Great Zhou Empire: Kill Zhao Kuangyin at the beginning

Chapter 387: Thirty Years of Kaixi (Special thanks to book friend 3321556/Xiaoye2000 for the monthly ticket!)

Five days later, on December 12, the 29th year of Kaixi, Liao ruler Yelu Xian died at the age of 41.

Empress Xiao Chuo and other ministers followed the will and supported Prince of Liang Yelu Longxu to ascend the throne as emperor, and changed the next year to the first year of Tonghe of the Great Liao.

Yelu Xian was given the temple name "Jingzong" and the posthumous title "Ying", and was called "Emperor Jingzong Ying". He was buried in Qianling Mausoleum under the southeastern mountains.

The daughter of the Dongshan leader whom Yelu Longxu married was named Xiao Ya and was promoted to queen.

Since Empress Dowager Xiao took charge of the government, she generally followed the policies of Emperor Jingzong, increased rewards for innovative craftsmen, and expanded trade with the Mayans.

For a time, Liao Dynasty products became the most popular commodities in the Maya continent, earning a lot of money...

At the end of the 29th year of Kaixi, on December 20th, Yan Su, the president of the "Royal Academy of Sciences", rushed back to Bian Jing from Shanghai to report to the emperor.

Chai Zongxun summoned Yan Su to the Yangxin Palace.

After greeting, Yan Su said:
“Your Majesty, I have been discussing and practicing with General Manager Yu at the Shanghai Imperial Shipyard for more than half a year, and finally completed the task of replacing the crossbows of the sailing battleships and large merchant ships with artillery as instructed by Your Majesty!

At present, the Royal Dockyard has completed the modification of 100 Royal Navy warships and has formed a production capacity of modifying 500 ships per month.

Chai Zongxun said happily:

"President Yan and Chief Steward Yu are truly the pillars of the court, and they have done a great job!
The production capacity of this modification is set at 300 battleships and 200 large merchant ships per month.

As for the price of modifying civilian merchant ships, we can just set the cost price this time."

The average cost of each large merchant ship produced by the "Royal Shipyard" in Shanghai was about one thousand taels. It was sold to the "Royal Commercial Group" at cost price and to private businesses for two thousand taels.

After installing the "Yansu Cannon", the cost increased by 6,000 to 8,000 taels. Although it cost a lot of money, the combat power was a qualitative leap.

Knowing that the profits would be more than five times higher if the sea trade routes from Da Zhou to India and Da Shi were opened, private businesses in Da Zhou were naturally willing to spend the money for the modification.

As a result, there are already hundreds of large civilian merchant ships waiting in the harbor of the "Royal Dockyard".

The New Year's Eve of the 30th year of Kaixi arrived in the blink of an eye.

This year's imperial "New Year's Eve Banquet" held in Huangyi Hall was even more lively and grand than in previous years.

In the past two years, Concubine Guo Ling'er and Concubine Liu E both gave birth to princes for the emperor. Together with the princes and princesses born to his other newly married concubines, Chai Zongxun now has 72 princes and 75 princesses.

The banquet was very lively. Chai Zongxun raised his glass to encourage everyone to drink from time to time, and everyone in the imperial family happily wished each other a happy new year.

There are more than 600 singing, dancing and acrobatic troupes from all over the country in the main hall, with a total of more than 50,000 people.

The non-stop performances of these groups kept the royal family dazzled and interested.

While tasting the delicious specialties from all over the Great Zhou, Chai Zongxun looked around at his more than one hundred children with a smile, thinking:

"It is said that the ancient sage King Wen of Zhou had a hundred sons. My empire is also called the Great Zhou, which means "repeating the cycle".

I don't know if it's true that King Wen has a hundred sons, but I'm still young and can definitely give birth to a hundred princes. "I thought again:

"I now understand what Zhu Yuanzhang was thinking in his previous life: when he became emperor, he wanted to take good care of his children and their descendants. However, by the end of the Ming Dynasty, there were too many members of the royal family, and the court could no longer afford their salaries.

It seems that the current system, in which all titles below the rank of prince are demoted by one level each generation, is more reasonable.

Otherwise, if I have so many princes, and they all reproduce from generation to generation, the national treasury will soon be exhausted no matter how much tax revenue it collects. "

As midnight approached, Empress Dowager Fu began to distribute "lucky money" to all the emperor's grandchildren with a smile on her face. What was rare was that she could remember the name of every grandson and granddaughter.

Because Chai Zongxun held the "New Year's Eve Banquet" in the palace every year, the princes and princesses had a rare opportunity to meet each other, and the relationship between them was very close. It was no longer like the princes and princesses of previous dynasties who had been following the rules and confined to the palace since childhood and were like strangers.

With the increase in the number of "Da Zhou Straight Roads" that have been completed and opened to traffic this year, the number of people visiting relatives and friends and traveling across the country during the New Year holiday has increased significantly.

As the territory of the Great Zhou continued to expand, vast areas rich in horse production, such as the Western Regions, Liao, and Central Asia, were incorporated into the country. The national horse production increased greatly, and the price also dropped by more than 50%.

The price of ordinary horses used by ordinary people for travel increased from being more expensive than gold during the Xian De period, when transportation was entirely dependent on walking, to fifty to eighty taels of silver per horse in the early Kai Xi period, and has dropped to twenty to fifty taels this year.

Of course, like the Chinese and Western Arabian horses, due to very high requirements for breeding and raising, the annual output is only a few thousand horses. Naturally, they became "royal horse farms" that exclusively supplied horses to the royal family, senior military generals, princes and ministers, and the price was extremely high.

The Arabian Horse is a hot-blooded horse native to northern Eurasia. It has infinite stamina and endurance. It is a long-distance riding horse as well as a jumping and dressage horse.

The myth of the Western Region Han Blood Horse has been circulating since the Han Dynasty.

Legend has it that the blood flowing from the front of its neck is blood-red; it is known in history as the "blood-sweating horse" that can travel a thousand miles a day. It is also known as the "Dayuan horse" and the "celestial horse". In order to obtain it, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty sent troops to conquer the Western Regions twice.

The history of the Arabian horse can be traced back to 3,000 years ago. It has a light and graceful body, dense hair all over its body, a curved neck, a high and protruding topknot, long shoulders, long and powerful limbs, obvious tendons, and a unique stretching and high-lifting gait, which makes it look noble and outstanding.

The most common colors include blonde, black, dark brown, chestnut, gray, and tan.

When Zhang Qian opened up the Western Regions, he discovered Dayuan horses and alfalfa in the Western Regions. As recorded in "Records of the Grand Historian", Akha-Teke horses were the Dayuan horses imported into China during the reign of Emperor Wu of Han in 101 BC, and they were still offered as tribute in large quantities until the Tang Dynasty.

Now, in Chai Zongxun's imperial garden, there are more than a hundred Arabian horses that he uses as mounts when traveling.

At present, the minimum monthly salary for the common people of the Great Zhou has reached 2 taels of silver per month, and with the prosperity of industry and commerce, there are many job opportunities all over the country. This is far from the autocratic and ignorant state of the Star Religion countries, which restrict the people to the land and leave them with no jobs.

At present, the average annual income of ordinary families in the Great Zhou Dynasty is more than 30 taels of silver. An average family can buy an ordinary horse as a means of transportation after saving for two or three years.

The number of horses purchased by businesses throughout the Great Zhou for transporting goods was even greater.

Therefore, in the past five years, horses have become an emerging commodity that has quickly entered people's homes, greatly improving the efficiency of commercial society while also facilitating people's travel.

According to statistics from the Ministry of Households, the number of horses owned by businesses and ordinary people in the entire Zhou Dynasty exceeded 20 million, with an average of one horse per family.

Horse breeding also became one of the top ten industries in the Great Zhou Dynasty.

(End of this chapter)