GBP Chapter 215 Yan and Jin
Chapter 215 Yan and Jin
[The country with the most noble bloodline among the seven major powers of the Warring States Period! Trivia about the history of the Warring States Period]
It was the country with the most noble bloodline among the seven major powers in the Warring States Period, and existed even longer than the Zhou Dynasty.
Like the Qin State, it was located in a remote area, but eventually became the weakest among the vassal states. In its 800-year history, it only produced one famous ruler. This video will help you understand the rise and fall of the Yan State in one go.
In 1044 BC, King Wu granted Duke Zhao the title of Marquis of Yan and officially established the State of Yan.
From the Western Zhou Dynasty in Chinese history to 222 BC, when the Qin army conquered Liaodong and King Xi of Yan was captured, the State of Yan had a total of 42 monarchs and 828 years of history. Let's start from the beginning of the State of Yan, chicken wings.
In the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, Duke Shao, the son of King Wen of Zhou, was the younger brother of King Wu of Zhou. In 1046 BC, King Wu defeated the Shang Dynasty. In Chaoge, King Zhou announced to the people that the Shang Dynasty had perished, established the Zhou Dynasty, appointed Duke Shao as the Grand Protector, and granted him the title of Grand Protector in Yan.
However, since Zhao Gong needed to stay in Haojing, he sent his son to Yan. Therefore, Zhao Gong's descendants established the State of Yan in Yan, also known as Yan Zhao Gong. He was the ancestor of the State of Yan and was known in history as Zhao Gong.
After King Wu's death, Duke Shao assisted King Cheng of Zhou and King Kang of Zhou, and initiated the 40-year Kangxi and Qianlong reigns for the Western Zhou Dynasty.
After Duke Zhao's death, the Yan State had five generations of monarchs, including Marquis Hui of Yan and Marquis Li of Yan, all of whom were nameless and had no surnames. Until the demise of the Western Zhou Dynasty, the Yan State quietly entered the Spring and Autumn Period.
When the 17th Duke Huan of Yan came to the throne, Yan was invaded by the Shanrong tribe in the north for many years, so the capital was moved to Linyi, and the national strength was not as good as before. When Duke Zhuang of Yan, the son of Duke Huan of Yan, came to the throne, the Shanrong tribe became even stronger.
Duke Zhuang of Yan was unable to resist and could only ask Qi for help. At that time, Duke Huan of Qi, the first hegemon of the Spring and Autumn Period, went to Yan, defeated the invading Shanrong, and then pursued them.
As a result, the Yan army lost its direction and was about to be trapped in the valley. They let the old horse in the army lead the way, and finally got out of the valley and defeated the Shanrong. This is where the idiom "an old horse knows the way" comes from.
Although the Shanrong were driven away, the capital Linyi was already in ruins. So Duke Zhuang of Yan thought of Linyi again and ordered a small-scale expansion to be started on the basis of the original city site.
In 658 BC, after Duke Zhuang of Yan died, his son Duke Xiang of Yan succeeded him and moved the capital to Ji, which is the predecessor of today's Beijing.
In 632 BC, the State of Jin defeated the State of Chu in the Battle of Chengpu and was named the leader of the princes by the Zhou emperor. From then on, it became the second dominant country in the Spring and Autumn Period.
After that, the vassal states of all sizes in the Central Plains vied for hegemony. Even the westernmost Qin State wanted to dominate the Central Plains. The Yan State seemed to have disappeared from history and had no sense of existence.
In 403 BC, Han, Zhao and Wei divided Jin, and Chinese history officially entered the Warring States Period. At this time, the vassal states no longer cared about the authority of the Zhou emperor, and began to compete with each other for the power of unification.
The goal of the war changed from honoring the king to a war of annexation between the vassal states. Therefore, the scale of the war continued to expand, with hundreds of thousands or even millions of people participating in the war, and it lasted for months or even years.
As a result, the weaker small countries began to reform and become stronger, and the gap between the unchanging Yan State and the Central Plains region became wider and wider.
In 380 BC, Yan's neighboring country underwent a major change, and the Tian family replaced Qi. The first thing the Tian family did was to send troops to attack their old neighbor Yan.
