Chapter 23 3. International city

In the Tang Dynasty, Chang'an was the capital of the world. Also worthy of this title, probably only the ancient city of Rome.However, Chang'an is not like many cities in Western Europe, where the public square is the center and the roads are paved radially.Chang'an, whose total area is seven times that of Rome, is square.This city was planned and designed by Yu Wenkai, a genius inventor of the Xianbei nationality, and was continuously expanded and expanded by the Tang people. It typically shows the grandeur and majesty of the Chinese imperial capital. Then let us walk into Chang'an.

In the middle of the north of Chang’an City is the palace city belonging to the royal family, including the Taiji Palace for the emperor, the East Palace for the prince, the Yeting Palace for the maids, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which is equivalent to the palace office.To the south of Miyagi is the Imperial City, where there are Taimiao and Shejitan, as well as various high-level government offices of the central government, such as Zhongshu Sheng, Menxia Sheng and Shangshu Sheng. It was the political center of the empire. The area of ​​Miyagi and Imperial City, which constitute the political center of the empire, is not much different. The east and west sides are aligned, and they are all regular rectangles.There is no wall on the north side of the imperial city, and the two cities are separated by a horizontal street 300 paces wide. On the north side of the street is Chengtianmen, the south gate of the palace city.Every major festival, the imperial court will hold grand ceremonies here, and it is also here to receive foreign missions and ethnic minority chieftains, which is equivalent to Tiananmen Square in Beijing today.

Starting from Chengtianmen, the south gate of Miyagi, passing through Suzaku Gate, the south gate of the imperial city, and then going to Mingde Gate, the south gate of Chang'an, is a straight avenue called Zhuque Avenue, also known as Tianjie.Tianjie is 150 meters wide, with sidewalks and drainage ditches on both sides, and neat and beautiful willow trees are also planted.Taking this as the central axis, Chang'an City presents an east-west symmetrical pattern, with Wannian County in the east and Chang'an County in the west, both belonging to Jingzhaofu. There are five north-south roads on both sides of Tianjie, criss-crossing with fourteen east-west streets, dividing the urban area outside the palace city and the imperial city into one hundred and eleven grids.Except for the East Market and West Market, the rest of the squares are residential areas, with fifty-four to the east and fifty-five to the west, called workshops.

The independence and closeness of the workshop are very strong.They all have walls and gates. There are four big ones and two small ones. They are in charge of the squares, and the doors are opened in the morning and closed in the evening.The north-south distance between each square is about 40 meters, and there are streets and alleys leading to each house in the square.It is very surprising that such a large-scale workshop is dotted all over the city of Chang'an.However, considering that the total area of ​​the city at that time was 84 square kilometers, which was nine times that of the existing old city of Xi'an, it would not feel crowded.

This is really "a hundred thousand houses are like a game of Go, and Twelfth Street is like a vegetable garden". The layout of Luoyang City is similar, and it is also a collection of many square grids, but the palace city and the imperial city are located in the northwest corner, and there are not as many streets and squares as Chang'an.Comparing the two, Chang'an is obviously more like an imperial capital. What is the intention behind such a plan? The intention was even more obvious in Chang'an: the emperor faced the south from the north, and ruled the world through the central government.People such as scholars, farmers, businessmen, etc., surround the leader and the highest power like stars holding the moon, like the stars in the sky participating in the Big Dipper.Unified planning and layout means that a unified country must have a unified will and management.The political philosophy of the centralized empire is vividly and clearly expressed.

This kind of planning even reflects the style of the Half-Blood Dynasty.The chessboard-like pattern reminds people of the well field system in the Western Zhou Dynasty, and the self-contained workshops remind people of the tribes of the Hu people.We are not sure whether Yu Wenkai thought so, but if he did, it would be urbanizing the well fields and tribes. Undoubtedly, this requires great talent, but also grandeur. Talent belongs to Yu Wenkai, while bearing belongs to Li Shimin.In the early years of Zhenguan when the political power was still to be stabilized, he allowed the surrendered Turks to live in nearly 10,000 households in Chang'an. This was not a decision that could be made based on the city's capacity.The future emperor is rich and powerful, so he doesn't care much.According to statistics, in the heyday of the Tang Dynasty, envoys or representatives of dozens of countries and nationalities lived in the state guesthouse of Honghe Temple. Some of them lived there for decades. The temple takes care of everything.

