Since the Accounting: A Chronicle of the Roman Khanate

Chapter 570 Folk Customs
Now, Majiazhuang is the largest village in the nearby area. Their industry is also relatively simple, which is to grow wheat and other crops at the request of the government.

Therefore, in this regard, Majiazhuang villagers are more experienced and their organization is relatively better.

The unit of 100 households was originally a military-civilian establishment. When the Purple Horde Khanate was first established, Guo Gai and others directly copied the names of ancient Rome from the book in order to facilitate everyone's understanding, and made some changes based on the experience of the Central Plains. Of course, at the grassroots level, the situation in Rome and Seris is actually not much different. They both unify military units and administrative units. Theoretically, a village governed by one hundred households would provide an army of one hundred households.

In the ancient Roman Republic, this kind of centurion was even more important because it was still a political unit. At the Centuria Congress, each centurion had one vote to elect consuls, censors and other senior officials, and also had the most important power to declare war and pass laws.

Scholars in the Purple Horde generally believe that although their cultural level was not as good as that of the Greeks at that time, these Romans had a very thorough understanding of power. The basis of power is violence, and voting rights are an exchange, allowing participants to abandon violent means and agree on the final solution in a peaceful and orderly manner.

The power of an individual citizen is relatively limited, and the Centurion has the right to vote. The reason is actually that a single citizen does not have a strong ability to oppose. However, there are only dozens of Centuries in Rome. One Centurion can really turn a proposal into useless paper. Therefore, we must give them a platform to express their opinions peacefully and a relatively fair process.

On the contrary, if there is no corresponding violence behind this right to vote, it will be meaningless. Just like some Italian city-states now, they are just signs that rich and powerful people can find casually. Even Rome itself, with the expansion of its scale and the surge of its army, the votes of this centurion assembly were increasingly losing value. The current situation is as an ordinary administrative unit.

In reality, it is difficult to say how many people a hundred households have. Changes in administrative divisions involve a lot of things and are often troublesome, so the government always tends to do as little as possible. Now the administrative management of the Purple Horde Khanate is becoming increasingly mature, and everyone joins the army according to their household registration population. The selection of field troops from local garrison soldiers is not limited to where they come from. Therefore, there are many people but few people, and gradually no one cares about it.

In actual operation, a place like Majiazhuang with 500 to 600 households is already too large, and it is difficult to manage it in detail at the 100-household level. However, they also have some spontaneously formed organizations to fill these gaps.

The most common organization is a joint venture group called a "society". This concept appeared very early in the Central Plains, and there were many records in the Han Dynasty at the latest. Since the late Spring and Autumn Period, iron farm tools began to appear and spread rapidly, and plowing cattle and plowing horses were also more widely used. On the one hand, this improved farming efficiency, and on the other hand, it also made the initial cost of cultivating land much higher. . When a single family cannot afford it, some people will naturally choose to organize themselves together to purchase more advanced farm tools and raise livestock together to improve farming efficiency.

In the local history of Eastern Europe, this situation has basically never happened. First of all, it's because of the lack of technology. After all, if you rely on manpower every day and hold a traditional Slavic wooden stick farm tool, then there is really no need to organize farm cooperatives or hire a plowing team...

However, this farming method at that time required two oxen to work in teams. Some people did not have the financial resources, so Zhao Guo advocated using labor exchange or calculating work value to organize people and cattle. It can be seen that as far back as that era, this kind of organization was already very popular and was accepted by the government.

"Tan", therefore, there are organizations such as "Tian She", "Zhou Tan" and even "Lao Lao Tan" (everyone jointly pays for people to serve as li fathers).

On the contrary, after the collapse of the Han Dynasty, people were forced to gather in Wubao Manor for military and security reasons, and a self-sufficient, closed and introverted economy was formed. But this state was actually very inefficient, and even the ancients at the time didn't like it. So much so that some Wubao owners themselves, after deciding that the world wanted peace, wanted to actively abandon Wubao and return to a normal economic model.