At that time, the 33rd monarch of Yan State, Duke Wen of Yan, could only seek help from the Three Jins in the west. The Three Jins sent troops and Yan State escaped. It was not until then that Yan State finally realized the importance of allies. If it continued to stay in a corner like before, it would probably no longer work in this chaotic world.
Su Qin, a strategist, also saw this. In 334 BC, after failing to persuade King Huiwen of Qin, Su Qin came to the State of Yan and waited for a year before meeting the King Wen of Yan.
Su Qin told Duke Wen of Yan that Qin's powerful army had already defeated the Three Jins, and the reason Yan was able to avoid the devastation of war and live and work in peace was precisely because it had Zhao as a barrier in the southwest.
Among all the princes in the world, the only one that posed a threat to Yan was Zhao. If they wanted to attack, they could reach the capital in just 10 days.
If Qin wanted to attack Yan, it would need to travel thousands of miles. Moreover, as long as it joined Su Qin's plan of vertical coalition, the six countries would unite. Even if Qi had ideas about Yan, it would have to consider it.
Su Qin's words hit the mark of Duke Wen of Yan. After hearing this, Duke Wen of Yan held Su Qin's hand and said excitedly: "During the period of the coalition, if you can maintain peace in Yan, Yan will repay you with all its might."
After the six states united, Qin was temporarily unable to break through the alliance, so it did not dare to attack Yan for more than 10 years. After that, Yan married its daughter to the crown prince of Yan, King Yi of Yan.
In 333 BC, Duke Wen of Yan died and the crown prince, King Yi of Yan, succeeded him. While Yan was in mourning, Qi State sent troops to capture 10 cities of Yan State.
So King Yi of Yan summoned Su Qin, who was also the Prime Minister of the six kingdoms, and asked him to take back the land occupied by Qi. Su Qin successfully persuaded the King of Qi to hand over 10 cities.
In 323 BC, Wei's prime ministers Xishou and Gongsun Yan initiated the Five Kingdoms Alliance. Wei, Han, Zhao and Zhongshan formed an alliance, and the monarchs of each country proclaimed themselves kings to fight against major powers such as Qin, Qi and Chu. Yan became the king from then on.
But King Yi of Yan died after only one year as king, and his son succeeded him as King Kuai of Yan. King Kuai of Yan was a rare talent in Chinese history. After he succeeded to the throne, he not only used his prime minister Zizhi, but also followed the example of Yao and Shun and abdicated the throne to Zizhi.
Thus, there was a king of a different surname in the history of Yan State, Zizhi. This Zizhi was not a good person. He basically made the country chaotic and the people were terrified. During this period, he killed the crown prince who was planning to rebel and buried his body in public. This directly led to several months of civil unrest in Yan State, with tens of thousands of deaths.
Qi State seized the opportunity to attack the capital of Yan State in one fell swoop, killing King Kuai of Yan and Zizhi, and Yan State was almost destroyed. Later, under pressure from Zhao, Han, Qin, Chu and other countries, King Xuan of Qi announced the withdrawal of troops, and King Wuling of Zhao sent King Kuai of Yan back to Yan State.
After more than 700 years of silence, the State of Yan finally ushered in its most glorious period, under the reign of King Zhao of Yan. After ascending the throne to avenge the destruction of his country, King Zhao of Yan began to work hard to govern the country, and took the strategist Guo Wei as his teacher. With the spirit of the ancients who paid thousands of gold for bones, King Zhao of Yan was eclectic and recruited talents from all over the world.
King Zhao of Yan built a Golden Terrace for the talents who came to Yan State to seek refuge. This move caused a sensation in the world, and talents from various countries, such as General Le Yi and strategist Su Dai, came to Yan State one after another.
King Zhao of Yan built a palace for Zou Yan to provide a place for students to study, appointed Le Yi as the second prime minister, and entrusted him with the power of state affairs and military. As a result, the Yan State, which was once scarred and nearly destroyed, began to grow stronger.
