Chapter 12 Chapter 11 Hui Merchants
The luxury of their life is even comparable to that of the royal family.
Their abundance thus feeds a large number of industries that live alongside them.
They created a unique architectural style.
Among the Chinese business gangs, only they are called Confucian businessmen.
Throughout the Qing Dynasty, there were as many as 19 champions from Huizhou, accounting for almost 17% of all champions.
What kind of legendary stories are there in the rise and fall of Huizhou merchants?
Why did the red-capped businessman Hu Xueyan, a wealthy man, end up in ruins and ransack his home in the end?
Since the Ming Dynasty, a large number of young women who have undergone special training and are preparing to marry wealthy businessmen as concubines have appeared in the area of Yangzhou.At that time, the emergence of the thin horse was actually closely related to the prosperity of a generation of merchants, which was the Chinese merchants called "a generation of Confucian merchants" - Huizhou merchants.Thin horses and Confucian merchants, progressive and conservative, rise and fall, many seemingly contradictory and reasonable things happened to Huizhou merchants.
So, what are the real reasons for the success and failure of Huizhou merchants?What enlightenment can their rise and fall give future generations?
Readers know how brilliant Anhui people were in the past, can you imagine?Let me give you an example, we watch a TV series, Qianlong went to the south of the Yangtze River six times, who do you think is receiving him?A native of Anhui, a great salt merchant in Anhui, named Jiang Chun, was received by him.In the end, he was conferred the rank of first-class Guanglu doctor, and even participated in the Thousand Seniors Banquet held by Emperor Qianlong in the 18th century. The glory of Anhui at that time was unimaginable.Of course, the current Anhui is far inferior to the era of Huizhou merchants in terms of economy.But why are Huizhou merchants so rich?Did it disappear in the end?And now you can't see Huizhou merchants anymore, what's going on? There are many similarities between the success of Huizhou merchants and Shanxi merchants. They are basically located in impoverished mountainous areas.Since the Eastern Jin Dynasty, there have been records of Huizhou people doing business, and the Qing Dynasty reached its peak.Today's Huangshan City in Anhui Province, Jixi County in Xuancheng, and Wuyuan County in Jiangxi Province formed a huge wealth group during the Qing Dynasty. Known as Huizhou merchants. So, what is so special about the successful business gang of Huizhou Merchants?What is their spiritual world and business strategy like?What made them successful, and what caused their downfall?
Therefore, Huizhou merchants basically originated from Huizhou, which is today's Huangzhou City in Anhui Province.In the era of Song Huizong, he named this place Huizhou with his "Hui" character, so it has been handed down.Every time I think of Song Huizong, I feel sorry for him. This man is proficient in everything from piano, chess, calligraphy and painting, but he is a poor executive and manager.Therefore, the Song Dynasty (Northern Song Dynasty) was basically buried in his hands.But his artistic accomplishment is unimaginable, and even his calligraphy can be unique and innovative (thin gold style).In his time, Zhang Zeduan, a well-known artist, painted a picture of "Surfing the River During the Qingming Festival". This painting shows the prosperity, extravagance and waste of commercial capital, which is similar to the level of later Huizhou merchants.So this is my biggest feeling for Huizhou merchants. Huizhou has a long history, it is the hometown of Zhu Xi.Let's see, what kind of business thinking do Huizhou merchants have?It can be said that Huizhou people should take Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism as their family rule, which means that Confucianism attaches great importance to this kind of ethical ordering between family and country.For example, "Parents are here, don't travel far." Don't run around when your parents are still alive, emphasizing the integrity of a family.So in Confucianism, especially Zhu Xi, it is very emphasized that on the basis of self-cultivation, one must do a good job in regulating the family before he can govern the country and bring peace to the world.But after all, it is a minority who can govern the country and the world, so for the general public, the family concept formed by the Qi family has become extremely important.This was the background of Huizhou people at that time, and their thinking was extremely rigid. Basically, the goal of their struggle was based on the glory of the family. Since Huizhou is Zhu Xi's hometown, it has a unique style of writing.In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the number of people admitted to Jinshi was close to 2% of the total in the Ming Dynasty, and the same was true in the Qing Dynasty. In the entire Qing Dynasty, there were as many as 19 champions from Huizhou, accounting for almost 17% of all champions.This is an incredible number, but how do you integrate this so-called official-based thinking into the thinking of Huizhou people?It can be said that Huizhou people focus on family glory, but they are very concerned about the pursuit of fame, and their purpose is not to govern the country and the world, but to honor the family.However, once you enter the officialdom, economic strength is very important. You rarely see that an honest official can become a gang, and it is unlikely.Therefore, economic strength can allow this group to play a pivotal role in the entire court, which is very important.So this is a combination of Confucianism and businessmen.What kind of personality do these people have?I think Hu Shi's words are very good.He said that trying to be an "Hui Camel", Hui Camel can basically be used as a description of the basic personality of Huizhou merchants.What is emblem camel? As a descendant of Huizhou tea merchants, Hu Shi knew the business activities of his hometown people like the back of his hand.He said that most Huizhou businessmen started their businesses with small businesses, endured hardships and stood hard work, accumulated some funds, gradually worked hard to develop, and some became wealthy businessmen.Camels are animals that can survive in extremely harsh environments.To this day, Anhui people still use Hui camels to encourage themselves in their cultural roots.In their view, referring to Huizhou merchants as Hui camels represents their indomitable pioneering and enterprising spirit. In my opinion, Hui camels in history have the same ideological origin. What is this origin?
After research, people found that there are a lot of pawnbrokers in Huizhou. This pawn industry should be called Chaofeng. For example, people who receive and buy goods on the counter should be called Chaofeng.But people in Jiangnan like to call him Huiboda. The pronunciation of this "boss" is similar to the pronunciation of "camel" in Jiangnan, so Huiboda has become Huiluotuo.There is another saying that Huizhou merchants like to carry a sack on their backs like a camel when they go out to do business.What's in this sack?Huibing, and three ropes.These ropes are very important, and they are called "carrying three ropes with you when you go out, you can do everything without asking for help." What's the use?Climbing mountains and crossing rivers are all necessary.What's more, you can hang yourself if necessary.So what kind of personality is this?This is very important, because Huizhou people are hard-working, and they are such a group of people who are desperate.Okay, then I will repeat the whole Huizhou merchants. The essence of Huizhou merchants is Confucian merchants. These Confucian merchants are a group of people with rigid thinking, but with the spirit of Hui camels, they are hard-working and rigid in thinking.For a person like this who endures hardships and stands hard work, burns all boats, and is very determined to do business with the Guangyao family, what path will he take because of his rigid thinking?This is very interesting, and I found that the explanation of my theory is very clear, it is clear - no matter how brilliant a business group that lacks thought innovation, it will definitely sink in the end, and there is no other possibility. Let's take a look, you have the foundation of knowledge, Zhu Xi's Neo-Confucianism and culture, and personality conditions, so what are Huizhou people waiting for?Just waiting for an opportunity.Sometimes opportunity is very important.As the saying goes, one is fate, two is luck, three is geomantic omen; The reason why Huizhou merchants can become a generation of outstanding business gangs is not enough to rely solely on the spirit of Huiluo camels. Their success is closely related to a new policy of the imperial court at that time. This policy made the fate of Huizhou merchants magically change. The reversal made them wait for what they wanted in the difficult survival, so what are they waiting for and what they want?
As a result, God favored Huizhou merchants after all. In 1371, shortly after the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, there was a good opportunity for Huizhou people to discover.At that time, the Ming Dynasty established 9 strategically important places at the border, and 4 of these 9 were in Shanxi. Therefore, Shanxi took advantage of the favorable location to first have the opportunity to establish a clan.The country asks merchants to transport grain. Of course, to give him some benefits, they give him salt. This salt is very important. One salt weighs 300 catties of salt on average.As long as you send the grain to the border, you will be given salt, and you can exchange it for salt, and then sell it.I did the math, 1 quote is equal to 300 catties, how much does 1 catty make? 1 catty earns 30 Wen, so 300 Jin multiplied by 30 Wen equals 9000 Wen, which is 9 taels of silver, and one quotation can earn 9 taels of silver.So what about 10,000 quotations? 90,000 taels of silver. At that time, Shanxi was the main one at this stage, because the four borders were all in Shanxi, so Shanxi people had the best chance to get Yanyin to buy salt, and it was difficult for Huizhou people to compete with them. There are many salt fields.What chance did the Huizhou people get in the end?This system is getting more and more corrupt, and finally it has become like this.After the people who sent the grain to the border got the salt, they didn't need to go to the salt field to get the salt. He could sell the salt to the Erdao dealers.At this time, the opportunity came for Huizhou merchants. They withdrew to the Lianghuai Salt Fields, bought salt bows at high prices, and used the salt to resell it everywhere, thus becoming second-hand dealers.Later, the Ming Dynasty could no longer sustain it, and people who sent food to the border did not need to buy salt, so a lot of corruption came out.So in the second year of Hongzhi (1489), it was simply canceled, and there was no need to send food. You can use the money to buy salt and forget it.At this time, Huizhou merchants had already accumulated a good foundation of wealth, so you asked him to take silver taels to buy salt, which made him very happy. This group of salt merchants has been made, and this group of Huizhou merchants has also been made. Around 1617, the Ming Dynasty suddenly proposed a new system called the Promotion of Gangfa.why?Because tax collection was a big problem at that time, many people disappeared after taking Yanyin, and the government did not get any benefits in the end.Many people took Yanyin and did not give enough money, which was a loss of tax revenue for the court.So in the forty-fifth year of Wanli (1617), the imperial court changed the promotion law.Just call you merchants who have Yanyin and register them in the book, and you will be there. For 1 old Yanyin you take, the imperial court will give you 9 new Yanyin. This is the so-called 10 principles; it can be hereditary.If there is no person in the book, you can’t make salt, it’s for the court tax, the book is very clear, I will collect taxes from you every year, and you can’t escape.This makes Huizhou merchants fatter, and his old salt is cited the most.Therefore, according to the distribution according to this ratio, 1 old Yanyin can be matched with 9 new Yanyin, and they will be issued at once, which is how Huizhou merchants grew up. At that time, we checked and found that the Lianghuai Salt Field produced 1.4 million yin of salt every year. According to the ratio I just mentioned, 1 yin is 9 liang, so 9 liang is multiplied by 1.4 million yin, that is, the Lianghuai Salt Field produces 1.4 million salt a year. You can get 12 million taels of silver.Maybe readers don’t quite understand what is the concept of 12 million taels of silver?Let me tell you, 1 tael of silver can buy 100 catties of rice, and you can go to a five-star hotel for a meal.At that time, a senior member of the first rank paid 180 taels of silver a year.So do you know what 12 million taels means?In the Beiyang Fleet in the late Qing Dynasty, an armored ship was worth 1.2 million taels, which meant that the Lianghuai Salt Field could produce 10 iron-clad ships a year. It's a pity that so much money has never been transformed into a modern industrial capital, and it is basically completely wasted in the hands of Huizhou people.During Qianlong's six trips to the south of the Yangtze River, Comrade Jiang Chun who received him was a general merchant. What is a general merchant?It is the person who specializes in managing small salt merchants.At that time, the Lianghuai Salt Field was divided into 8 general merchants. Didn’t 1 old salt merchant provide 9 new salt merchants? These 8 general merchants completely controlled these small salt merchants, which was equivalent to the meaning of the imperial court’s public institutions.Then he will serve as the general merchant, and he is extremely rich. The close relationship between him and the imperial court is unimaginable. He personally received Emperor Qianlong's six trips to the south of the Yangtze River to eat, drink and have fun. During this time, Comrade Jiang Chun, a Huizhou merchant, was responsible for all the expenses. The title of Dr. Lu is probably to enjoy the treatment at the ministerial level.It can be seen that the glory of the entire Huizhou merchants at that time was unimaginable.But what did Huizhou merchants do with the money they earned from the salt? The period of more than 300 years from the middle of the Ming Dynasty to the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty was the most prosperous period for Huizhou merchants.Salt industry, pawnbroking industry, tea, timber, etc. are the four major industries that Huizhou merchants are keen to operate.The wealth of Huizhou merchants can be said to be as rich as an enemy country. Even Emperor Qianlong lamented that "the merchants are so rich that I can't match them."Possessing such a huge amount of funds seems to be enough to build an immortal industrial empire. However, we have not seen this scene, but a large amount of funds have created a top Jiangnan beauty brand called "Yangzhou Slim Horse" and extremely luxurious buildings. Style, then, how is the money of Huizhou merchants used?Why are they so passionate about these?
