Chapter 36 The fourth quarter Li Wangqu, Tang Laiqu

Since the 11th century, the Dangxiang ethnic minority active in the northwest of my country has grown rapidly.Their leader, Li Yuanhao, established the Daxia Kingdom (called Xixia by Song people) in 1038 AD, controlling a large area of ​​land including all of Ningxia, Shaanxi, Gansu, and Inner Mongolia, forming a three-country relationship with the Northern Song Dynasty and Liao Dynasty.The Ningxia Plain is the base of the Xia Kingdom, and its capital Xingqing (now Yinchuan City) is here, and its 500,000 army mainly relies on it for its military rations.Starting from the needs of the country, Xixia must pay attention to the construction of farmland and water conservancy here.

According to relevant information, the Great Xia State built many irrigation projects on the Xixia Plain, among which the Liwang Canal project is the most famous.Liwangqu, also known as Haowangqu, was built by Li Yuanhao, the founding king of Xixia (AD 1038-1048).It is 300 miles long.The Yellow River has a high sediment content, and the channels that use the Yellow River water as their water source are easily silted up by sediment and must be maintained frequently.Researchers believe that the Liwang Canal is actually a re-dug out of the Aishan-Han Yan Canal that was silted up due to long-term disrepair.Therefore, it is still called Hanyan Canal in some books, which is what it is called in "Song History", and it is written as Hanyuan Canal.The source and delay sounds are similar.

In addition to Liwang Canal, there was an important irrigation canal named Tanglai Canal on the Ningxia Plain during the Western Xia Dynasty, which was longer than Liwang Canal, about 400 miles.Some documents of Tang Lai Qu are recorded as Tang Lai Qu or Tang Liang Qu, "Lai", "Lai" and "Liang", although the characters are different, the pronunciation is the same or similar.The Tanglai Canal in Xixia is the development of the Guanglu Canal since the Han and Tang Dynasties.Probably Guanglu Canal was rebuilt twice in the Tang Dynasty, one was presided over by Guo Ziyi, the other was presided over by Li Ting, and it was relatively intact in Xixia, so people called it Tang Lai Canal at that time.Tang Laiqu and Liwangqu played an important role in the agricultural production of Xixia. "Song History Xia Guozhuan" said: "Its (Xixia) land is rich in grains, especially rice and wheat. Gan (the state is now Zhangye) Liang (the state is now Wuwei) In the middle, the rivers are used for irrigation, and in Xing (the state is in today's Yinchuan) and Ling (the state is in today's Lingwu), there are ancient canals called Tangliang, Hanyuan... There is no risk of drought or flood in the year."

In 1227, the Western Xia Kingdom merged into the Mongol Khanate.It turns out that Xixia's farmland water conservancy on the Ningxia Plain was severely damaged during the war.In the early days when the Mongolian Khanate owned the Yellow River Basin, many upper-class figures did not have enough understanding of the importance of agriculture.Therefore, during the period of the Mongolian Khanate, no attention was paid to the restoration of water conservancy in the Ningxia Plain.When Kublai Khan came to the throne, the situation changed significantly, and the development of agriculture was raised to a high position. In the first year of Zhiyuan (AD 1264), that is, seven years before the official name of the country was changed to Yuan Dynasty, he sent someone who was good at water conservancy. Zhongshu Zuocheng Zhang Wenqian presided over the work in the Northwest, accompanied by Guo Shoujing, an outstanding water conservancy expert.

Zhang and Guo spent three years in the Northwest, making great efforts to restore the farmland and water conservancy damaged by the war in various parts of the Northwest today.According to the "Yuan History Guo Shoujing Biography", the water conservancy projects restored by them include Tanglai and Hanyan canals on Zhongxingfu Road (where the government is located in today's Yinchuan City), which are 400 miles and 250 miles long respectively; Yes, there are 10 main canals with a length of 200 miles, and 68 branch canals.These restored channels can irrigate more than 90,000 hectares of farmland in total.

In addition to the two canals of Tanglai and Hanyan, the irrigation projects built in the Yuan Dynasty on the Ningxia Plain also included Qinjia Canal and Spider Canal.Qinjia Canal is Qin Canal, in the east of the Yellow River in the Ningxia Plain.The Spider Canal is on the Weining Plain in the Ningxia Plain.

---

Notes: