(Martyrdom of The Cliff Mountain)
Lu Xiufu stood on the cliff with Zhao Fu, the last little emperor of the Southern Song Dynasty, on his back, at the bottom of the cliff, which was a rough sea.
He looked back behind him, the mountains and rivers were thousands of miles, the sunset was passed, and the sunset was infinitely beautiful.
On top of this hot land, there were once literati with full stomachs, who used their pens as the front for the development of the dynasty and worked hard.
There are also brave and fearless warriors, on the battlefield, fighting with swords, killing the enemy, and defending the country.
There is also a wise lord, a benevolent king, who leads the people of the Great Song Dynasty to march in tandem.
The flower of prosperous culture once bloomed here, the people lived in peace, the people were happy, and the best era was born here.
But now it's all over.
The empire collapsed, and the glory was gone.
The Mongol iron rode south, across the four wildernesses, the Southern Song Dynasty was weak, unable to resist, first Kaicheng surrendered, then fled to the sea, and finally forced to this cliff mountain desperate situation, there is no way to retreat.
Lu Xiufu was infinitely sad, but he no longer hesitated, jumped down, and jumped into the sea with the little queen on his back.
100,000 soldiers and civilians have thrown themselves into the sea one after another, and there is no southern Song Dynasty in the world
- Caption
(Late Song Emperor Zhao Fu)
On the coast of today's Jiangmen City, Guangdong Province, there is a sea area, the tides of the sea rise and fall, one after another, the scenery is very different.
Along the coast, there are high cliffs, if you climb on the cliffs, the sea and sky are colorful, the blue waves of the angry sea, and the unsightly view.
During the Southern Song Dynasty, which dates back more than 700 years, there was a fierce battle here, which not only completely destroyed the Song Dynasty that lasted for three hundred years, but also completely changed the pattern of Chinese history, and if we want to understand this war, we must first talk about a person.
This person was the last emperor of the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhao Fu.
At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, there were three emperors, although they were called emperors, but they were actually more like difficult brothers.
When the Song Dynasty was strong, when the emperor was a graceful and luxurious beautiful errand, and when the dynasty fell, being an emperor became a high-risk occupation.
Emperor Gong was captured by the Mongols at Lin'an and surrendered.
The remaining Southern Song Dynasty ministers fled to Jiangnan, and Zhao Yun became emperor, Zhao Yun did not work for long, accidentally fell into the water, rescued and frightened, and received a bento in two days.
Zhao Yun was also dead.
At this time, although the Southern Song Dynasty had been swept to the sea by the Mongol army, there were still many civilian and military generals following, and there were many loyal and courageous soldiers who were willing to advance and retreat together, as if they were still a small imperial court, so even if they had been forced to the end of the road, there seemed to be a glimmer of life.
Since there was a glimmer of life, the imperial court could not go a day without an emperor.
As the only remaining bloodline of the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhao Fu naturally became the new emperor.
He was only seven years old that year.
Of course, people cannot hope that as soon as a seven-year-old child ascends the throne, he will be able to rule the martial arts and turn the tide, turn the tide of the tide, save the situation from falling, and help the building to fall.
Supporting Zhao Fu as emperor was only to regard him as the mascot of the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty, making the people at the bottom look as if the Southern Song Dynasty was still like that.
If you want to save this dynasty whose life is on the line, you have to rely on yourself.
Zhao Fu had just ascended the throne on the front foot, and the Mongol army on the back foot was chasing after him, and there was no way, when the imperial chancellor Lu Xiufu and the taifu Zhang Shijie had to continue to flee with the little emperor, they panicked and ran to the vicinity of the cliff mountain in Jiangmen City.
Here, the Civil and Military Officials rested for a while and established a new small court of the Southern Song Dynasty, intending to continue to fight against the Mongol Yuan.
But the settled ministers soon heard bad news that Wen Tianxiang, a Southern Song general who had fought against the Mongol army in Jiangxi, had been captured.
This is undoubtedly bad news for everyone, Brother Wen is so fierce, let the Mongols clean up, do we still have hope for the defeat of this group of remnants?
Soon, the Mongols gathered their armies and opened up the cliff mountain in a mighty way, forming a three-sided encirclement of the cliff mountain.
Saying that it is surrounded on three sides is actually a siege to death.
Because Cliff Mountain is a topography, there are roads on three sides and the sea on one side.
The Mongol army surrounded the three sides of the road, which was equivalent to directly catching turtles in an urn.
Lu Xiufu was a courtier, and he was very good at governing the country and the state, but leading the troops to fight was really not his strength, so the task of resisting the enemy army was handed over to the hands of The Taifu Zhang Shijie.
Lu Xiufu (left) Zhang Wenjie (right)
But what we need to know is that the position of Taifu is also a civilian position, equivalent to a special teacher of the royal family, specializing in teaching the prince to read and be reasonable, and there is no half-cent relationship with leading soldiers to fight.
But there is no way, the Southern Song Dynasty government turned over and adjusted, there are only two people left, who are you not on?
Zhang Shijie, who was under great pressure, began to think day and night about ways to break the enemy, and some strategists suggested that he should camp on the cliff mountain and look for a weak breakthrough for the Mongolian army.
This opinion is very pertinent, because the Government of the Southern Song Dynasty at this time can be said to be called Heaven and Earth, and it seems that there is no other choice but to break through from the ground, and it cannot always jump into the sea, right?
However, Zhang Shijie quickly rejected this opinion, believing that if the military camp was built on land, it would cause some soldiers who were afraid of fighting to sneak away, so he not only did not set up camp on land, but also burned all the original palaces, houses and other buildings on land.
The fire is soaring, and the cliffs and mountains at night are illuminated like day.
There was no way to stay on land, and Zhang Shijie decided to move the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty to the sea.
Thousands of Ships of the Song Army were firmly connected by iron cables, fixed to the sea, and connected into a man-made "sea land".
Seeing this scene, is it a bit familiar?
Yes. This scene of iron ropes and boats also appeared in the Battle of Chibi in the Three Kingdoms period.
History has proved countless times that whoever connects the warships is dying.
Warships are warships, and the purpose of making warships is to give play to the characteristics of warships with small size, fast movement, and combat flexibility, and to connect these warships together is definitely not a clever method. Because this is equivalent to turning a parallel circuit into a series circuit.
(Chain link)
Maybe you don't know what string parallel is, then I can tell you in a simpler way.
A warship that fights alone will die one to the death. And the warships that are connected, as long as one has an accident, a nest is finished.
When Zhou Lang broke Cao, the method used was to use a small boat full of thatch and flammable materials to rush straight to Cao Cao's iron cable giant ship, and the small fire boat touched the big ship, and directly lit cao Cao's large ship phalanx.
Ready-made strategies and ways of playing are placed there, and they do not need to be used in vain.
Therefore, the Mongols did the same, and also prepared several small boats, rushing towards the fleet of the Southern Song Dynasty.
But the Mongols did not expect that time changed, the vicissitudes of the sea, the society was progressing, the times were developing, and the big ships of the Southern Song Dynasty would certainly not honestly wait for you to crash, you to burn. The soldiers pre-coated the hull with thick silt, causing the Mongolian small boat to crash into the fleet, but because of the silt barrier, the fire could not spread.
The fire did not succeed, the Mongols had another plan, and the Mongolian warships were all launched into the water and surrounded a circle, just trapping the Southern Song Dynasty fleet in the circle.
Blockade, isolation, I will trap you at sea, cut off water and food, I see what you do.
This time the Southern Song Dynasty has no ruts, the so-called soldiers will come to block, water to cover the ground, you have policies and I have countermeasures, but you cut me off food, cut off my water, do not give me food to eat, who can stand this?
Seeing that the Morale of the Song Army was getting lower and lower, the Mongolian Army decided to launch a general offensive.
At this time to fight the Southern Song Dynasty, it is really like a kitchen knife cutting cabbage, it is easy.
Hundreds of thousands of Southern Song Dynasty soldiers, fleeing all the way south, going in the wind and rain, worried and frightened, now even a mouthful of hot soup, hot rice can not eat, such a team, what combat effectiveness to resist the attack of the Mongolian army?
If this is only an objective problem with the Southern Song army, then the real reason for the failure of the Southern Song army is because the soldiers lost one of the most important things.
The name of this thing is hope.
Thousands of miles of fertile land, thousands of miles of rivers and mountains, lost the hands of the enemy army, fled south hopelessly, trapped in the cliff mountain, want to do a desperate fight.
Perhaps these Southern Song Dynasty soldiers already knew their end from the beginning of this road of escape.
The Southern Song Dynasty could not be saved, and the fate that awaited it was only destruction.
Rather than establishing the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty in the south to restore the glory of the empire, it is better to say that this is just the self-consolation of these patriotic loyalists and soldiers.
They still harbor unrealistic illusions that as long as there is a breath, there is still hope for the Southern Song Dynasty.
But even this small glimmer of hope, the Mongolian army will not give them again.
In 1279, on March 19, the fierce Battle of Yashan ended with a full victory for the Mongol army.
(Battle of Yashan)
Lu Xiufu, the prime minister, threw himself into the sea on his back, and 100,000 soldiers and civilians jumped into the sea one after another, which led to the scene at the beginning of the article.
The Southern Song Dynasty, after all, is still dead, and the two Song Emperors series has also come to an end, but as an author, I am still a little reluctant.
To sum up, my impression of the emperors of the two Song Dynasties is not very good, from the founding of Zhao Kuangyin to the surrender of Zhao Fu to the sea, in 320 years, a total of 19 emperors were born, they have different lives, different legends, but without exception there is no particularly capable emperor.
Taizu had the right to plot, but he did not think about the future generations.
Renzong is an old and good man, but he is only the lord of shoucheng.
Huizong played, Duzong was stupid, Ningzong was cowardly..., counting and counting, you will find that there is not a single Wenzhi martial artist.
I'm not a critic of history, and I'm not a Song Black, but these emperors of the two Song Dynasties are really unspiring.
I don't think I can blame these emperors, because history is a general trend, and the emperor seems to be the lord of the world, but the emperor also has many things that cannot be changed and cannot be decided.
People often say that the Song Dynasty was a weak Song, and the emperor of the Song Dynasty was also a weak emperor, but in fact, under the pattern of chaotic strife, under the impact of Liao, Jin, Western Xia, and Mongolia, who can be perfect?
How an emperor should be a good emperor, how an emperor should do and how to be a good emperor, but in fact, everyone's life is different, the emperor is also a person, it is just a common man.
What kind of dynasty is a good dynasty? What kind of emperor is a success?
As the writer Mingyue said in that year:
There is only one success – to live life on your own terms.