Chapter 47 Twenty, three points Zhou Qichen

Since the founding of the Liang Kingdom, Taicheng faced the possibility of being breached for the third time.The first time was the siege of Hou Jing, and the second time was when Xiao Yi's Jingzhou army crusaded Hou Jing.If history repeats itself again, the Southern Dynasties will come to an end. Chen Baxian was the attacker in the last Taicheng offensive and defensive battle. He saw through Hou Jing's weakness and led his troops to defeat Hou Jing; Ask Wei Zai, who has recently received his account, for advice. Wei Zai is the grandson of Wei Rui. He has been familiar with history books and art of war since he was a child, and he is very strategic.He analyzed: "If the Qi army divides its forces to guard the road leading to Sanwu and invade the southeast, it will be bad. There is a camp left by Hou Jing on the south of the Qinhuai River. Our army should seize the time to build a city on this basis to protect the The transportation to the east is smooth, and then send another light cavalry to cut off the Qi army's food road, so that there is nothing to plunder and no money to retreat, within ten days, the Qi army will be defeated."

Inspired by Chen Baxian, he ordered Xu Du, governor of Hezhou, to build a wooden fence in Yecheng (now Chaotianmen, Nanjing, Jiangsu), and Wei Zai and others built a castle on the south bank of the Qinhuai River to block the eastward route of the Qi army; he sent Hou Andu to sneak into Jiangbei at night. , Burned thousands of ships of the Qi army; and sent general Zhou Tiehu to rob grain, and captured Zhang Lingzhou, the governor of Northern Qi and North Xuzhou who was in charge of escorting the supplies. Chen Baxian's series of combined punches frustrated Xu Sihui and his Northern Qi reinforcements.Xu Sihui was afraid of long nights and dreams, so he took the initiative to attack the fortifications of Yecheng.Chen Baxian personally led the elite troops to open the Ximing Gate of Taicheng and attack, defeating Xu Sihui.Seeing that the situation was not good, Xu Sihui left Qi general Liu Damo to guard the stone city, and retreated to the quarry on the riverside in one breath.

Chen Baxian did not directly attack Xu Sihui. He ordered Hou Andu to attack Xu Sihui's old nest, Qinjun (now Liuhe, Jiangsu), and captured Xu Sihui's soldiers and family members. He also captured trophies such as pipas and eagles. repayment."Xu Sihui was shocked and wanted to go back to the Stone City, but was repelled by Hou Andu, and all the military supplies and weapons fell into Liang Jun's pocket. On the side of Stone City, Liu Damo, the guard, was also at a disadvantage in a series of battles. The wooden fence was burned, the ship was seized, and countless casualties occurred.Chen Baxian surrounded Stone City on all sides, and Liu Damo couldn't hold on because of the lack of water in the city, so he asked Chen Baxian for peace.

Qi Jun showed weakness, but did not let go of his arrogance. Liu Damo put forward the condition that Chen Ba should send a proton first.The Liang army had a slight advantage on the battlefield, but the defense of Jiankang City was weak and the army was short of rations. All the officials were afraid of repeating the mistakes of Jiangling and did not want to fight again.Chen Baxian said: "Since everyone wants to negotiate peace with Qi, if I disagree, you will think that I don't want to send a proton, regardless of the interests of the country; If you break the alliance and come back again, then all the lords will join me in fighting the enemy!" Chen Baxian took his nephew Chen Tanlang and Yongjia Wang Xiaozhuang as hostages, and sent the remaining Qi army back across the river.The two countries have made an alliance, and each has a truce.

Chen Baxian really needed this rare truce, and turned his guns to deal with the disturbance in the southeast.He sent his nephew Chen Qian and his favorite general Zhou Wenyu to attack Wu Xing's Du Kan and Wang Sengzhi.Du Kan was brave and foolish, addicted to alcohol, and his general Du Tai was defeated and surrendered to the city. Du Kan was beheaded, and Wang Sengzhi and his younger brother Wang Sengmin fled to the Northern Qi Dynasty.Chen Qian and Zhou Wenyu attacked Kuaiji again, and eliminated Wang Sengbian's confidant, Zhang Biao, the governor of East Yangzhou, and the Sanwu area was completely stable.