What did Huizhou merchants do when they made money from salt?What was done was very disappointing.The first thing is to do a pawn shop.Many Huizhou merchants open pawnshops and feel safe and secure.Moreover, Huizhou merchants are doing very well in pawnshops. For example, there are 500 pawnshops in Nanjing, and Huizhou merchants and Fujianese compete for this site.The interest charged by Fujianese for opening pawnshops is 3 to 4 cents, while that of Huizhou merchants is 1 cent, thus forming a powerful pawn group, so how will history evaluate it in the end? It's called Wudian, no Hui, which means that almost all the pawns are from Huizhou.But other than that, what else did Huizhou merchants do?Tea is also sold.At that time, during the reign of Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty, China's export trade surplus was about 850,000 taels of silver, and the largest export was Keemun black tea from Huizhou.Do you know that Shanghai will host the World Expo in 2010? In fact, our Huizhou merchants participated in the World Expo in Panama in 1915, and the Keemun black tea that Huizhou merchants participated in the exhibition even won a gold medal.There is also the dry wood industry, which is used to purchase wood for the palace.For example, when the imperial palace was rebuilt in the seventh year of Chongzhen (1634), this privilege was given to Huizhou people.Readers may be curious, why are Huizhou people doing it?That is what I said earlier, the Huizhou Group has formed a strong and powerful group based on the entire Huizhou family through the Jinshi examination.They are officials in the imperial court, and the so-called Yanyin, the so-called timber, and even various industries are supported by the Huizhou gang in the imperial court.Someone in the imperial court spoke, so the Huizhou Gang gained a huge economic advantage with internal and external support. This is the purpose of Huizhou people's study, to glorify their ancestors.I believe that Huizhou merchants seem not very interested in governing the country and the world.But what is more interesting is that under the influence of this Confucianism, the entire Huizhou merchant group was particularly interested in building various archways.For example, during the Qianlong period, there was a Bao family who built seven majestic archways in Tangyue County.This loyalty, filial piety and righteousness, "righteousness" is to be kind and generous.For example, Hongze Lake, Yangtze River, and Huaihe River were often flooded. The Bao family donated a total of 60,000 shi of rice, 40,000 shi of wheat, and 3 million taels of silver.Therefore, the imperial court praised his family for their generosity, so Bao's family built a large archway, which was very luxurious and a waste of money.What's more interesting is that Huizhou merchants built more than 6,000 huge ancestral halls.Huizhou people often say that their biggest thing is to build ancestral halls. Without ancestral halls, there would be no clan, and without clans, there would be no clan. Therefore, a lot of money was spent on building ancestral halls.How much did it cost?The family of Huzhong County has a ancestral hall of the Hu family. During the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, it cost 13 million taels of maintenance, which is equivalent to using 10 ironclad ships to make this thing. It is not built, but repaired. How luxurious . Also, another one is called Ye Family Ancestral Hall.Have you seen "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"?Some scenes were filmed here.Readers recall the mansion in the movie "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" again. It is very magnificent, but you may not know that it is the ancestral hall built by Huizhou people.At that time, the Ming Dynasty only allowed ordinary people to build houses with an area of 3,000 square meters.This is too small for these rich people, but you are ordinary people, and you can't build a big building, so what should you do?Huizhou merchants began to make various sculptures. Once Huizhou merchants made a fortune, buying houses and land seemed to be their favorite thing to do after they had wealth.Today, we can also feel the prosperity of Huizhou merchants at that time from these preserved archways, ancestral halls and folk houses.During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, when Huizhou merchants were at their peak, they built a large number of gardens with their huge wealth and purchased real estate all over the country. Moreover, Huizhou merchants were good at imitating famous buildings in various places and integrating the beauty of the world into their own architectural art. So, apart from the Huizhou architecture of "green mountains and green waters, white walls and black tiles", what other industries did Huizhou merchants support?What does the decline of the red-capped businessman Hu Xueyan explain?
