Late Tang Dynasty Floating Life

Chapter 1678 Aftermath
Throughout July and August, court officials above rank five were extremely busy.

In addition to normal work, there are so many things to do in the preparation of the new yamen, the selection of personnel, the handover of work, the division of interests, etc., that they put most of their energy on it.

Compared with the court officials in the Southern Yamen, the Lifan Yuan and the Privy Council in the Bei Ya are much more relaxed.

Their most recent work is related to the three cities of Mobei.

The westernmost part is Linyuan City, which is located in the area of ​​Khobdo in later generations. The city has a circumference of more than eight miles. In addition to the [-] forbidden horse and infantry soldiers stationed in rotation, after two years of operation, more than [-] households of Han and Han people have reclaimed and reclaimed the city. settle down.

Khobdo is a good place. There are forests, rivers, lakes, and mountains. The terrain is relatively conducive to defense. The agricultural and animal husbandry resources are rich enough. Later generations of the Qing army still fished, hunted, and farmed here to provide supplies for the Western Expeditionary Army. ——The grassland is generally dry, but if you search carefully, you can still find some areas suitable for farming.

Heichengzi is ready-made, but it has undergone reconstruction. The city is about [-] miles around. At present, there are more than [-] settled households who live by growing rye and millet and grazing cattle and sheep.

This city is probably the central core of the three cities in Mobei, and it is more convenient to assist in any direction.

Heichengzi is a common name, and the current big name is "Supreme City".

The city of Kedun on the east side is more than ten miles away, and now there are only five or six hundred households, half of which are Khitan, and half are immigrants from Hedong and Hebei.

In order to avoid confusion with the Hun family's Ketun city at the northern foot of Yinshan Mountain, the city was renamed "Suiyuan".

After entering the second ten days of July, the area around Suiyuan City was repeatedly invaded by border invaders.There were not only the Khitans under Abaoji's tent, but also the Tatar and Shiwei tribes who were drawn and seduced by him, or felt that they could not bear the "squeeze" and "control" of Daxia.

After hearing the news and inviting the saints, the Privy Council of the South and North Yamen immediately issued an order to dispatch troops. The forbidden army sent [-] horsemen, [-] soldiers from Liaodong Prefecture, and [-] soldiers from various tribes, and went north to search for the enemy.

However, before the main army was assembled, a vanguard of the Liaodong Army had just arrived, and before they had time to fight, many Khitans and vassal tribes came to surrender.

They are not dominated by tribes, but are divided into small clans. It seems that the internal opinions are not unified. Some people are willing to surrender, some are not, and there is chaos.

After the interrogation, it was learned that A Baoji had already led people far away, and this time he went south to loot, but he was just grabbing something before leaving.

The vanguard sent people to pursue them and intercepted many tribes that were running slowly.Seeing that they could not escape, they surrendered.

The imperial court ordered all the descendants to be slaves, and no accidents caused a rebellion. After a long fight, most of them surrendered again. After being dispersed, they were sent to the states of Liaodong to serve as slaves to the government soldiers.

With such a group of people here, the Liaodong Dao's fubing trilogy is basically complete.

From the end of the Tang Dynasty to the fifth year of Tongguang, in the 30 to 5000 years, miscellaneous names were continuously placed, and the historical debts have basically been made up to this point. This year, among the last 3000 people of the Fengguo Army, 2000 people were transferred to the various ministries of the Forbidden Army. The remaining [-] people went to Muzhou to serve as soldiers.

Counting the Anton Mansion, there are a total of 20 soldiers and [-] households.Liaodong is deformed, no doubt, like a large slavery society.

In this society, there are a small number of superiors, half of normal people, nearly half of de facto slaves, plus some savages, mixed races, savage and ferocious, and it will take at least a few decades of stability before they can completely blend and digest and become a stable society. territory.

Fortunately, the Great Xia Dynasty, like the rising sun, had this time to accumulate.

******
On the fifth day of September, Shao Shude personally convened officials from the Northern and Southern Yamen and the Eastern Palace to discuss the fiscal and taxation reform draft put forward by Zhao Guangfeng and Xiao Yun in Guanfeng Hall.

The Prince himself was also present.

After traveling abroad for so long, he has a deeper understanding of the sufferings of the people and a clearer understanding of the actual situation of the low-level officialdom.Shao Shude once had a long talk with him, and found that his son's governance philosophy has also changed accordingly, and he was very satisfied. It seems that it is necessary to go out more to have a look.