Hehe, being rich is self-willed. But after the Anshi Rebellion, the Tang Empire couldn't take it anymore.So Prime Minister Li Mi (read Rubi) ordered to stop the supply, and the envoys sued the government.Li Mi, who was daring to do something, didn't take that kind of trick. He called these people together and reprimanded them: How can there be diplomats like you in the world?Either return to the country by way of Huihe or by sea, and if you want to stay, you have to serve the Tang Dynasty and work to get a salary.You figure it out! No one was willing to leave, so Li Bi incorporated them into the Shence Army.As a result, the royal family has added a young man, and Honglu Temple has saved half a million yuan in hospitality expenses every year.

Clap your hands and applaud, as well as businessmen from the eastern and western cities. The east and west cities are the business districts of Chang'an.Generally speaking, Dongshi is the center of domestic trade, while West City is the center of international trade.From exotic treasures to needles and threads, all products are either bought in the East Market or in the West Market.Over time, shopping becomes "buying stuff".Maybe that's what "things" means—things bought from the east and west markets are things, otherwise they are not things. However, why are the merchants happy when the envoys and representatives are incorporated?

Because these "foreign guests" often send IOUs, and the shop owner is inconvenient to urge them due to "diplomatic relations".In fact, the envoys and representatives were credited because the country's finances were tight and the Honglu Temple's subsidies could not be paid on time.Datang defaulted on foreign guests, and foreign guests defaulted on the shop, but the shop couldn't default on the country. How could it not be complaining? However, this is just the chaos after the turmoil. Chang'an in the prosperous Tang Dynasty was full of prosperity.There is a story that in the ninth year of Emperor Xuanzong's Tianbao (750), a man named Zheng Liu met a stunning beauty while shopping, and they fell in love at first sight and spent a good night together.It wasn't until the next morning, when he told the barbarians selling cakes at Fangmen, that he realized that he fell in love with a vixen.

This beautiful and kind vixen is the artistic image of Orchid, right? In fact, Chang’an is not the only city with vixens. Many other cities are also international cities, such as Luoyang, Yangzhou, Liangzhou (Wuwei), Ganzhou (Zhangye), Suzhou (Jiuquan), and Shazhou in the Hexi Corridor. (Dunhuang).In those northwestern cities, Buddhism was widely disseminated by different ethnic groups in Hindi, Persian, Sogdian, Turkic and Tibetan languages, accompanied by camel bells. The most typical one is Guangzhou. Guangzhou has been an important treaty port in my country since the era of Sun Quan, and even more Hu merchants gathered in the Tang Dynasty.As far as Master Jianzhen saw, there were merchant ships from Persia, India, Sri Lanka, the South China Sea, and Southeast Asian countries.After the demise of the Sasanian Dynasty, there were more Arabs.However, Arab ships were still called Persian ships, and the Persian language was also commonly used in the Indian Ocean, just as Sogdian was commonly used on land routes.

Ships from all over the world stopped at Guangzhou Port. What Datang gives is respect, protection and preferential policies.Hu merchants lived alone in Fanfang, and were managed by the government through the person in charge of Fanfang.They were allowed to maintain their own religious beliefs and customs, and were even granted some autonomy to adjudicate internal disputes.Thus, even the architectural style is Arabic.The southern scenery and exotic atmosphere are really enchanting. Tang Taizong's proposition of "love as one" has been fully reflected, and the expats living in Guangzhou regard Datang as their own country.Therefore, when Huang Chao's army came in, they were naturally on the front line of the defense of Guangzhou.The result was the killing of 120,000 expats, including Muslims, Christians, and Jews. The battle of faith is put on hold for now.At the moment, they are all from Tang Dynasty. Yangzhou is another story.Yangzhou, which prospered by relying on the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, is marked by poets, beauties and Persians.The latter lived in China after the demise of the Sasanian Dynasty, but they were all so rich that the fakes were called "poor Persians", which means that there are no poor Persians.That's right, how can "Fireworks go to Yangzhou in March" if you are ashamed in your pocket? So Du Mu had his dream of Yangzhou that he dreamed of every ten years, and Xu Ning and Zhang Hu, who were competing to be the first, also competed to open their screens.Zhang Hu's poem says: Beside the well in the ten-mile-long market, watch the gods on the Yueming Bridge.Xu Ning said: "Three parts of the world are bright moon nights, and two parts are rogues." Yangzhou. This time, Zhang Hu seemed to be at a disadvantage again. In fact, there are also colorful Yizhou (Chengdu), which is rich in Shu brocade, and Hongzhou (Nanchang), which is a transfer station and distribution center, and so on.Of course, these cities also have different styles, but they have one thing in common-the streets are full of barbarians. So, what is it that attracts businessmen, bankers or usurers, diplomats, scholars, explorers and missionaries from all over the world?Couldn't it just be silk, tea and considerate brothel girls? of course not.

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Notes: Volume two hundred and thirty-two, and please refer to Wang Zhongluo's "History of the Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties".