Great Warriors of Sui and Tang Dynasties

Chapter 1060
Xuanzheng Hall.

"Your Majesty, the Tubo mission has arrived in Luoyang at noon, and the group has been arranged by Honglu Temple in the west city."

Emperor Luo Cheng didn't lift his head when he heard this, he was still looking at the goods list of the Fulin Kingdom and the Persian Kingdom Business Group in front of him.

"These Tubo people can really walk this way. It takes several months to walk, and they arrive in Luoyang City on the second day of the first lunar month. Don't you think they got stuck on purpose? point?"

Admiral Li Xian said, "According to the normal itinerary, they should have arrived in Luoyang years ago, but they were delayed for a long time in Chang'an and other places. It was indeed a deliberate delay of the Zhengdan Grand Court Meeting."

The Zhengdan Grand Court Meeting is a grand ceremonial ceremony of the Great Qin Dynasty. On this day, the envoys from all over the country will gather to worship the emperor, and at the same time, the envoys from all directions and the princes from all over the world will also congratulate together.

But the envoys from Tubo missed the Zhengdan Grand Court Meeting. You said they missed it, but they arrived in Luoyang in the second year of junior high school, so they missed that day.

They wrote a form of surrender to the Great Qin Emperor, claiming to be a vassal, willing to be a vassal of the Great Qin, but on the other side they deliberately got stuck and refused to participate in the Zhengdan Great Court Meeting. The behavior of the Tubo people made Luo Cheng not know how to evaluate it.

"After all, the Tubo people are still not convinced. They were not really defeated by our Qin army. Therefore, although they retreated to the plateau and kissed the princess, they still think that they did not lose to us last time." The emperor stroked his short beard.

"Saint, but Tubo really sent 5000 yaks, 1 sheep, [-] taels of gold and [-] taels of silver this time, not to mention the Princess Saimaga, who was indeed born of Tubo Zanpu, Still the eldest daughter."

5000 taels of gold and 1 taels of silver are already a lot of money, not to mention 20 yaks and [-] sheep, which add up to more than [-] guan.

For individuals, this is indeed a lot of money, but for Emperor Luo Cheng, and for the Great Qin court, it is not worth mentioning.

For the Beiya imperial army in Daqin, the annual support expenditure of a soldier was at least [-] guan, and the annual support expenditure of [-] soldiers exceeded the sum of the money and livestock sent by the Tubo people.

"Your Majesty, Tubo can't be compared with our Great Qin. Daqin now has more than 5000 million households and a population of more than 20 million, but the population of Tubo is only one million, and its soldiers are only 5000. The money of [-] guan is distributed to a population of one million. In fact, each person has to share [-] yuan. This is no better than Daqin's [-] million population, which only costs [-] yuan.

"Haha, so to speak, it is true."

Luo Cheng thought for a while, "The Ministry of Internal Affairs sent people over to prepare for the reception of the Tubo princess into the palace. They can satisfy whatever requirements they have."

The emperor was more concerned about the goods brought by the Tubo mission. "Send someone to have a good chat with the Tubo mission. We can eat all the goods they brought."

Whether it is a business group from the Western Regions, a mission from Tubo, or a mission from Silla, Baekje and Dongying, or a mission from various tribes on the grassland.

Generally, the missions of various ministries will bring a lot of commercial goods over, and in the name of tribute, they will pay tribute to the imperial court with these local products.Of course, the Chinese tradition cannot take advantage of these vassal states, so they will give back.

In fact, this is a kind of trade in disguise, but it does not directly talk about trade, but about tribute rewards. Generally speaking, the rewards from China will always be more valuable than the things brought by the vassals.

But it does not mean that the Central Plains suffered a disadvantage, because most of the things brought by the vassal state were considered special products. These goods were monopolized by the imperial court, and then put on the market for sale.

Therefore, this tributary trade system is liked by the vassal states and the imperial court. It is a kind of international trade of goods monopolized by the imperial court.

Of course, in addition to the goods brought by the state, the vassal states will also have ministers of missions who will bring a batch of goods. These goods are privately owned by the officials or merchants of the vassal state. It is much more convenient, and sometimes even customs clearance taxes can be saved.

For these goods, the imperial court usually eats most of them, and then deliberately keeps some in the market, and also gives domestic merchants a little bit of profit.

Regardless of whether it is tribute or entrainment, in short, this is considered international trade, coupled with the arrival of various caravans and caravans, making Daqin finally begin to have international trade again since the Sui Dynasty.

Luo Cheng attaches great importance to this international trade. In this era, the longer the trade is, the more goods that are not available in the Central Plains can be traded, which also means that these goods are rare and valuable.

For example, the spices brought by merchants from the Western Regions, and the frosting sugar brought by the Tubo people this time, these are things that are not yet available in Daqin.

Spices are even more expensive than gold, and the frosting sugar produced in Tianzhu is also extremely expensive. The transaction of this kind of thing brings great profits.

If the imperial court controls the transactions of these commodities, it can directly earn a fortune. It does not monopolize the transactions of these commodities and draws taxes from them, and it can also receive a lot of taxes.

During the Tang Dynasty, a prime minister, Yuan Zai, hoarded hundreds of shi of spices, which was widely spread at that time.

To put it bluntly, international trade can not only stimulate the export of domestic commodities such as porcelain and silk to earn gold and silver in exchange for spices and frosting sugar, but also increase tax revenue for the court.The growth of the export industry will inevitably drive the development of these industries in the country.

The emperor now designated Xishi, one of the three cities in Luoyang, as a special market for international trade, whether it was Silla Baekje or Dongying in Haidong, or Xiqishi Wei Tiele in the grassland, or the countries in the Western Regions, or even Whether it's Persia and Fulin in Western Taixi, or Linyi, Tubo and other southern barbarians, the merchants of all countries are traded in the Western Market.

"The Maritime Silk Road routes in southeast ports such as Guangzhou and Jiaozhi have not yet matured. When the Maritime Silk Road matures, it will directly connect Tianzhu and Persia. At that time, it will be able to bring greater trade volume."

The most direct benefit of trade is money, which can increase income for the imperial court, including income from trade, income from shipping, and even industrial and commercial tax income brought about by the development of the foreign trade industry.

Money is needed to do everything, and the court is short of money right now. If the income from trade can be greatly increased, then Luo Cheng can reduce the current extremely high salt tax, so that the people will no longer be so dissatisfied with the salt price .

Among the goods brought by the Tubo people this time, the frosting sugar produced in Tianzhu is the most. This thing is actually white sugar produced from sugar cane.At this time, the Central Plains did not have white sugar refining and decolorization technology, and the color of the sugar produced was darker and yellower.In fact, the cream sugar produced by Tianzhu people is not white enough, but yellowish granulated sugar, but it is still pursued by the noble officials and wealthy people in the Central Plains.

Luo Cheng remembered that refining brown sugar from sugar cane, and decolorizing and refining white sugar seemed not too difficult. He vaguely remembered that he could use loess water or something to filter and decolorize. Luo Cheng felt that he could think about it carefully when he had time, and then gave this idea to the servant The people in the province should study it. If the formula is found, the royal family can establish a frosting workshop at that time. At that time, they can produce their own frosting sugar to grab the local market, and even sell it to Tianzhu and Persia.

"Decree to Taifu Temple Trading Department, this time when business groups from various feudal states come, they must do a good job in receiving them, and tell them that trade is a long-term business, don't just focus on making money and make a one-shot deal, it must flow steadily to attract more Many Hu merchants came to trade."

(End of this chapter)