Before discussing the draft fiscal and taxation reforms, Shao Shude looked at Yang Juan, taking advantage of the news from the grasslands in the north, and asked: "Yang Qing, I have kept the memorials about the taxes and labors of the various tribes in the grasslands that you handed over. Thinking about going for such a long time, I think it is still necessary to implement it carefully.”

"What orders does Your Majesty have?" Yang Jue asked.

"Several tribes responded to Abaoji this time, why?" Shao Shude asked back.

"The grassland tribes don't accept discipline. Even if they are frightened by Tianwei for a while, they will still repeat themselves after a long time." Yang Jue replied.

Shao Shude nodded, and asked again: "Are there many tribes like this?"

"not much."

In fact, the situation is obvious.Most of the tribes were not subdued, but followed the crowd and came to Heichengzi to participate in the national meeting and elected Shao Shude as the Supreme Khan.

But there are hundreds of people, all kinds of people, there are always some people who are not convinced, dare to risk the displeasure of the world, collude with foreign enemies, and suddenly rise up.

Fortunately, there are only a small number of such people, and the grassland political ethics have not been completely destroyed.

But as Yang Jue said, because of the frequent wars, the grassland tribes are under a lot of pressure, and dissatisfaction has been accumulating. Even though last year's disaster relief and a wave of goodwill, it only made most people feel a little relieved.

If heavy taxes are levied at this time, there will definitely be a situation where the officials force the people to oppose them, because they are really poor.

"In the three cities of Mobei, each has a town envoy and an official office of the Lifan Court, and they are divided into dozens of tribes." Shao Shude said: "The order goes down, and each tribe can have a little sexual intercourse, and it will be paid for by livestock and skins. You can consider the specific amount. "

According to Shao Shude's original intention, the tribes of the grassland can be completely exempted from tax, because they really don't like their wealth.

The same is true in some places in the Mainland.For example, the imperial court will not take a penny of taxes from Anxi Road at all, and even provide more subsidies to speed up local construction.

The same goes for the Mobei Grassland, which is divided into three parts, there is no need to use their money.

But whether to use it or not is one thing, and whether to accept it or not is another.

Officials, garrisons, and tax collection are the three symbols of actual control and even sovereignty.

The guards of Linyuan, Wushang, and Suiyuan are in charge of military affairs, and Meilu sent by Lifanyuan is in charge of civil affairs. Each of the three cities has [-] imperial guards stationed. The first two sovereignties have been exercised, and now only the last one remains collect taxes.

The tax still has to be collected, even if it is a symbolic payment, even if the tax is still used on them in the end, this process must be done.

The Lifanyuan system headed by Yang Jue had previously formulated a detailed taxation plan for the grasslands, and even specified how many livestock and skins a certain tribe had to pay.

The plan is very detailed, which shows that after a few years, they have a clearer understanding of the situation in the Mobei Grassland, which is very good.The only problem is that the tax charged is a bit heavy, basically according to the "tithe" standard.It may be okay in a short period of time, but there will definitely be troubles after a long time-even if you don’t dare to rebel, can’t I go?
"I obey the order." Yang Jue and several subordinates looked at each other and decided to go back and revise the taxation standard.

For the poorer tribes, just hand over ten or eight horses, cows, and camels.

Richer tribes pay slightly more.

The livestock collected as taxes were distributed to the three cities and handed over to the local Meilu for management as a supplement to the official herdsmen.

When there are too many livestock raised by the government, some of them are sold to the Central Plains, where they are exchanged for luxury goods such as tea, porcelain, and silk, and then sold to nobles in the grasslands. etc.

In the eyes of the sage, the status of the entire Mobei Grassland is the same as that of Anxi Road, a place that needs financial subsidies.

"What does the prince think?" Shao Shude looked at his son and asked again.

"Your Majesty, I once visited the Great Xianbei Mountains, and the tribes in the grasslands are indeed suffering." Shao Chengjie said: "They participated in the five-year western expedition for at least three years, which was very exhausting. Many people even became slaves and leaders. Grazing, life plummeted. Otherwise, A Baoji would not be able to instigate so many people to rebel with him. Now that the fiscal and taxation reform has been completed, I have no objection to the plan implemented in the Han area, but feel that the taxation on the grassland is too heavy. It’s a heavy tax, which I think is very good, but it’s just a little money, and the tens of thousands of people in Mobei can still be supported by the imperial court.”