King Zhao of Yan kept a low profile for 28 years, which not only accumulated a lot of wealth for Yan, but also cultivated Yan's vigor and strength. In 284 BC, King Zhao of Yan appointed Le Yi as the general and launched a joint attack with Qin, Han, Zhao and Wei, successively conquering 72 cities of Qi, entering the capital in one fell swoop and recovering the lost territory.
The royal family looted all the treasures in the palace, and only the cities of Ju and Jimo were left in the huge Qi State. At the same time, King Zhao of Yan sent troops thousands of miles to expand the territory of Yan State to the northeast to the Liaodong area, and Yan State became one of the seven major powers in the Warring States Period.
However, the strength of Yan State was short-lived. With the death of King Zhao of Yan, Yan State returned to its previous weakness and mediocrity.
After King Zhao of Yan died, his son King Hui of Yan succeeded to the throne. He believed the slander and forced Le Yi to leave. After Le Yi left, Qi State quickly regained more than 70 lost cities, and King Zhao of Yan's achievements were almost lost.
In 249 BC, King Zhuangxiang of Qin completely ended the era of the Zhou Dynasty as the common ruler of the world. Ten years later, the Battle of Changping defeated the State of Zhao, and the six eastern states no longer had the strength to compete with the powerful Qin.
It was only a matter of time before the six kingdoms were unified. However, at this time, the 42nd monarch of Yan, King Xi of Yan, took advantage of the lack of national strength of Zhao and sent troops to invade Zhao, but ultimately failed.
The Zhao State sent General Lian Po to defeat the invading Yan army and pursued them for 500 miles all the way to the capital of Yan State. Yan State was almost destroyed, and the King of Yan ceded five cities before the Zhao army withdrew.
In 227 BC, the capital of Zhao, Handan, was captured by the Qin army, and King You of Zhao was captured. Prince Jia of Zhao fled to Dai. Seeing the Qin army approaching Yishui, the whole Yan State was in a panic. Just when the King of Yan was looking for a plan, Prince Dan of Yan proposed a bold plan - to assassinate King Ying Zheng of Qin.
So there was the house period, but in the end Jing Ke was captured alive, Ying Zheng was not killed, and Prince Dan brought himself a fatal disaster, which also accelerated the process of the demise of the State of Yan.
In 226 BC, Qin defeated the King of Yan and Prince Dan fled. The King of Yan killed Prince Dan and cut off his head in the hope of saving the State of Yan. The naive King of Yan certainly failed to do so. In 222 BC, King of Yan was in Liaodong. The State of Yan was destroyed.
[The history of a country that is more likely to unify the world than the Qin State, the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period]
He founded the country because of a piece of tung leaf, but dominated the Spring and Autumn Period for a century. Anyone who wanted to dominate the Central Plains had to form an alliance with him. Even if he was suppressed by him, he still forcibly maintained his hegemony.
If he were still alive, it would not be the Qin that unified China. He would be the Jin State, the predecessor of the three kingdoms of Han, Zhao, and Wei.
From 1033 BC, when King Cheng of Zhou conferred his younger brother Tang Shuyu in a forbidden area, to 376 BC, when the last monarch of Jin, Duke Jing of Jin, was deposed as a commoner, Jin had a total of 39 monarchs and a history of 658 years.
Today let us start with Tang Shuyu, the founder of Jin State, and King Cheng of Zhou, the King Wu of Zhou.
In 1043 BC, King Wu of Zhou died. King Cheng of Zhou was young when he ascended the throne, and the Zhou Dynasty was regented by Duke Zhou. In 1035 BC, Duke Zhou led his army to quell the rebellion.
One day, King Cheng of Zhou was playing with his younger brother Tang Shuyu. King Cheng of Zhou cut a piece of paulownia leaf into the shape of a scepter and said to Tang Shuyu, "I will use this to confer a title on you." The historian nearby happened to hear it and immediately asked King Cheng of Zhou to choose an auspicious day to confer the title on Tang Shuyu.
King Cheng of Zhou said that he was joking, but the historian said that once the emperor had spoken, the historian must record it truthfully and execute it according to the etiquette. So King Cheng of Zhou granted Tang Shuyu the title of Tangdi, hence the name Tang Shuyu. This is the story of "Tongye Enfeoffment" recorded in history books.
