younger brother will marry the elder brother's woman. Therefore, after the death of the Xiongnu old man, his sister-in-law became his brother's empress. In this way, after the younger brother took the throne, this sister-in-law still has a lot of influence.
At the same time, this sister-in-law and her father, who also had great influence in the Xiongnu at that time, can be understood as the commander of the Yulin Army on this side of the Central Plains.
In this way, after the younger brother took the throne, he naturally felt restrained. So after that, the younger brother directly abolished his sister-in-law's position as queen as a new single Yu.
This incident became the trigger for the subsequent division of the Xiongnu. In this way, after abolishing his sister-in-law, his younger brother completely sat in the position of Shan Yu. But by this time, there were already many contradictions within the Xiongnu, and the self-reliance tendency of the major Xiongnu kings was already obvious.
So next, this newly ascended younger brother Shan Yu came up with a way, that is, to transfer the contradiction through war. At that time, this younger brother Shan Yu pointed the finger at the Han Dynasty. He drew troops from the Xiongnu forces and then formed an army of about 10,000 people to attack the Han border.
But as a result, just after this army approached the border of the Han Dynasty, there was a defection on the Xiongnu side. Three Xiongnu, directly separated from the large army, surrendered to the Han Dynasty in advance. And the Han Dynasty, because of this, learned the news and began to quickly take precautions.
So in the end, this younger brother's plan alone can only be fruitless.
This kind of plot, in fact, has happened many times in the history of the Central Plains. The new emperor fought with the former empress dowager for power, and then staged a coup d'état to imprison the empress dowager. Or through foreign wars, to divert domestic contradictions. This kind of trick is a trick that the emperor of the Central Plains has played rotten.
And in the history books of the Central Plains Dynasty, there are also many records of the results of the failure of this method. Once the foreign war fails and the contradictions fail to be successfully transferred, then the contradictions within the regime will become more and more intense.
On the side of the Xiongnu at that time, it was the same. Because this military operation was fruitless, Shan Yu's prestige further declined. Moreover, at this critical time, a natural disaster occurred on the side of the Xiongnu. That year, there was a heavy snowfall in the Xiongnu. This heavy snow directly froze most of the Xiongnu's livestock.
In this way, the people at the bottom of the Xiongnu naturally had a harder time living. At the same time, the contradictions within the rule of the Xiongnu were about to break out. On the side of the Central Plains Dynasty, there was a natural disaster at the end of the dynasty, and then a peasant uprising was about to break out. On the Hun side, this script has not changed much.
After the natural disaster that year, because many of the Xiongnu low-level people could not live at all. So next, many small Xiongnu tribes rebelled. They either surrendered directly and collectively to the Han Dynasty, or they rebelled on the spot and began to rebel against the Xiongnu kings above.
Faced with this situation, this younger brother Shan Yu, although he transferred troops everywhere to fight the fire, but in the end he still could not solve the problem. In the years that followed, uprisings began to break out within the Xiongnu. And in order to suppress the uprising, the headquarters alone had to give more power to the Xiongnu kings in those places. After that, the Xiongnu kings in those places could further become independent.
This script is almost exactly the same as the plot of the late Eastern Han Dynasty. In this way, after a few years of suppression, this younger brother Shan Yu also died. After the death of this younger brother Shan Yu, the high-level contradictions of the Xiongnu also began to break out completely.
To put it simply, after the death of his younger brother Shan Yu, the Xiongnu nobles began to hold collective meetings to discuss who would make the new Shan Yu next. At this time, the sister-in-law who was previously deposed suddenly jumped out, which was basically equivalent to launching a coup d'état. With her influence, coupled with the military power of her mother's family, she quickly controlled the central Xiongnu.
Then, this sister-in-law chose to support the Right Sage King. The reason why this Right Sage King was chosen was mainly because the two had a personal relationship before.
In this way, in the end, this right-wise king was put on the position of Shan Yu, which later history called 'Holding Yan Shu Shan Yu'.
And after this Right Sage King took the throne, in order to sit firmly in the position of Shan Yu, he naturally began to vigorously clean up the forces left by Shan Yu before. After that, before his butcher's knife, many high-ranking nobles who remained with that younger brother were slaughtered. And many of the sister-in-law's mother's family members have been reused.
This kind of thing, put on the side of the Central Plains, is generally called a certain palace change. And after this palace change, those local Xiongnu kings who were already powerful naturally would not sit still. So the next script, roughly a few Hun kings, began to raise troops against him, saying that he was not in the right position.
In this way, the Xiongnu Civil War officially began.
And after the start of this civil war, the Xiongnu internal kings of the Japanese chasing kings Shan, soon fell behind. This ancestor Shan, his grandfather was the one who imprisoned Su Wu back then. Moreover, after the death of Marquis Shan Yu, at the beginning, it was actually this sage who succeeded his father. But later, because his uncle was relatively strong, his father abdicated.
After that, his uncle Fox Gulushan ascended the throne and became the lord of Zhongxing of the Xiongnu, and began to fight Li Guangli. As for his father, after abdicating the throne, he was not completely killed, but became the Zuoxian king of the Xiongnu.
And after his father's death, according to the practice on the Xiongnu side, the position of Zuoxian King cannot be hereditary. So later, the position of Zuo Xian King was given to that younger brother Shan Yu. As for the sage Shan, he was named King of the Sun.
Although it is a bit of a family downfall, in the generation of Xianxianshan, he still controls a large tribe in his hands, with tens of thousands of people under his command. Therefore, when the Xiongnu civil war broke out, this tribe of the Japanese king also became an important force of the Xiongnu.
But the problem is that this king of the sun is a bit contradictory to the right sage king back then. Therefore, when that Right Sage King took the throne, he naturally became the object to be cleaned up. At that time, the strength of the headquarters alone was still very strong, and the king of the day could not fight at all.
It was also at this time that it was suggested that the king of the day could defect to the Han Dynasty. Then, the repressed king of the Japanese on the Xiongnu side finally agreed to this proposal and formally surrendered to the Han Dynasty. This is the historical background of the surrender of the Japanese king.
A Xiongnu king, with tens of thousands of Xiongnu troops, voluntarily surrendered to the Han Dynasty. This was almost unthinkable in the previous history of the Huns. Even in the era of Emperor Wudi of Han back then, he put a knife on the neck of the people to force them to surrender.
And then, the surrender of the king of the day seemed to be the beginning. After this, the Xiongnu civil war began to intensify, and Shan Yu began to attack several local Xiongnu kings. More and more Xiongnu tribes began to voluntarily surrender to the Han Dynasty.
In this way, two years later, some local Xiongnu kings within the Xiongnu elected the son of the previous younger brother Shan Yu to make a new Shan Yu, which is Huhan Evil Shan Yu. In this way, for a while, two Xiongnu kings appeared within the Xiongnu. After that, this Huhan Xie Shan Yu led troops to attack Shan Yu's headquarters, and soon defeated the Shan Yu who held Yan Shu.
After the defeat of the last Shan Yu, he fled directly to the Xiongnu's Right Xian King's headquarters, intending to bring troops back again for revenge. But as a result, the Right Sage King didn't pay attention to him at all. So in the end, this last Shan Yu of the Xiongnu unification period was cornered and could only commit suicide and die.
And the death of the last Shan Yu seemed to become a signal, marking the complete disintegration of the Xiongnu. After that, Huhan Xiedan Yu won a victory and regained control of the Xiongnu royal court. But the Xiongnu kings of other Xiongnu places still disobeyed him.
So in the next year or two, there were four more single-minded and self-reliant. For a moment, five Shan Yu appeared inside the Xiongnu!
This is also known as 'five singles standing side by side' in history.
And with the complete division within the Xiongnu, the opportunity to belong to the Han Dynasty naturally came completely. In the following ten years, the Han Dynasty recruited a large number of Xiongnu tribes and reduced the overall population of the Xiongnu. On the other hand, it is instigating the Xiongnu to continue internal fighting and constantly consuming the strength of the Xiongnu.
In addition, because the Xiongnu began the civil war, the Han Dynasty also took advantage of the situation to establish the Western Regions Protectorate on the Western Regions. With the establishment of the Western Regions Protectorate, the Xiongnu's influence on the Western Regions was completely cut off.
After that, the Han Dynasty began to support Huhan Xie Dan Yu, one of the five singles. In order to get the support of the Han Dynasty, this Hu Han Xie Shan Yu later directly surrendered to the Han Dynasty and officially declared himself a vassal to the Han Dynasty. Later, he also went directly to Chang'an and bowed down to Emperor Xuan of Han.
Because this Hu Han Xie Shan Yu was completely subordinate, the Han Dynasty naturally began to support him and defeat several other Shan Yu. At the same time, in this process, the Han Dynasty did not forget to mix sand with the Xiongnu and constantly assimilate those Xiongnu.
In this way, ten years later, this Huhan Xie Shan Yu finally unified the Xiongnu again. However, at that time, the Xiongnu had been almost infiltrated by the Han Dynasty. The entire Xiongnu had almost become a vassal state of the Han Dynasty.
By the way, after that, Hu Han Xie Shan Yu came to the Han Dynasty again to worship. However, at that time, the reign of the Han Dynasty was no longer Emperor Xuan of Han, but Emperor Yuan of Han. In the process of that pilgrimage, in order to strengthen its control over the Xiongnu, the Xiongnu also wanted to deepen relations with the Han Dynasty, so in the end, the Han Dynasty resumed the policy of peace and affinity, allowing a palace maid to pretend to be a princess and marry the Xiongnu.
That palace maid is the famous Wang Zhaojun. And that story is called Zhaojun's exit.
epilogue
Therefore, from the perspective of the whole process, it was not Emperor Xuan of Han or Emperor Wudi of Han who really destroyed the Xiongnu, but the civil war of the Xiongnu itself. If the Xiongnu themselves did not have civil strife, even if the Han Dynasty was strong, it would be difficult to destroy the Xiongnu, and at most it would have been able to beat them back to Mobei.
Of course, the civil war of the Xiongnu does not seem to be solved by one or two Ming monarchs. After all, under the ancient social system, more than a hundred years after the establishment of a regime, internal contradictions must gradually intensify. This trend is actually inevitable. Therefore, what really destroyed the Xiongnu was actually the contradiction of the Xiongnu themselves.