Taking woodcarving as an example, for a house with an area of only 3,000 square meters, 20 masters have been working on the woodcarving for 4 years.The windows are basically carved wood.Then there are brick carvings, not ordinary bricks, with patterns engraved on them.The courtyard is a small bridge with flowing water and stone carvings on it.The gold posted by Chen Ancestral Hall was as high as 100 taels, and the construction cost was about 600,000 taels of silver.In addition, for example, building a garden, let alone that.They have all kinds of gardens, and the purpose of building gardens is for private clubs, so that leaders can come to play at home, and this habit has been passed down to this day.In addition, there is land speculation. Let me take the Bao family as an example. The Bao family is far away in Yangzhou. Why is it in Yangzhou?Because Yangzhou at that time was a goods distribution center, this group of Huizhou merchants went to Yangzhou, Jiangsu to do business. We can say that Yangzhou in Jiangsu at that time was basically Huizhou merchants.The data we found is that the Bao family bought 2,000 mu of (righteous) land in Huizhou, not to help the common people, but to help their own clan.So Yangzhou was the most luxurious and prosperous paradise on earth at that time.In fact, I think many people were envious of the prosperity at that time, and even I wanted to go there to see what was going on.In addition, Huizhou merchants also spent a lot of money on some playful things, such as women, piano, chess, calligraphy and painting.Let me give a few examples. There are two people called "Yangzhou Erma". They are two brothers, surnamed Ma, and they are both big salt merchants.They set up a small Linglong Mountain Pavilion, which covers a very, very large area.Although it's called Xiao Linglong, it's not small at all, it's huge.At that time, the so-called Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou were not because of their strange looks, but their strange style of writing. The Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou had stayed here before. Why, Huayuan.For example, Comrade Zheng Banqiao, he is the first of the eight monsters, and he is the best at painting bamboo. The literati complex in Huizhou merchants broke out under the support of a lot of money. They not only created the Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou, but also created Huiban. Beijing paved the way for the emergence of Peking Opera.And when things like opera, calligraphy and painting, and even the so-called "thin horse" are pushed to the extreme of extravagance without restraint, the footsteps of the hidden crisis are getting closer and closer.
Let’s look at how extravagant Huizhou merchants are. They even invite opera troupes to sing at home. We often do this kind of thing now. At that time, many Huizhou merchants often invited famous actors for birthday parties. For example, when they sang, the tip they gave was 160,000 taels of silver, 400,000 taels of silver.There is another one, called the skinny horse.For example, Li Xiangjun in it, she is a thin horse.And Chen Yuanyuan and Gu Hengbo, too.What is a skinny horse?The thin horse is a famous prostitute in the "nightclub" in Yangzhou.At that time, because these Huizhou merchants in Yangzhou were doing so well, they had no place to spend their money, so they went to Miss Bao. They had done what we are doing now.There is a very interesting kind of people, called Zongyi, which is a profession. They used to buy and sell animals, but in the end, the world was bad, and they stopped buying and selling animals, and they bought and sold people.These people went to the countryside to pick a lot of slender girls with good skin and good faces. Since he was a livestock farmer, he named these skinny girls Thin Horses.This "horse" is very interesting, Ma Zi, also means a woman.This phrase is commonly used in the southeast and other places, including Taiwan. "Let me introduce, this is my horse", which means my girlfriend, and the name came from that time. After he bought these girls, he trained them from an early age, making them proficient in all kinds of piano, chess, calligraphy and painting. After the training, he invited Huizhou merchants from Yangzhou to come here, just like you go to a nightclub. Call these skinny horses over and stand in a row, let these merchants comment, see how your skin is, and take it home as a concubine when you are done.There are also many skinny horses who end up as prostitutes. For example, Chen Yuanyuan was born as a skinny horse, and she is very beautiful.Who started such a corrupt thing?It started from our Huizhou merchants.Now that I’ve talked about it, have you seen any content that Huizhou merchants are diligently investing the money in the most productive places at this moment? Have you ever seen it?No, it's basically eating, drinking, whoring, gambling, and drinking.I think these eight words are the most appropriate to describe Huizhou merchants, what a pity.How did they fail? Huizhou merchants used to break through the mundane and enter business because of difficult livelihoods. At this time, the "Hui camels" were full of brave and enterprising spirit.However, when they had a huge amount of wealth, they turned back to the tradition to seek their home. Once faced with drastic changes, the Achilles heel of Huizhou merchants was exposed. Then, what directly led to the collapse of Huizhou merchants? What kind of enlightenment does success or failure give us?
Huizhou merchants grew up because of salt, starting from the Ming Dynasty.So how did they fail?It was also because of the salt that it collapsed. In the process, I couldn't see any reaction from this business group, and there was no ability to respond. They were extremely poor, far inferior to Shanxi merchants. After doing ticket numbers, our Huizhou merchants will collapse to the end.Because in 1832, that is, the twelfth year of Daoguang, the outline was changed to votes, that is, the guidelines were changed to votes.What's the meaning?To put it bluntly, you just need to go directly to our taxation unit to pay taxes, and then you will be given a salt ticket and you can go to buy salt.At this point, the previous monopoly rights were completely abolished in the 12th year of Daoguang, and you can do the salt business if you have money.As a result, Huizhou merchants collapsed and disappeared.Moreover, in the last years of Daoguang, the Taiping Rebellion happened again. People from Huizhou who were engaged in pawn shop business and tea business in Jiangsu and Zhejiang happened to encounter the Taiping Rebellion.Moreover, Ceylon and India also produce tea, and their tea competes with Keemun black tea, so the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom hinders your business, and black tea from India and Ceylon competes with you.After doing this, Huizhou merchants completely collapsed, and disappeared without a trace in a blink of an eye.Therefore, so many things you see today are historical relics, and this is the level of our Huizhou merchants.After the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty, there were basically no Huizhou merchants. In the end, there was Hu Xueyan. Anhui people listed him as Huizhou merchants, and Zhejiang people listed him as Zhejiang merchants. A standard opportunist, he only did one thing in his life, which is to make friends with powerful people and speculate. He also did silk, but failed in the end.How did he send it?I don’t want to spend too much time talking about Hu Xueyan. Let me put it this way. Before Hu Xueyan, Huizhou merchants collapsed after the 12th year of Daoguang (1832). He is a small self-employed person, a small businessman who flatters his horse and speculates. He is nothing. So everyone, please see that the development of our Huizhou merchants is due to salt, but Huizhou merchants did not do the so-called capital conversion. They did not convert these salt industry capital and commercial capital into industrial capital that was popular at that time, and did not build factories. It is a pity that it led to the complete collapse of Huizhou merchants.This is the history of Huizhou merchants.