Tang Shuyu's territory only extended eastwards to the Hefen River. After Tang Shuyu's death, his son Xiefu moved to the vicinity of the Jin River, and thus changed the country's name to Jin. Tang Shuyu became the first monarch of the Jin State, and was known as the Marquis of Jin.
After that, Jin State served as the northern barrier of Zhou Dynasty and protected the Zhou emperor. After the reign of Emperor Cheng and Emperor Kang, the Western Zhou Dynasty began to decline. The Rongdi tribes in the north gradually moved south. The monarchs of Jin State followed the Zhou emperor in his expeditions.
In 840 BC, the seventh monarch of Jin State, Marquis Jing of Jin, died and was succeeded by his son Situ. From then on, the post of Situ was abolished and renamed Zhongjunwei. It was not until the time of Duke Wen of Jin that it was confused with Zhongjun among the Six Lords.
In 805 BC, the ninth monarch of Jin, Marquis Mu of Jin, followed King Xuan of Zhou to attack the Rong and Di tribes, but was defeated. Marquis Mu of Jin was deeply ashamed. His wife gave birth to his first son, and Marquis Mu of Jin named him Chou, hoping that he could avenge his humiliation.
Three years later, Duke Mu of Jin led his army north and won a great victory. At this time, his wife gave birth to his second son, and Duke Mu of Jin named him Chengshi. At that time, the doctor of Jin believed that the name was an unlucky omen and that Jin would sooner or later fall into chaos.
Jin Muhou's younger brother Jin Shangshu declared himself emperor, forcing Prince Chou to flee. In 781, Prince Chou led his men back to Jin and seized the throne, becoming Marquis Wen of Jin. Although this did not cause much shock to Jin at the time, it laid the seeds for decades of civil war in Jin.
In 771 BC, Zhou Youwang set off beacons to trick the princes, and the country was destroyed. Duke Wen of Jin supported King Ping of Zhou to succeed to the throne, while Duke Shen, the uncle of King You of Zhou, supported Yu Chen, the younger brother of King You of Zhou, and the Zhou Dynasty formed a situation of two kings coexisting.
Duke Wen of Jin killed King Xi of Zhou in Xindu, ending the 20-year-long situation of two kings coexisting in the Zhou royal family.
He was called Duke Wen, Duke Xiang of Qin, and Duke Wen of Jin. As a result, he gained the trust of King Ping of Zhou and was given the power to assist the emperor and fight on his behalf. During the reign of Duke Wen of Jin, the State of Jin quickly entered its first peak of development in its history.
In 746 BC, Duke Wen of Jin died and was succeeded by his son Duke Zhao of Jin. He granted his uncle Chengshi the title of Marquis of Quwo, which violated the etiquette between the monarch and his subjects and also gave Quwo the power to threaten the monarch of Jin.
Seven years later, Jin's minister Panfu assassinated Jin Zhaohou, and Chengshi succeeded him, but was strongly resisted by Jin Zhaohou's supporters. Chengshi retreated to Quwo, known in history as Quwo Huanshu. The people of Jin supported Jin Zhaohou's son Xiaohou as the king, and a 7-year-long civil war broke out in Jin.
The great clans of Quwo and Yicheng began to attack each other. Quwo Huanshu defeated Jin Xiaohou and completely dominated the military power of Jin. Later kings of Jin referred to Duke Wu of Jin and Duke Xian of Jin together to encourage themselves in the hope of longevity.
In 677 BC, Duke Wu of Jin died and his son Duke Xian of Jin succeeded him. Duke Xian of Jin was a controversial monarch in history. On the one hand, he pursued an expansionist policy and expanded the territory, which was known as his period of sickness. In the 38 years, he destroyed the State of Guo by a false route, which became a classic of the Thirty-Six Stratagems, making the State of Jin unprecedentedly powerful.
On the other hand, he knew very well that in order to prevent the incident of Quwo replacing Yi from happening again, his own lineage ordered the massacre of all the descendants of Duke Wen of Jin. In order to leave a permanent hidden danger for his rule, he also built another capital and named it Jiang. Anyone who opposed would be severely punished, even his own son.