Chapter 7 Chapter Seven: Emperor Wudi’s Building Ships and Their Sea Patrols

When Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty (reigned from 140 BC to 87 BC) ruled, the social economy developed and the country was strong.In order to unify the coastal areas and develop the transportation and trade between the near sea and the ocean, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty tried his best to strengthen the shipbuilding industry, build a powerful navy, and made seven sea patrols. The shipbuilding industry in the Han Dynasty was already very developed.According to the records in ancient books and the research on the ship models of the Han Dynasty unearthed in modern times, it can be seen that the Han Dynasty was able to produce various types of ships according to different purposes and needs, including passenger ships, cargo ships, and warships.Among the passenger ships, there are official ships and private ships; among the private ships, there are also boats, boats, boats, flat boats, light boats, boats, and boats.Many warships were developed from civilian ships.Warships are much more demanding than civilian ships.The structure and performance requirements of warships are very high. First of all, they must be strong, able to defend against the enemy's attack, and must also be aggressive. They must be equipped with weapons capable of attacking.Therefore, warships represent the shipbuilding capabilities and technical level at that time.There are also many types of warships, such as Ge boats, bridge boats, fighting ships, Meng Chong [mengchong Mengchong], building boats, etc.

In the Han Dynasty, my country's shipbuilding technology was mature.The "building boat" can best illustrate the superb shipbuilding technology of the Han Dynasty.Louchuan is a synonym for the navy, and it is also a general term for warships. For example, sailors are called Louchuan pawns and Louchuan soldiers, and naval generals are called Louchuan generals and Louchuan captains.In the third year of Yuanshou (120 BC), Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ordered the excavation and construction of Kunming Pool with a radius of 40 miles in the southwest of Chang'an City, and built boats in the pool.Tall buildings can be built on the boat, so it is called a building boat.This is an important warship ship type in the Han Dynasty.Building ships existed in the Qin Dynasty, and in the Han Dynasty, their scale and shape were much larger than those in the Qin Dynasty. Their large number of appearances is an important symbol of the high development of the shipbuilding industry in the Han Dynasty.According to the "Historical Records Ping Zhun Shu": "At that time, the more eager to fight with the Han ships, the Kunming Lake was overhauled, and the surrounding area was built, and the buildings and ships were more than ten feet high, and the flags were added to it, which was very strong. "The hull of the building is tall, and there are three floors on it. The first floor is called "Lu", "like a house"; , "It is also in the Shangyue Jue (bird) room, waiting in the middle to look at it like a bird's warning" (Liu Xi's "Shi Ming").Lu, Feilu, and Queshi, each of these three floors has a female wall to defend against the enemy's bow, arrow and stone attack. There are shooting windows on the female wall.The boats are well-equipped, and have used ropes, oars, sculls, sails and other driving tools.The battle flags are also planted around the building boats, which are mighty and majestic.Sometimes, there are nearly a hundred tall building boats in Kunming Pool.In the Han Dynasty, more than 2,000 buildings and ships and 200,000 navy troops could be dispatched in one battle.When fighting, the fleet is equipped with various combat ships.The warship at the forefront is called "Xiandeng"; there is also the narrow and long warship "Wanglong" that hits the enemy ships; They all use double-layer boards called "sills", and boards are set up on all sides to defend against arrows and stones, and the inside is like a heavily armed ship with a prison sill.There are also main battleships Luzhan, Maotu, Gechuan and so on.Lou Chuan and Ge Chuan are large ships, both of which are more than 500 hu, and there are cabins on board, called "scouts", to observe the enemy's advance and retreat. 300 Dendrobium is called "(Zhou Zhou)". Below 200 hu is called a boat, and its movement is like a stile, which can be done by one person.There are also "艆 (船弤)" and "(舟发)" ((木发)), etc., which are all large sailing ships.In addition, there are larger ships, such as the Yuzhang Dajia (Xiangxiang, also pronounced Chuanchuan) with palaces on it, which can carry tens of thousands of people. "Ten thousand people" may be an exaggeration.Even if it carries "thousands of people", the load capacity has reached 90-100 tons.

There were many ships built in the Han Dynasty.The boats built at that time were calculated by the length of "zhang", and some big merchants had a boat of 1,000 zhang. Archaeological excavations can also prove the development of the shipbuilding industry and advanced shipbuilding technology in the Han Dynasty. From 1973 to 1974, a wooden ship model was unearthed in the tomb of the Western Han Dynasty on Fenghuang Mountain, Jiangling, Hubei. It is 71 cm long and 10.5 cm wide at the middle. The head is narrow, the tail is slightly wider, the bottom is flat and fusiform, and the ends are streamlined Alice.The wooden slips unearthed at the same time as the ship model also contained information about boats.

From 1951 to 1952, in Tomb No. 203 of the Western Han Dynasty excavated in Changsha, a ship model with small two ends and a large middle, narrow and long boat shape, 16 paddles, and regular nail holes were found on both sides of the ship model and on the bow and tail decks. .It shows that this kind of ship has adopted the advanced nailing technology in the world at that time. In 1955, a pottery ship model was unearthed in the tomb of the Eastern Han Dynasty on the outskirts of Guangzhou. , the two sides of the ship are equipped with side walkways for poles and rudder anchors. It is a medium-sized inland river passenger and cargo ship with a partial deck.