In the last years of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, in order to restore the country's strength, he appointed Zhao Guo as the Captain of Susu, responsible for improving agricultural technology. Zhao Guo synthesized the technology at that time and proposed the "Shidai Method". He experimented on the open space in the palace and achieved success. Then demonstrations were carried out on public fields and the fields of people with titles, so that officials, three elders and others from all over Guanzhong and the northwest came to learn, and then went back to teach the people. This is also a standard process that has been carried out by governments throughout the ages.

These associations also had a lot of influence on folk customs. The Yi Zhou Shu called it "eating together, playing together, and farming together". The people were used to organizing cooperation, often farming together, and having dinner together from time to time. The government was also affected. Some contracts were signed by officials after notarization, and the court's policies would also be taken into consideration.

By the Han Dynasty, this phenomenon had become very common. Judging from the bamboo slips left at that time, many people would choose to engage in agriculture and commerce in partnership, and would make oaths and sign contracts in the "community" for sacrifices. This kind of organization is called a "community" or

This kind of folk behavior is actually a kind of self-organizing ability. Although it is called a "small farmer economy" in name, under this model, the people are not closed-minded at all. On the contrary, there are always many voluntary organizations, and everyone is willing to engage in commercial and operational work in their spare time.

Of course, cultural and institutional influences are also important. The Europeans were not completely inventive. They also made some heavy agricultural tools like the Saxon wheel plow. As the name suggests, this kind of plow is so heavy that it needs a two-wheeled frame like a gun carriage as a support to move and work.

Wheel plows of different sizes require different amounts of animal power, which seems to range from eight to twelve oxen. There are also mixed methods such as four horses and six oxen, or four horses and four oxen, but they are certainly not affordable for ordinary farmers. A smaller heavy plow also requires at least two oxen. However, the invention and spread of these agricultural tools did not allow local people to form the same cooperative methods as in the Han Dynasty. Instead, they allowed wealthy nobles to annex land faster.

As for horses, although horse farming seems to be a European characteristic, according to later statistical data, in the Middle Ages, only 5% of the cultivated land was cultivated by horses at most. The main reason is that horses are too expensive. For example, the Dalke family in Donremi Village is specifically described as "farmers who plow the land with horses" because their family is actually quite wealthy and can even plow the land with horses. In most places, even if horse plowing is more efficient, people cannot afford it. They can only make do with oxen, donkeys, or even manpower. Moreover, in backward places like England, heavy plows were not popular. Everyone still adheres to the methods of their ancestors and uses the light plow brought by the ancient Romans more than a thousand years ago. The situation in the Rus' region was similar. It wasn't until several hundred years later that the Germans brought their farming methods to the Volga River Basin before they finally reclaimed the land. As for the local original Slavs, they had no domestic animals, so they would definitely die from exhaustion if they had to pull the plow by themselves. So the conclusion is not to plow, just lie flat.

Until the establishment of the Red Horde Khanate, farm animals were scarce assets. During the confrontation between the Ulan Army and the Chahan Army, the Ulan Army once ordered a ban on the use of poison gas in villages. On the one hand, it was because most of the soldiers had poor education and would not use it; another important reason was that some villages had Horses exist. While Slavic peasants were worthless, horses were too valuable to be killed with weapons of mass destruction. Therefore, the Ulan Army usually uses mild means such as taking hostages to force villages to cooperate with them. As a result, many villagers abandoned the more brutal Chahan Army and supported them in their final victory. You can imagine what it was like before.

Investigating the reason, Guo Kang himself doubted whether it was a problem with the iron. Compared with other places in the world, the special thing about Seris is that the technology of using blast furnaces to produce iron in large quantities has been there for a long time.

The iron used in agricultural tools has very high requirements for hardness and wear resistance, and also pays great attention to output and low cost, and does not care much about the quality of other aspects. This is just suitable for early pig iron. Perhaps because of this, the popularity of iron farm tools in the Central Plains was very early, and may even be earlier than iron weapons. Just like the drainage needs of shallow coal mines gave birth to the industrial era, the local iron mines also promoted the rapid development of agriculture. It was forced out of poor quality iron ore...