As Chen Baxian expected, the apparent peace in the north lasted only three months.In March of the seventh year of Tianbao in the Northern Qi Dynasty (the first year of Liang Taiping, AD 556), Emperor Wenxuan of Qi killed Liu Damo, who had been disadvantaged in the previous battle, tore up the covenant, and sent generals Xiao Gui, She Di Fulian, Dongfang Laohe Ren Yue, and Xu Sihui Leading 100,000 troops, launched a new round of Liang Liang campaign.The Liang army was ready. The Northern Qi army was defeated by Chen Baxian's generals Huang Cong and Hou Andu in Liangshan (now Dangtu, Anhui) and Liyang (now Hexian, Anhui), and the main force retreated to Wuhu upstream.

The two armies faced off until May, when Bei Qi made a strange move, saying that as long as the deposed emperor Xiao Yuanming was sent back, the Qi army would leave.Chen Baxian knew that Northern Qi was going back on his word, and he didn't expose it, so he agreed to prepare a boat to send Xiao Yuanming away.But only a few days later, Xiao Yuanming's malignant sore broke out and he died.Some people said that Chen Ba did the trick first, while others said that Bei Qi sent people to assassinate the puppet prince.No matter what, Xiao Yuanming's death made the battle suddenly tense.

The Qi army took advantage of the problem, mobilized the army to question the crime, intercepted the retreat of the guard Zhou Wenyu with sailors, avoided the main force of the Liang army with cavalry, and marched towards Jiankang. Chen Baxian recalled Zhou Wenyu and Hou Andu to fight Xu Sihui in Baicheng, southeast of Jiankang.On that day, the south wind suddenly blew up, and Liang Jun was against the wind. Chen Baxian objected to going to battle immediately.Zhou Wenyu was brave and shouted: "The situation is urgent, how can we stick to the method of warfare!" As he said, he mounted his horse and led the troops into the formation.Strange to say, the wind suddenly changed, hundreds of Qi troops were killed and injured, and they were defeated by Hou Andu's elite cavalry during the retreat.

Seeing that they could not gain the strategic initiative, the Qi army went around to the north of Jiankang City, occupying Zhongshan, Mufushan, Xuanwu Lake and other places, in an attempt to besiege Jiankang. It was midsummer in the south of the Yangtze River, and it rained continuously for days, and the water in the lowlands was more than one foot deep.The Qi army's barracks could only be pitched in muddy water, soldiers' toes were festered, and diseases spread.The situation in the city was not good either, food was not delivered, and the hunger was unbearable, but at least there were houses in the city, and the environment was not as damp as outside the city.

After the rainstorm, the sky cleared up a little, so Chen Ba first bought a lot of wheat and rice in the city to reward his soldiers.It just so happened that Chen Qian sent three thousand dendrobium rice and one thousand ducks from outside the city.Chen Ba first ordered people to cook the rice and duck separately, and the soldiers each took a lotus leaf, wrapped it in rice, covered it with a few pieces of duck meat, and had a hearty meal. (It is said that later generations processed it on this basis and created the famous Guangdong food - lotus leaf rice.) After the energy was replenished, Chen Baxian led the army to launch a general attack on the Shogunate Mountain in the north of the city, and Hou Andu was still in the lead.

