It's exam season recently, let's talk about an exam question, are the champions of ancient times really level?
What is the level of the ancient champion in modern times?
There have been five or six hundred champions in Chinese history, and some of them are our acquaintances.
Go to the poor place of the water, and sit and watch the clouds rise. --Tang Dynasty. Wang wei
The famous "lying flat" pastoral poet of the Tang Dynasty was the champion, the last loyal minister of the Southern Song Dynasty, and also the champion.
Liu Gongquan, who is proficient in regular script and is as famous as Yan Zhenqing, is still the champion.
These champions seem to be acquaintances during the college entrance examination.
If you want to know how much gold the champion has, we can first take a look at their papers.
The picture above is currently the only authentic copy of the Ming Dynasty Champion scroll in Chinese mainland. The six words "first and first place" on the volume are the handwriting of Emperor Wanli of the Ming Dynasty.
The owner of the scroll is Zhao Bingzhong, the champion of the Ming Dynasty, 2460 characters, written in pavilion style.
For this kind of exam, you have to write out the paper in one day. The whole volume has three layers, is framed on rice paper, and is 3.3 meters long.
In a physical sense, the artistic component of this scroll is as tall as a 2-story building.
Zhao Bingzhong, a benevolent brother, was a 15-year-old student of the Supplementary Mansion, a 24-year-old Zhongju person, in the twenty-sixth year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty, at the age of 25, he participated in the palace examination and won the first place in one fell swoop, becoming the title of the champion gold list.
It seems easy, but in fact, the purpose of the imperial examination is to win scholars for the country, and every step was made hellish by the government at the time.
The Chinese imperial examination system, which began in the Sui Dynasty and lasted for more than 1,300 years.
In 1370 AD, after Zhu Yuanzhang began the talent expansion plan, the imperial examination began to gradually become mature and perfect.
However, even if it is perfected, it is still difficult, and some people fail the test at all.
The Ming Dynasty stipulated that those who dismissed idle officials, advocated excellence and some other circumstances were not allowed to take the exam. To put it simply, dramas, related households, people with criminal records, and those who are mourning at home after their parents die cannot be tested.
The first level of the imperial examination is called the children's examination, which includes the Hefu examination and the hospital examination.
At the end of the children's examination, the Ming Dynasty was presided over by the school officials, and the Qing Dynasty was presided over by the school administration.
It doesn't really matter who cares in the end, the important thing is that the pass rate of the first county test in the children's test is only about 10%.
More than ninety percent of the candidates will not be able to meet the last person in charge at all, and after the whole round of children's examinations, all three stages have passed, according to the data we can find, according to the admission rate of the Qing Dynasty, it is only about 1%.
Due to the high difficulty of this wave, plus the fact that they can take the exam at a few ages, there are many young talents who want to get the golden house, marry Yan Ruyu, and reach the peak of official life, and they may not have passed the children's examination at the age of seventy or eighty
He is still called a child at the age of eighty, but he can take the cloud life test, and he is still unripe when he is old
Fortunately, when the first level is passed, the candidate will be called "Xiucai", as a reward for becoming an intellectual, and can get some exemption from part of the tax.
Seeing that the official does not kneel, he does not need to be punished when he is tried, he walks swaggeringly, and when he is bumped into, he is called Tang Tu Xiucai, which is insulting. Xiucai is just a stepping stone to the pinnacle of officials and students.
The road to the imperial examination has just begun, and the second level that candidates have to go through is called the township examination.
It is generally held in the provincial capitals of various provinces, because the test has to be held for nine days and six nights, and during the examination, all the life behaviors of the candidates, eating, drinking and lazing, have to be carried out in a room of about three square meters.
Therefore, candidates not only have to be able to take exams, but also have to stay up late.
If everyone is able to participate in the imperial examination museum, there will be a display of this scene.
This is the seat of some candidates, the examination venue.
If they want to sleep, they can move the board down and squint like a bed for a while.
After being admitted to the township examination, the candidates will transform from poor and sour talents to masters, because they are qualified to be officials and have more privileges.
The wealthy landlords of all stripes will also make angel round investments in the juren without shame, including but not limited to marrying their daughters to these quasi-officials.
After passing the township examination, people can go to prepare for the next level, the general examination held by the Ministry of Rites, that is, to enter Beijing to catch the examination.
Compete for the last few hundred tribute places, go up to the tribute, and then participate in the palace examination personally invigilated by the emperor, and only after the emperor's BOSS direct recruitment can you become a jinshi.
By the way, if you take the first place in the township examination, you will be called Xie Yuan; The first person in the examination is called Huiyuan, and the later palace exam, in case you get another champion, it is called Lianzhong Sanyuan.
It's all a later thing, and they all say that they have the qualifications to be officials, how can there be more places. The admission rate of the township examination in the Ming Dynasty was about 4%, and the admission rate of the general examination was less than 10%.
Don't talk about Gongshi, a county in a remote area, if you are in the exam, even if the ancestral tomb erupts from the volcano, as a showman, you may not be able to lift it for the rest of your life.
There was once a Xiucai surnamed Lu, who knew 1,000 words at the age of three, memorized Tang poems at the age of five, read four books and five classics at the age of seven, and was proficient in poetry and songs at the age of eight. When he was 25 years old, he couldn't eat enough.
For another example, one of the biggest IPs of ancient Chinese novels "Strange Tales from Liao Zhai", its author Pu Songling became a Xiucai at the age of 19, and then he was still a Xiucai after 44 years of examination.
Li Shizhen, a first-generation medicine saint, failed to take the exam many times.
Han Yu, the head of the eight masters of the Tang and Song dynasties, failed in the imperial examination three times in a row, and finally reached the Jinshi rank for the fourth time.
There is also a student named Huangchao who failed in the imperial examination, after failing to pass the examination many times, "I killed a hundred flowers after the flowers bloomed", and the Huangchao uprising indirectly led to the demise of the Tang Dynasty.
In the second year of Renzong Jiayou in the Northern Song Dynasty, there was the largest imperial examination in history, with nearly 400,000 reference students, and 388 people finally became Jinshi, among which they also gathered.
These three of the "Eight Masters of the Tang and Song Dynasties":
and Cheng Hao, who founded Cheng Zhu Lixue, and other members of the "silent writing and reciting" heavenly group.
If you expand the scope a little, the chief examiner is Ouyang Xiu, and it is their father Su Xun who brought the Su brothers to the exam, except for Wang Anshi, the six Song families in the Tang and Song dynasties, this time everyone is together, but in the end, this time, the candidates above have not yet ranked in the top three.
And in the previous imperial examinations, the final champion will basically not be a nerd who remembers his books. In addition to having solid basic skills, the champion memorized the four books and five classics, and wrote well.
In fact, it is necessary to show a strong ability to govern the country. In addition to examining scriptures and history poems, the imperial examination will also test policy theory, which is simply a test of current politics.
He has to find a way to solve the problems of the country, the problems of people's livelihood. The champion must really have ideas in his head, and he must also have the world in mind.
As mentioned above, Zhao Bingzhong, the champion of the Ming Dynasty, his exam question is called "Ask the Emperor's Politics and the Emperor's Heart".
The core of the argument is how to improve politics so as to achieve a prosperous situation of political clarity and social harmony.
The champion needs to discuss the emperor and the people, policy and the rule of law, the rule of law and the rule of virtue, etc., and also has to analyze the social phenomena of the time in simple terms, talk about the social contradictions and corruption of governance at that time, and even tactfully point out that the corruption of officials and the emperor have an unshirkable responsibility.
Finally, he put forward a series of reform proposals with sharp writing, clear views, and thorough reasoning.
To be honest, the author was sweating when I saw the exam questions.
After becoming the champion, various titles such as masters of Chinese studies, famous writers, leaders of various departments, etc., will beckon to the champion. Zhao Bingzhong later became an official to the Ministry of Rites, which is equivalent to the current Minister of the Central Propaganda Department and the Minister of Culture.
Of course, not all champions are at the zenith level of five levels and six generals.
In the book "Qing Barnyard Banknotes", there is a mention of a Qing Dynasty man named Long Ruyan.
This old brother has never been promoted since he became a showman. Later, when he came to Beijing, he became a member of the "North Drifter" family, and he could only work as a private school in the Eight Banners.
However, as luck would have it, when he was a teacher, it happened to be Emperor Jiaqing's 50th birthday.
According to the usual practice, the ministers need to send a few poems to the emperor, and luckily, the people served by Long Ruyan just happened to not be able to write, so they asked Long Ruyan to write on their behalf.
It just so happened that Long Ruyan liked to be clever again, so he directly found some nouns and good sentences from the poems written by Kangxi Qianlong in the past, moved the flowers and trees, and composed a long poem and sent it up.
When Jiaqing saw it, not only did he not blame, but he was moved to cry.
Because, he felt that the southern scholars often disdained to read the poems of the emperor, and this person was familiar with reading this, which showed his sincerity in loving the king.
was moved directly, and Long Ruyan became a lifter. After becoming a lifter, Long Ruyan thought about taking another test.
However, his level is really limited. Later, when I went to participate in the imperial examination, I was brushed down again. What I never expected was that Jiaqing still remembered Long Ruyan at this time.
As soon as I saw that there was no such person among the people on the list, it said that the quality of candidates this year was not very good.
Later, the chief examiner Leng had no choice, and in the imperial examination held later, he insisted on raising Long Ruyan to the position of champion.
Jiaqing was satisfied, and I was right, "What I have appreciated is not wrong." ”
In fact, with the exception of a few sons of luck, almost all champions will not be rote nerds.
These champions are now up, and it is not surprising that they are also top students.
And behind this group of champions, it can really be said that it will be a success.
In ancient times, reading means being out of production, and in ancient times, productivity was limited, and children wanted to be talents, and it was far from enough to study hard.
As for whether you can pass the test, as I said above, the probability of each round of the exam is basically less than 10%.
Whether in ancient times or today, not everyone can become a champion.
But unlike the ancients, each of us has a ticket in our hands, and compared to the ancients, each of us is a winner. So again, walking in the exam room is considered a victory.
The world is yours and ours, but ultimately yours is yours.
I hope every student can
Horse to success, ride the wind and waves, the title of the gold list
That's all for talking about today, and if you like it, you can click three times in a row.
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