Readers know how brilliant Anhui people were in the past, can you imagine?Let me give you an example, we watch a TV series, Qianlong went to the south of the Yangtze River six times, who do you think is receiving him?A native of Anhui, a great salt merchant in Anhui, named Jiang Chun, was received by him.In the end, he was conferred the rank of first-class Guanglu doctor, and even participated in the Thousand Seniors Banquet held by Emperor Qianlong in the 18th century. The glory of Anhui at that time was unimaginable.Of course, the current Anhui is far inferior to the era of Huizhou merchants in terms of economy.But why are Huizhou merchants so rich?Did it disappear in the end?And now you can't see Huizhou merchants anymore, what's going on? There are many similarities between the success of Huizhou merchants and Shanxi merchants. They are basically located in impoverished mountainous areas.Since the Eastern Jin Dynasty, there have been records of Huizhou people doing business, and the Qing Dynasty reached its peak.Today's Huangshan City in Anhui Province, Jixi County in Xuancheng, and Wuyuan County in Jiangxi Province formed a huge wealth group during the Qing Dynasty. Known as Huizhou merchants. So, what is so special about the successful business gang of Huizhou Merchants?What is their spiritual world and business strategy like?What made them successful, and what caused their downfall?
Therefore, Huizhou merchants basically originated from Huizhou, which is today's Huangzhou City in Anhui Province.In the era of Song Huizong, he named this place Huizhou with his "Hui" character, so it has been handed down.Every time I think of Song Huizong, I feel sorry for him. This man is proficient in everything from piano, chess, calligraphy and painting, but he is a poor executive and manager.Therefore, the Song Dynasty (Northern Song Dynasty) was basically buried in his hands.But his artistic accomplishment is unimaginable, and even his calligraphy can be unique and innovative (thin gold style).In his time, Zhang Zeduan, a well-known artist, painted a picture of "Surfing the River During the Qingming Festival". This painting shows the prosperity, extravagance and waste of commercial capital, which is similar to the level of later Huizhou merchants.So this is my biggest feeling for Huizhou merchants. Huizhou has a long history, it is the hometown of Zhu Xi.Let's see, what kind of business thinking do Huizhou merchants have?It can be said that Huizhou people should take Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism as their family rule, which means that Confucianism attaches great importance to this kind of ethical ordering between family and country.For example, "Parents are here, don't travel far." Don't run around when your parents are still alive, emphasizing the integrity of a family.So in Confucianism, especially Zhu Xi, it is very emphasized that on the basis of self-cultivation, one must do a good job in regulating the family before he can govern the country and bring peace to the world.But after all, it is a minority who can govern the country and the world, so for the general public, the family concept formed by the Qi family has become extremely important.This was the background of Huizhou people at that time, and their thinking was extremely rigid. Basically, the goal of their struggle was based on the glory of the family. Since Huizhou is Zhu Xi's hometown, it has a unique style of writing.In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the number of people admitted to Jinshi was close to 2% of the total in the Ming Dynasty, and the same was true in the Qing Dynasty. In the entire Qing Dynasty, there were as many as 19 champions from Huizhou, accounting for almost 17% of all champions.This is an incredible number, but how do you integrate this so-called official-based thinking into the thinking of Huizhou people?It can be said that Huizhou people focus on family glory, but they are very concerned about the pursuit of fame, and their purpose is not to govern the country and the world, but to honor the family.However, once you enter the officialdom, economic strength is very important. You rarely see that an honest official can become a gang, and it is unlikely.Therefore, economic strength can allow this group to play a pivotal role in the entire court, which is very important.So this is a combination of Confucianism and businessmen.What kind of personality do these people have?I think Hu Shi's words are very good.He said that trying to be an "Hui Camel", Hui Camel can basically be used as a description of the basic personality of Huizhou merchants.What is emblem camel? As a descendant of Huizhou tea merchants, Hu Shi knew the business activities of his hometown people like the back of his hand.He said that most Huizhou businessmen started their businesses with small businesses, endured hardships and stood hard work, accumulated some funds, gradually worked hard to develop, and some became wealthy businessmen.Camels are animals that can survive in extremely harsh environments.To this day, Anhui people still use Hui camels to encourage themselves in their cultural roots.In their view, referring to Huizhou merchants as Hui camels represents their indomitable pioneering and enterprising spirit. In my opinion, Hui camels in history have the same ideological origin. What is this origin?