These technologies also provide the basis for new organizational methods. The various rapid developments during the Warring States Period and the emergence of these technologies should also promote each other. This kind of organizational ability naturally has many benefits in the military.

Even here now, it can be easily seen that those who are accustomed to various organized activities can adapt to war faster. On the battlefield, their discipline and reaction speed are far better than those of European farmers who are confused and citizens who always react inexplicably. If you think about it carefully, in addition to regular training, there should also be factors in this regard.

These habits will also affect the character of the local people. As the saying goes, the soil and water support the people, and that's probably it.

Villagers like Majiazhuang have developed the habit of organizing themselves at any time as needed through a generation of continuous attempts. Guo Kang previously felt that this period of time did not seem to be long in a traditional agricultural society. But judging from the situation here, this period of time has been enough for their thinking to change, and they are much more active than their neighbors.

Organizing plowing teams, leasing livestock, and hiring craftsmen to perform specialized technical work are all common activities in the village. Many of the measures taken by Xianggongmiao Village were learned from them.

The initiative of these people is also more obvious than that of their neighbors. On the one hand, as long as they are interested, they will do their best in whatever they do. Even if their village is not the richest here, the villagers are still willing to spend money in key places. They will take the initiative to squeeze out money, build more schools, hire teachers and instructors to train their children, hoping to lay a solid foundation and gain an advantage in future competition within the army.

On the other hand, they will also be very active on other issues. Everyone knows where the special status of Xianggongmiao Village comes from, and generally does not compete with them. However, the people in Majiazhuang are very "progressive" and have always been unconvinced by this. They feel that their village is just more lucky. If you replace yourself, you can do the same thing.

Therefore, these villagers appear to be both shrewd and reckless. They are not afraid of Xianggongmiao Village, who has a close relationship with the Guo family, and often take the lead in fighting for good things; but every time they choose the opportunity to show their abilities and advantages to their superiors in a systematic way, and if they have the opportunity, they will get close to Zhu Guo and build a relationship. This time, while their family was back, the people from Majiazhuang really started to take action again.

Their village chief, Ma Shizhu, is a sturdy man about forty years old. He used to be a cavalry officer in the army. He has not completely retired yet and is still leading new recruits in the local battle group. He also teaches some veterinary skills, from equestrian skills to taking care of horses. The village's cattle team also had his contribution.

One hundred households in Majiazhuang is another young man named Ma Wanjun. After Ma Shizhu withdrew from the front line of the army, he gave up his position in Baihu.

People in Xianggongmiao Village always said that Ma Shizhu was very cunning, but they were more polite to the taciturn Ma Wanjun because he was very good at fighting. It is said that when he was just twenty years old, he was able to kill the cavalry besieging him with one against three. The first time he became a captain of ten, he killed the Alemannic knight who came to challenge him during a duel. Everyone thinks that he is the most powerful man in Majiazhuang who is most likely to become a general in recent years, so it is inevitable to respect and fear him.

Although their surnames are the same, Ma Shizhu, Ma Wanjun, and even the legendary old village chief Ma Boluo are not relatives of each other, and they even have different ancestry. Ma Baolu and Ma Shizhu could still be considered from Bulgaria, while Ma Wanjun's family simply moved here from the south of the Balkan Mountains. It's just that everyone has settled here and all have the surname Ma after the river, so they call each other with the same surname, which increases the friendship between neighbors. But in fact, they are not from the same family by blood.

The name of their village is quite unique, because the village has always believed in worshiping God. The name of the village chief of Mapaolo is a tribute to the apostle Paul. Later, with the spread of Central Plains culture, villagers became more and more proficient in naming, and their use of words gradually became smoother. For example, the ten pillars actually mean the cross; the hosts refer to the Lord of the Hosts. In short, they are all allusions picked out from the scriptures. Although Guo Kang doubts whether this kind of name is arrogant, the fact that he uses allusions to name it also shows that the cultural level of the local villagers is indeed much higher.

(End of this chapter)