Shao Shude smiled and said, "That's right. You can't just look at small profits when doing things, but have a big picture."

To put it bluntly, it is a question of resource allocation.

Rich areas feel that their hard-earned money is being used by the court to subsidize people they have never met, and they must feel uncomfortable.

Not only China is like this, but foreigners are also unhappy.

Take Germany as an example. Part of the tax paid by the wealthy Bavaria state will be used by the government to subsidize the poor brothers of the former East Germany. Are you happy?

But the country, always bear for the country.Anxi, Grassland, and central Guizhou must be losing money financially, but what can you do?Give it all up?Obviously impossible.

"A Baoji is afraid of Master Wang, and leads the crowd to flee, where do you think he will go?" Shao Shude asked again.

"I'm sure he ran west." Shao Chengjie said, "It's just like the old Tatar story."

The westward migration of the Tatar tribes began when the Uighurs collapsed.

The demise of the Uyghur Khanate was a major event for the grasslands and had a profound impact.

The Khitan and Xi people in the eastern part of the Khanate rose successively. After some contests, the Xi people were defeated and became vassals. , mighty.

Perhaps it was the rise of the Khitan that caused the turmoil of the Thirty Tatars, so wave after wave of westward migration began.

Now that the Khitan has been destroyed by the Great Xia, the momentum of the Tatars' westward migration has weakened, but there are always some people who do not want to continue to move westward with a government on their heads.

If I can't go due west, then I will go north first, then west, and I will run anyway.

To these people, Shao Shude's attitude is that if they didn't surrender before, let them go.

Those who surrender and then run away, send people to chase them, and forget it if they can't catch up.

The leader of the tribe that was chased was executed, and some of the tribe gave the tribe as a reward, some were sent to Liaodong as trilogy, and some became official slaves, grazing cattle and sheep for the three cities and even farming.

Overall, his attitude is still very relaxed.

The westward migration of the tribe stems from a strong sense of insecurity, because the east is too far away, and they are obviously not weak, but they have no confidence to stay in the local life.

All the tribes that migrated to the west can fight.In history, there were tribes closely related to the Khitan people who moved westward to Ukraine in one breath and gained the right to rule.This is not easy. A Mongolian-speaking tribe goes to an unfamiliar place, surrounded by Turkic-speaking tribes. It is actually very powerful to conquer a world.

Let them go, go to the west, because of the population disadvantage, they will eventually be assimilated, and Feila can't bear it.And the space they left behind actually eased the conflict between man and land in the grassland.

In the future, if the descendants of Daxia look westward, they may be able to gain some connections.

"Are you so sure that Abaoji is going west?" Shao Shude thought about it carefully, and felt that the possibility was not small.

"Abaoji has lost all his battles and defeats in the Great Xianbei Mountains. He should have lost confidence." Shao Chengjie said, "If you don't run, you are waiting for death. If you run, you still have a chance."

Shao Shude thought about it, and it was true.

When the Khitan was conquered that year, there were 20 people around A Baoji, and the remnants were collected one after another, and the number of people should be more than 30.

Afterwards, his strength is hard to judge.

In the area of ​​the Great Xianbei Mountains, he annexed most of the Wugu people and the Yu people through military conquest and political win-win.For the next few years, the unsatisfactory battle on the battlefield caused him to lose a lot of Dingkou cattle and sheep, and many tribesmen went south to join Xia.

But then he recruited the rebellious Shiwei tribes, and possibly annexed some Tatars, and his whereabouts were erratic. Who knows how many people he still has.

If this group of people went west, Shao Shude doubted whether the Shrigas and Ogus could withstand it, and it would probably be a bit difficult.

However, this may also be a good opportunity for the Great Xia court to intervene.

Just wait.

"Pay close attention to A Baoji's whereabouts." Shao Shude said: "But don't spend too much energy. So many people move westward, and after a long time, they will always show their feet. Don't worry. Now, let's clarify the taxation of the grassland tribes first. , perfect it."

"The minister obeys the order." Everyone responded one after another.

Shao Shude nodded, got up and left.

Tomorrow he will be heading west out of town.

The Persians departing from Bukhara are about to arrive in Luoyang, and he wants to greet them in person.

(End of this chapter)