After research, people found that there are a lot of pawnbrokers in Huizhou. This pawn industry should be called Chaofeng. For example, people who receive and buy goods on the counter should be called Chaofeng.But people in Jiangnan like to call him Huiboda. The pronunciation of this "boss" is similar to the pronunciation of "camel" in Jiangnan, so Huiboda has become Huiluotuo.There is another saying that Huizhou merchants like to carry a sack on their backs like a camel when they go out to do business.What's in this sack?Huibing, and three ropes.These ropes are very important, and they are called "carrying three ropes with you when you go out, you can do everything without asking for help." What's the use?Climbing mountains and crossing rivers are all necessary.What's more, you can hang yourself if necessary.So what kind of personality is this?This is very important, because Huizhou people are hard-working, and they are such a group of people who are desperate.Okay, then I will repeat the whole Huizhou merchants. The essence of Huizhou merchants is Confucian merchants. These Confucian merchants are a group of people with rigid thinking, but with the spirit of Hui camels, they are hard-working and rigid in thinking.For a person like this who endures hardships and stands hard work, burns all boats, and is very determined to do business with the Guangyao family, what path will he take because of his rigid thinking?This is very interesting, and I found that the explanation of my theory is very clear, it is clear - no matter how brilliant a business group that lacks thought innovation, it will definitely sink in the end, and there is no other possibility. Let's take a look, you have the foundation of knowledge, Zhu Xi's Neo-Confucianism and culture, and personality conditions, so what are Huizhou people waiting for?Just waiting for an opportunity.Sometimes opportunity is very important.As the saying goes, one is fate, two is luck, three is geomantic omen; The reason why Huizhou merchants can become a generation of outstanding business gangs is not enough to rely solely on the spirit of Huiluo camels. Their success is closely related to a new policy of the imperial court at that time. This policy made the fate of Huizhou merchants magically change. The reversal made them wait for what they wanted in the difficult survival, so what are they waiting for and what they want?
As a result, God favored Huizhou merchants after all. In 1371, shortly after the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, there was a good opportunity for Huizhou people to discover.At that time, the Ming Dynasty established 9 strategically important places at the border, and 4 of these 9 were in Shanxi. Therefore, Shanxi took advantage of the favorable location to first have the opportunity to establish a clan.The country asks merchants to transport grain. Of course, to give him some benefits, they give him salt. This salt is very important. One salt weighs 300 catties of salt on average.As long as you send the grain to the border, you will be given salt, and you can exchange it for salt, and then sell it.I did the math, 1 quote is equal to 300 catties, how much does 1 catty make? 1 catty earns 30 Wen, so 300 Jin multiplied by 30 Wen equals 9000 Wen, which is 9 taels of silver, and one quotation can earn 9 taels of silver.So what about 10,000 quotations? 90,000 taels of silver. At that time, Shanxi was the main one at this stage, because the four borders were all in Shanxi, so Shanxi people had the best chance to get Yanyin to buy salt, and it was difficult for Huizhou people to compete with them. There are many salt fields.What chance did the Huizhou people get in the end?This system is getting more and more corrupt, and finally it has become like this.After the people who sent the grain to the border got the salt, they didn't need to go to the salt field to get the salt. He could sell the salt to the Erdao dealers.At this time, the opportunity came for Huizhou merchants. They withdrew to the Lianghuai Salt Fields, bought salt bows at high prices, and used the salt to resell it everywhere, thus becoming second-hand dealers.Later, the Ming Dynasty could no longer sustain it, and people who sent food to the border did not need to buy salt, so a lot of corruption came out.So in the second year of Hongzhi (1489), it was simply canceled, and there was no need to send food. You can use the money to buy salt and forget it.At this time, Huizhou merchants had already accumulated a good foundation of wealth, so you asked him to take silver taels to buy salt, which made him very happy. This group of salt merchants has been made, and this group of Huizhou merchants has also been made. Around 1617, the Ming Dynasty suddenly proposed a new system called the Promotion of Gangfa.why?Because tax collection was a big problem at that time, many people disappeared after taking Yanyin, and the government did not get any benefits in the end.Many people took Yanyin and did not give enough money, which was a loss of tax revenue for the court.So in the forty-fifth year of Wanli (1617), the imperial court changed the promotion law.Just call you merchants who have Yanyin and register them in the book, and you will be there. For 1 old Yanyin you take, the imperial court will give you 9 new Yanyin. This is the so-called 10 principles; it can be hereditary.If there is no person in the book, you can’t make salt, it’s for the court tax, the book is very clear, I will collect taxes from you every year, and you can’t escape.This makes Huizhou merchants fatter, and his old salt is cited the most.Therefore, according to the distribution according to this ratio, 1 old Yanyin can be matched with 9 new Yanyin, and they will be issued at once, which is how Huizhou merchants grew up. At that time, we checked and found that the Lianghuai Salt Field produced 1.4 million yin of salt every year. According to the ratio I just mentioned, 1 yin is 9 liang, so 9 liang is multiplied by 1.4 million yin, that is, the Lianghuai Salt Field produces 1.4 million salt a year. You can get 12 million taels of silver.Maybe readers don’t quite understand what is the concept of 12 million taels of silver?Let me tell you, 1 tael of silver can buy 100 catties of rice, and you can go to a five-star hotel for a meal.At that time, a senior member of the first rank paid 180 taels of silver a year.So do you know what 12 million taels means?In the Beiyang Fleet in the late Qing Dynasty, an armored ship was worth 1.2 million taels, which meant that the Lianghuai Salt Field could produce 10 iron-clad ships a year. It's a pity that so much money has never been transformed into a modern industrial capital, and it is basically completely wasted in the hands of Huizhou people.During Qianlong's six trips to the south of the Yangtze River, Comrade Jiang Chun who received him was a general merchant. What is a general merchant?It is the person who specializes in managing small salt merchants.At that time, the Lianghuai Salt Field was divided into 8 general merchants. Didn’t 1 old salt merchant provide 9 new salt merchants? These 8 general merchants completely controlled these small salt merchants, which was equivalent to the meaning of the imperial court’s public institutions.Then he will serve as the general merchant, and he is extremely rich. The close relationship between him and the imperial court is unimaginable. He personally received Emperor Qianlong's six trips to the south of the Yangtze River to eat, drink and have fun. During this time, Comrade Jiang Chun, a Huizhou merchant, was responsible for all the expenses. The title of Dr. Lu is probably to enjoy the treatment at the ministerial level.It can be seen that the glory of the entire Huizhou merchants at that time was unimaginable.But what did Huizhou merchants do with the money they earned from the salt? The period of more than 300 years from the middle of the Ming Dynasty to the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty was the most prosperous period for Huizhou merchants.Salt industry, pawnbroking industry, tea, timber, etc. are the four major industries that Huizhou merchants are keen to operate.The wealth of Huizhou merchants can be said to be as rich as an enemy country. Even Emperor Qianlong lamented that "the merchants are so rich that I can't match them."Possessing such a huge amount of funds seems to be enough to build an immortal industrial empire. However, we have not seen this scene, but a large amount of funds have created a top Jiangnan beauty brand called "Yangzhou Slim Horse" and extremely luxurious buildings. Style, then, how is the money of Huizhou merchants used?Why are they so passionate about these?