Hou Andu said to his general Xiao Mahe: "General Xiao is famous for his bravery, but seeing it once is worse than hearing it!" Xiao Mohe resolutely replied: "Today, let Ming Gong see it!" Xiao Mahe took the lead and rushed straight to the Qi army's camp. He was invincible, as if he had entered the land of no one. Hou Andu also bravely helped and led his troops to attack the Qi army behind him.Chen Baxian marched hand in hand with Wu Mingche, Shen Tai and other troops, and defeated the seemingly strong Qi army. The soldiers of the Northern Qi Dynasty fled to the river, and in order to fight for the boats, they became a mess, trampled each other, and drowned in the water, countless of them.Xu Sihui, Xiao Gui, Dongfang Lao and other generals of the Qi army were captured alive. Ren Yue and Wang Seng escaped with their lives.Liang Jun chased to the river and burned the abandoned boats of Northern Qi. The haze of several months in Jiankang City was finally swept away, and a hearty victory was ushered in.Chen Baxian ordered that all the captives such as Xu Sihui and Xiao Gui be beheaded for public display.Of course, revenge was unavoidable, and the Northern Qi people became enraged and killed the hostage Chen Tanlang. Chen Ba first made great contributions, and was granted the titles of Supervisor of Zhongshu, Situ, Inspector of Yangzhou, Duke of Great Wall, and soon he was promoted to Prime Minister, Lu Shangshushi, and General Zhenwei.In February of the second year of Taiping (AD 557), Xiao Bo, Chen Baxian's old boss, refused to accept it and rebelled in Guangzhou. Zhou Wenyu led the army to easily defeat him and pacified Lingnan, the base of Chen Baxian's fortune. Chen Baxian's position has been stabilized, and his ambition has also expanded.In two months, he won Xiangguo, King Chen, Jiajiuxi, Jiashuli, ranking above all kings.In October, the last abdication ceremony of the Southern Dynasties was held in Jiankang. Chen Baxian ascended the throne, changed the name of the country to Chen, and changed the Yuan to Yongding. He was Emperor Chen Wu. One year before Emperor Chen Wu proclaimed himself emperor, Yu Wentai of the Western Wei Dynasty died of illness. Under the arrangement of Zhongshan Gong Yuwen Hu, his son Yu Wenjue accepted the Zen throne of Emperor Gong of the Western Wei Dynasty, changed the name of the country to Zhou, and was called Northern Zhou in history.So far, Zhou, Qi, and Chen's tripartite confrontation has been fully formed, and the great chaos caused by Hou Jing that shook the world has finally come to an end. Throughout the Hou Jing Rebellion, we can roughly divide it into two parts: the Hou Jing Rebellion in the Northern Dynasties and the Hou Jing Rebellion in the Southern Dynasties. Hou Jing and Gao Cheng turned against each other and rebelled against the Eastern Wei Dynasty. The Eastern Wei Dynasty immediately attacked Hou Jing, forcing Hou Jing to ask for help from the Western Wei Dynasty and Liang State respectively, and dragging the two countries into the quagmire of war. This is Hou Jing's rebellion against the Northern Dynasty.Hou Jing crossed into Liang from the south, had conflicts with Liang's monarchs and ministers, rebelled again, captured Jiankang, first abolished the two Liang emperors, and then established himself as emperor until he was defeated and died. This is Hou Jing's chaos in the Southern Dynasty.The combination of the two rebellions is the panorama of the Hou Jing Rebellion. The two rebellions launched by Hou Jing successively caused innocent lives to be brutally poisoned, and tens of thousands of heads fell to the ground suddenly. As the "Sorrow in the South of the Yangtze River" said, "ghost fires are in chaos in Pinglin, and souls are wandering in Xinshi", but this is war.Simply blaming the initiators of wars for their sins cannot really prevent wars.From a historical perspective, we should see as clearly as possible the direct and indirect effects of this war in troubled times on the social structure. Before the Hou Jingzhi Rebellion, the Western Wei Dynasty was far inferior to the Eastern Wei Dynasty in terms of military strength and economic strength, and was trapped by natural disasters such as famine for many years.After the Hou Jing Rebellion, the Western Wei Dynasty obtained the vast territory of Hanzhong, Bashu, and Yongjing, which was twice as large as the Eastern Wei-Northern Qi Dynasty, which greatly solved the previous famine problem.The newly added territories were all rich and rich, and wealth was accumulated rapidly. Coupled with effective institutional innovations, the poor and weak Western Wei-Northern Zhou gradually became stronger, and they had the capital to fight against the Eastern Wei-Northern Qi for a long time. Due to the impact of the Hou Jing Rebellion in the Eastern Wei Dynasty, the originally prosperous Henan economy was severely impacted. The new territory seized from Huainan was adjacent to the other two countries, and it was turbulent. Consume national power. Hou Jing endangered the state of Liang and slaughtered the gentry, which dealt a fatal blow to the social civilization of the Southern Dynasties.The clans of the Liang Kingdom competed with each other and devoured each other, losing a large amount of land and population. Emperor Liang Yuan burned books and moved scholars and people into the Northern Dynasty, which caused irreparable damage to the culture of the Southern Dynasty.Although Chen Baxian, who represented the Wu people and barbarian forces in the south, took advantage of the chaos and rose up, he was unable to restore the cultural scale before the war.It was from the Chen Dynasty that the Northern Dynasties despised the Southern Dynasties culturally.The Southern Dynasties not only lost the opportunity to catch up with the Northern Dynasties, but were also doomed to decline. After the Hou Jing Rebellion, the strength of the originally weak Western Wei was strengthened, the development of the originally powerful Eastern Wei was hindered, and the Southern Dynasty, which sat on the mountain and watched the tigers fight, was unable to compete for supremacy.After a series of ups and downs, the Guanlong aristocratic group from a corner of the northwest became the darling of the times, and finally achieved unity and created the unprecedented Sui and Tang Dynasties. It can be seen that the Hou Jing Rebellion had extremely important significance and influence on the trend of the entire Southern and Northern Dynasties, and it was a key turning point in ending the great division of the Chinese world in the past four hundred years. Please see the next part "Three Points Return to the Sui Dynasty".