In 1975, a large-scale ancient shipbuilding factory site was excavated in Guangzhou, and three large slipways were discovered, which can simultaneously build several wooden ships weighing 50 to 60 tons.According to textual research, this is a shipbuilding site in the Qin and Han Dynasties.In addition, there are Qin and Han shipbuilding factories in Sichuan, Shaanxi, Fujian, Zhejiang, and Jiangxi. There are many naval bases in the Western Han Dynasty.The standing army of the navy is stationed in various important places along the river and the sea, and is under the jurisdiction of the county guard.The main naval bases of the Western Han Dynasty were Yuzhang (Nanchang, Jiangxi), Xunyang (Jiujiang area, Jiangxi), Lujiang (Anqing, Anhui), Kuaiji (Suzhou, Jiangsu), Juzhang (at the mouth of Hangzhou Bay, Qiantang River, Yuyao, Zhejiang), Bochang (Bochang, Shandong) Xing into Laizhou Bay) and other places.Counties such as Lujiang and Kuaiji are also important shipbuilding bases.

With his powerful navy, Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty completed the unification of the feudal separatist regimes in Dongou (now southeast of Zhejiang Province), Minyue (part of Fujian), Nanyue (part of Guangdong and Guangxi), consolidated the sea area, and established a strong foundation for Southeast Asia. It laid the foundation for the unimpeded access to the southern coastal shipping routes, thus opening up the Maritime Silk Road. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty also patrolled the sea seven times, not only very close in age, sometimes once a year, and he was still patrolling the sea at the age of 69 until two years before his death.

The first sea patrol: In the first month of spring in the first year of Yuanfeng (110 BC), Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty patrolled the sea for the first time.As far as Donglai (now Ye County, Shandong Province), Qi people took the opportunity to tell stories about the sea, and there were no less than ten thousand people.He sent a large fleet of thousands of people equal in size to Xu Fu Dongdu to explore the way to Japan.He even personally led the fleet to go to Penglai to seek immortals.It is only after the bitter remonstrance of the ministers.Then he patrolled along the Bohai Sea to Jieshi, eastward to the west of Liaoning, and then returned to the capital Chang'an in May.

The second sea patrol: In the first month of spring in the second year of Yuanfeng (109 BC), only six months after the first sea patrol, Emperor Wu visited Donglai again and stayed for several months, begging the gods to see nothing.Return to Chang'an in April.In autumn, Xun Zhi (zhizhi), the left general, was sent to send troops from the west of Liaoxi, and Yang Pu, the general of the building boat, led a navy of 50,000 to cross the Bohai sea and land from Shandong to attack North Korea.The route of the two marches this time was the same as that of Emperor Wu's first tour of Donglai and the route to western Liaoning.It can be seen that this patrol is still for the opening of the route to Japan.The next year, due to the internal division of the Korean ruling group, the Wei family died in North Korea.Emperor Wu established Zhenfan (now the area around Kaesong, North Korea), Lintun (now south of Hamgyong South Road, North Korea), Lelang (now south of Pyongyang, North Korea), and Xuantu (tutu) (now Qingyuan, Liaoning) in the area ruled by the Wei family in Korea. Nearby) four counties to open up overseas sea routes.Afterwards, the middle obstacle (Korea) of the China-Japan air route was opened up, and the Han people migrated to Korea and Japan in large numbers, and the Japanese could also come to China via North Korea.

The third sea patrol: In the winter of the fifth year of Yuanfeng (106 BC), Emperor Wu first visited the shipbuilding bases in Jiangxi and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River in Hunan, and then led a large fleet from Xunyang (now Jiujiang, Jiangxi, and Huangmei, Hubei) "From the Xunyang Floating River, shoot into the Jiaojiang River, and get it."Down the river, I went to Anqing to inspect the Zongyang (Zongyang, Anhui) shipbuilding base at the mouth of Caizi Lake below Anqing, and added ships and sailors. , out of the mouth of the Yangtze River, into the East China Sea, and northward along the coast to Langye.In March, return to Taishan, and in April return to Chang'an.For the lower reaches of the Yangtze River and the coast, the Lujiang (Anqing and Zongyang, Anhui) naval base is more important than the Xunyang (Jiangxi) naval base.

The fourth sea patrol: In October of the sixth year of Yuanfeng (105 BC), Emperor Wu patrolled the sea to the east. In the first year of Yuanfeng, he sent out to sea to search for the whereabouts of the immortal ship. Since no return was found, the second batch of fleet was sent. Go out to sea and cross to the east. The fifth sea patrol: in the first month of spring in the third year of Taichu (102 BC), Emperor Wu went east to the sea to seek gods and learn about the situation of the sea fleet, but he still did not return.In April, Mount Tai was sealed off, and the Zen Stone Pavilion (at the foot of Mount Tai, alchemists thought it was the pavilion of immortals) was returned to Chang'an.

The sixth sea tour: In February of the third year of Taishi (94 BC), Emperor Wu made another east tour, seeking gods, to Langye, and then crossed the sea to Chengshan and Zhifu, "crossing the sea and returning". The seventh sea patrol: In the first month of spring in the fourth year of Zhenghe (89 BC), Emperor Wu visited the sea for the last time to Donglai. The sea was boiling, and the boats could not leave the port, so they had to return.In March, Emperor Wu repented of his past mistakes, adopted Tian Qianqiu's suggestion, and canceled the matter of all alchemists seeking immortals.After that, Emperor Wu sighed to his officials: "I used to be foolish and deceived by alchemists. Are there any immortals in the world? They are all demons, and they should go on a diet and take medicine, and just get less sick."

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