What did Huizhou merchants do when they made money from salt?What was done was very disappointing.The first thing is to do a pawn shop.Many Huizhou merchants open pawnshops and feel safe and secure.Moreover, Huizhou merchants are doing very well in pawnshops. For example, there are 500 pawnshops in Nanjing, and Huizhou merchants and Fujianese compete for this site.The interest charged by Fujianese for opening pawnshops is 3 to 4 cents, while that of Huizhou merchants is 1 cent, thus forming a powerful pawn group, so how will history evaluate it in the end? It's called Wudian, no Hui, which means that almost all the pawns are from Huizhou.But other than that, what else did Huizhou merchants do?Tea is also sold.At that time, during the reign of Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty, China's export trade surplus was about 850,000 taels of silver, and the largest export was Keemun black tea from Huizhou.Do you know that Shanghai will host the World Expo in 2010? In fact, our Huizhou merchants participated in the World Expo in Panama in 1915, and the Keemun black tea that Huizhou merchants participated in the exhibition even won a gold medal.There is also the dry wood industry, which is used to purchase wood for the palace.For example, when the imperial palace was rebuilt in the seventh year of Chongzhen (1634), this privilege was given to Huizhou people.Readers may be curious, why are Huizhou people doing it?That is what I said earlier, the Huizhou Group has formed a strong and powerful group based on the entire Huizhou family through the Jinshi examination.They are officials in the imperial court, and the so-called Yanyin, the so-called timber, and even various industries are supported by the Huizhou gang in the imperial court.Someone in the imperial court spoke, so the Huizhou Gang gained a huge economic advantage with internal and external support. This is the purpose of Huizhou people's study, to glorify their ancestors.I believe that Huizhou merchants seem not very interested in governing the country and the world.But what is more interesting is that under the influence of this Confucianism, the entire Huizhou merchant group was particularly interested in building various archways.For example, during the Qianlong period, there was a Bao family who built seven majestic archways in Tangyue County.This loyalty, filial piety and righteousness, "righteousness" is to be kind and generous.For example, Hongze Lake, Yangtze River, and Huaihe River were often flooded. The Bao family donated a total of 60,000 shi of rice, 40,000 shi of wheat, and 3 million taels of silver.Therefore, the imperial court praised his family for their generosity, so Bao's family built a large archway, which was very luxurious and a waste of money.What's more interesting is that Huizhou merchants built more than 6,000 huge ancestral halls.Huizhou people often say that their biggest thing is to build ancestral halls. Without ancestral halls, there would be no clan, and without clans, there would be no clan. Therefore, a lot of money was spent on building ancestral halls.How much did it cost?The family of Huzhong County has a ancestral hall of the Hu family. During the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, it cost 13 million taels of maintenance, which is equivalent to using 10 ironclad ships to make this thing. It is not built, but repaired. How luxurious . Also, another one is called Ye Family Ancestral Hall.Have you seen "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"?Some scenes were filmed here.Readers recall the mansion in the movie "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" again. It is very magnificent, but you may not know that it is the ancestral hall built by Huizhou people.At that time, the Ming Dynasty only allowed ordinary people to build houses with an area of 3,000 square meters.This is too small for these rich people, but you are ordinary people, and you can't build a big building, so what should you do?Huizhou merchants began to make various sculptures. Once Huizhou merchants made a fortune, buying houses and land seemed to be their favorite thing to do after they had wealth.Today, we can also feel the prosperity of Huizhou merchants at that time from these preserved archways, ancestral halls and folk houses.During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, when Huizhou merchants were at their peak, they built a large number of gardens with their huge wealth and purchased real estate all over the country. Moreover, Huizhou merchants were good at imitating famous buildings in various places and integrating the beauty of the world into their own architectural art. So, apart from the Huizhou architecture of "green mountains and green waters, white walls and black tiles", what other industries did Huizhou merchants support?What does the decline of the red-capped businessman Hu Xueyan explain?
