Chapter 21 Section 5 "Letter Banner", Paper Edict, "Thousand-Li Niu", Camel Post

During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, many new things appeared in the history of post offices. During the Three Kingdoms period, in the area ruled by Cao Wei, in addition to inheriting the bronze symbols from the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States period and the bamboo symbols from the Qin and Han Dynasties, a new communication symbol: Xinfan was created.A letter banner is a flag made in a variety of different patterns and colors.The state of Wei used the five flags of Qinglong, Zhuniao, Xuanwu, Baihu, and Huanglong as signals for different regions.Qinglong banners are used to command the eastern counties, Zhuniao banners are used to command the southern counties, white tiger banners are used to command the western counties, and Xuanwu banners are used to command the northern counties.In Jinai, yellow dragon banners are used.In the Jin Dynasty, this kind of letter flag was still used, but the pattern and color were simplified, and only one kind of white tiger flag was used for the four directions, and the bird script was written on the flag, whichever meant the lightness of flying.This is a signal to send troops.The signal of the main peace uses another kind of Zou [zou] Yu flag, Zou Yu is a kind of black-striped white tiger.Raising the Zouyu flag is to declare peace to the other party.

During this period, the second new thing that appeared in the history of post offices was that paper edicts gradually replaced bamboo slips.Since the invention of paper in the Han Dynasty, paper, a light and cheap writing utensil, has been widely used among the people, replacing the once popular Jane.During the Wei and Jin dynasties, the emperor began to use a kind of green paper for imperial edicts, which was called paper imperial edicts.This started from the time of Cao Cao.According to the decree at the time, the government had to distribute paper and wooden letters to subordinate civil servants every month, and asked them to write their opinions to their superiors on paper on a regular basis, then put it in wooden letters, and finally presented it to Cao Cao for reading.This kind of letter or official document is called a "letter".The term was later inherited and has been used to this day.Letters are much more convenient than bamboo and wooden slips in the past, and can be opened at will.Therefore, it is said that in the Jin Dynasty, there was an official who was too careful. After writing the letter, he was always worried that there would be errors in the letter. He opened and closed the letter dozens of times, and finally sent it to the superior. , became an empty letter.This example shows that it was already very common to use letters as an important means of communication in society at that time.

"Qianli Niu" is also an anecdote about the communication business in the Jin Dynasty. According to historical records, some local officials were looking for a fast horse express named "Qianli Niu" in order to get in touch with the central government as soon as possible or send fresh food to the central government.It is said that from Dagon (Yanyan) Prefecture to Luoyang, "return once sent at night", travel thousands of miles back and forth in a day.At that time, mobile mailboxes also appeared. When Jurong County Magistrate Liu Chao was on a tour, he ordered people to make a large wooden box called "big letter". Love.

The camel post, that is, the camel to deliver the letter, is a matter of the Northern Dynasties.In the famous folk song "Mulan Poetry" at that time, there was a sentence "I would like to borrow a camel to travel thousands of miles and send my son back to my hometown". In fact, there are many examples of using camels as communication tools in the Northern Wei Dynasty in history books.It is said that when Emperor Wei Xiaowen decided on a big surname, the rich families in various places feared that they would not be able to get a "high family", so they sent letters to the central government to report their situation to the central government. "("Ministry of the Chaoye").This is what Li Min in Longxi did, and was nicknamed "Tuo Li" at that time.

There is also a story of "hanging the drum to call the police". "Northern History" records that during the time of Emperor Xiaowen of Wei Dynasty, Li Chong was appointed as the governor of Yanzhou.At that time, the world was in chaos, thieves were rampant everywhere, and business travel and post offices were hindered.After Li Chong arrived in Yanzhou, he ordered a drum tower to be built in each village, with a drum hanging high.When thieves come to rob, someone immediately beats the drum with double mallets to call the police to the whole village and neighboring villages.The villages cooperated with each other, and the robbers who came were repelled one by one.Later, "Zhuzhou set up buildings and hung drums" in the Northern Wei Dynasty became a custom.This is a form of communicating with each other using sound.

The above-mentioned historical facts all show that during the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, my country’s post post business developed greatly, and each dynasty created some new things, which made the post post business continue to improve. However, throughout the period of the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, after all, there was a long period of war and chaos, and most of the rulers of each dynasty did not cherish the power of the people, and often took the lead in destroying the post office system. "Book of Jin" records that Sima Yan, Emperor Wu of the Jin Dynasty, often used the delivery car of the post office to select beautiful women for the palace from all over the country.His envoys harassed the people along the way in a public post car, and plundered plunder, so that a county lord, Yu Yu, made a bitter speech, criticizing the "vulgarity" at that time: Welcoming the new year, crossing the roads. Those who are welcomed are afraid that there are not many boats and horses, and those who see them off hate that there are often few officials and soldiers." The transportation facilities are used to welcome and send off officials, so where is there a normal post office?Emperor Xuan of the Northern Zhou Dynasty in the Southern and Northern Dynasties was even more arbitrary.He swaggered through the city in Luoyang and rode on the imperial post horse himself, traveling 300 miles a day.Followed by his four queens and guards of civil and military officials, hundreds of people are riding on the post car, driving mightily on the post road.What's even more absurd is that Emperor Xuan of Zhou also ordered that the post cars of the four empresses must drive side by side, and the roads would be blocked.In this way, the normal postal system is naturally corrupted.Some rulers of the Southern Dynasties also often used the public post to show off their power and disturb the common people.Xiao Ziliang of the Southern Qi Dynasty wrote an article "Please Stop Taiwan Envoy Letter", exposing the malpractice of the post office at that time.The article wrote: Those so-called envoys "resigned from the court, the mood is different, and they stay in villages and counties in the evening, and Weifu is on the go."This situation did not improve fundamentally until the Sui Dynasty unified the north and the south.