Taking woodcarving as an example, for a house with an area of only 3,000 square meters, 20 masters have been working on the woodcarving for 4 years.The windows are basically carved wood.Then there are brick carvings, not ordinary bricks, with patterns engraved on them.The courtyard is a small bridge with flowing water and stone carvings on it.The gold posted by Chen Ancestral Hall was as high as 100 taels, and the construction cost was about 600,000 taels of silver.In addition, for example, building a garden, let alone that.They have all kinds of gardens, and the purpose of building gardens is for private clubs, so that leaders can come to play at home, and this habit has been passed down to this day.In addition, there is land speculation. Let me take the Bao family as an example. The Bao family is far away in Yangzhou. Why is it in Yangzhou?Because Yangzhou at that time was a goods distribution center, this group of Huizhou merchants went to Yangzhou, Jiangsu to do business. We can say that Yangzhou in Jiangsu at that time was basically Huizhou merchants.The data we found is that the Bao family bought 2,000 mu of (righteous) land in Huizhou, not to help the common people, but to help their own clan.So Yangzhou was the most luxurious and prosperous paradise on earth at that time.In fact, I think many people were envious of the prosperity at that time, and even I wanted to go there to see what was going on.In addition, Huizhou merchants also spent a lot of money on some playful things, such as women, piano, chess, calligraphy and painting.Let me give a few examples. There are two people called "Yangzhou Erma". They are two brothers, surnamed Ma, and they are both big salt merchants.They set up a small Linglong Mountain Pavilion, which covers a very, very large area.Although it's called Xiao Linglong, it's not small at all, it's huge.At that time, the so-called Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou were not because of their strange looks, but their strange style of writing. The Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou had stayed here before. Why, Huayuan.For example, Comrade Zheng Banqiao, he is the first of the eight monsters, and he is the best at painting bamboo. The literati complex in Huizhou merchants broke out under the support of a lot of money. They not only created the Eight Eccentrics of Yangzhou, but also created Huiban. Beijing paved the way for the emergence of Peking Opera.And when things like opera, calligraphy and painting, and even the so-called "thin horse" are pushed to the extreme of extravagance without restraint, the footsteps of the hidden crisis are getting closer and closer.
Let’s look at how extravagant Huizhou merchants are. They even invite opera troupes to sing at home. We often do this kind of thing now. At that time, many Huizhou merchants often invited famous actors for birthday parties. For example, when they sang, the tip they gave was 160,000 taels of silver, 400,000 taels of silver.There is another one, called the skinny horse.For example, Li Xiangjun in it, she is a thin horse.And Chen Yuanyuan and Gu Hengbo, too.What is a skinny horse?The thin horse is a famous prostitute in the "nightclub" in Yangzhou.At that time, because these Huizhou merchants in Yangzhou were doing so well, they had no place to spend their money, so they went to Miss Bao. They had done what we are doing now.There is a very interesting kind of people, called Zongyi, which is a profession. They used to buy and sell animals, but in the end, the world was bad, and they stopped buying and selling animals, and they bought and sold people.These people went to the countryside to pick a lot of slender girls with good skin and good faces. Since he was a livestock farmer, he named these skinny girls Thin Horses.This "horse" is very interesting, Ma Zi, also means a woman.This phrase is commonly used in the southeast and other places, including Taiwan. "Let me introduce, this is my horse", which means my girlfriend, and the name came from that time. After he bought these girls, he trained them from an early age, making them proficient in all kinds of piano, chess, calligraphy and painting. After the training, he invited Huizhou merchants from Yangzhou to come here, just like you go to a nightclub. Call these skinny horses over and stand in a row, let these merchants comment, see how your skin is, and take it home as a concubine when you are done.There are also many skinny horses who end up as prostitutes. For example, Chen Yuanyuan was born as a skinny horse, and she is very beautiful.Who started such a corrupt thing?It started from our Huizhou merchants.Now that I’ve talked about it, have you seen any content that Huizhou merchants are diligently investing the money in the most productive places at this moment? Have you ever seen it?No, it's basically eating, drinking, whoring, gambling, and drinking.I think these eight words are the most appropriate to describe Huizhou merchants, what a pity.How did they fail? Huizhou merchants used to break through the mundane and enter business because of difficult livelihoods. At this time, the "Hui camels" were full of brave and enterprising spirit.However, when they had a huge amount of wealth, they turned back to the tradition to seek their home. Once faced with drastic changes, the Achilles heel of Huizhou merchants was exposed. Then, what directly led to the collapse of Huizhou merchants? What kind of enlightenment does success or failure give us?
Huizhou merchants grew up because of salt, starting from the Ming Dynasty.So how did they fail?It was also because of the salt that it collapsed. In the process, I couldn't see any reaction from this business group, and there was no ability to respond. They were extremely poor, far inferior to Shanxi merchants. After doing ticket numbers, our Huizhou merchants will collapse to the end.Because in 1832, that is, the twelfth year of Daoguang, the outline was changed to votes, that is, the guidelines were changed to votes.What's the meaning?To put it bluntly, you just need to go directly to our taxation unit to pay taxes, and then you will be given a salt ticket and you can go to buy salt.At this point, the previous monopoly rights were completely abolished in the 12th year of Daoguang, and you can do the salt business if you have money.As a result, Huizhou merchants collapsed and disappeared.Moreover, in the last years of Daoguang, the Taiping Rebellion happened again. People from Huizhou who were engaged in pawn shop business and tea business in Jiangsu and Zhejiang happened to encounter the Taiping Rebellion.Moreover, Ceylon and India also produce tea, and their tea competes with Keemun black tea, so the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom hinders your business, and black tea from India and Ceylon competes with you.After doing this, Huizhou merchants completely collapsed, and disappeared without a trace in a blink of an eye.Therefore, so many things you see today are historical relics, and this is the level of our Huizhou merchants.After the Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty, there were basically no Huizhou merchants. In the end, there was Hu Xueyan. Anhui people listed him as Huizhou merchants, and Zhejiang people listed him as Zhejiang merchants. A standard opportunist, he only did one thing in his life, which is to make friends with powerful people and speculate. He also did silk, but failed in the end.How did he send it?I don’t want to spend too much time talking about Hu Xueyan. Let me put it this way. Before Hu Xueyan, Huizhou merchants collapsed after the 12th year of Daoguang (1832). He is a small self-employed person, a small businessman who flatters his horse and speculates. He is nothing. So everyone, please see that the development of our Huizhou merchants is due to salt, but Huizhou merchants did not do the so-called capital conversion. They did not convert these salt industry capital and commercial capital into industrial capital that was popular at that time, and did not build factories. It is a pity that it led to the complete collapse of Huizhou merchants.This is the history of Huizhou merchants.