Chapter 5 Chapter 3 Why the poorer the poorer

In the late Warring States period, the Chinese already knew how to cultivate intensively, and the yield per mu in the Han Dynasty, according to calculations by scholars, had reached about 140-150 jin.This seemingly inconspicuous output has been pursued by other regions of the world for more than a thousand years. Taking Britain as an example, their yield per mu reached 97 catties until the 12th and 13th centuries.It stands to reason that our ancestors should be able to live comfortably in this land. However, three factors deprive them of the right to a comfortable life. The first factor is population pressure.In the pre-industrial era, China's population grew faster than most countries and regions.The average annual population growth rate of Western Europe during the 1700 years from AD 2 to the pre-industrial revolution was 0.065%, while China’s average annual population growth rate was about 0.11% during the period from AD 2 to 1840 when the Opium War broke out, which was nearly 100% higher than that of Western Europe. double.The frequency of the cycle of population increase and decrease in ancient China and the number of steps of growth are unique in the history of the pre-industrial world.

Therefore, although China has a vast land, its population density has always been much higher than that of Europe.According to the research conducted in China, the per capita cultivated land area in China's feudal society was generally maintained at about ten mu before the Northern Song Dynasty.After the Northern Song Dynasty, the per capita arable land area dropped to less than ten mu, and in the second half of the nineteenth century, the per capita arable land area dropped even further to less than three mu.By the 13th century, when the average arable land of British farmers was relatively small, a farmer still had more than 18 acres of arable land.

For thousands of years, on the vast land of China, as long as there is an acre of idle land, a child will be born to occupy it immediately.The simple goal of filling this mouth while reproducing as many mouths as possible attracts too much attention from the Chinese to other human needs.Therefore, although agricultural technology is constantly improving, although Chinese farmers have always been so tenacious and hardworking, the vast majority of China's bottom society has been struggling with half-starvation and will never be relieved. Zhu Yuanzhang's family is a typical representative.The Zhu family has been civilians for generations, and there has never been a single person with a certain status in their ancestors.In the sixteenth year of Yuanzhizheng (AD 1356), the 29-year-old Zhu Yuanzhang captured Jiqing (now Nanjing).He vaguely remembered his father saying that his ancestors lived in Zhujiaxiang near Nanjing.After sending people to search for a few days, they found that Zhujiaxiang was a small village forty miles away from Nanjing City.At this time, there were still several impoverished descendants surnamed Zhu living in the village. They heard that the general of the Red Scarf Army who captured this place was actually their distant family. They were overjoyed and came to visit Nanjing together.Zhu Yuanzhang was very excited, and affectionately "talked about the rituals of the elders and the young, and practiced the way of harmony" with them. They sat together and recalled the history of the old Zhu family together.According to the old people, the Zhu family seems to be originally from Peixian County, Jiangsu Province, and they were considered to be the fellows of Liu Bang, the emperor of the Han Dynasty. At some point, they lived in the vicinity of Nanjing.

Everyone has exhausted all their memories, and they can only trace back five generations.The first generation is called Zhu Zhongba.Judging from this unrefined name, the "Kaijizu" who can be recalled has been reduced to poverty, so that he doesn't even have the energy and ability to come up with a name.Like his old man, the names of the following generations are all replaced by numbers without exception.However, the poor living conditions did not affect the prosperity of the Zhu family.Zhong Basheng had three sons, the first name was Liu Er, the second name was Eleven, and the third name was Bai Liu.Bailiu gave birth to two sons, named Siwu and Sijiu.Sijiu gave birth to four sons in the first grade, second grade, fifth grade, and tenth grade.Changfang Chuyi is Zhu Wusi's father.Zhu Wusi was born in the 16th year of Zhiyuan (AD 1279).He also had an elder brother named Wuyi, who was four years older than him and was born in the twelfth year of Zhiyuan (AD 1275).May 1st and May 4th each gave birth to four more sons, so when Zhu Yuanzhang was in line, his nickname was "Chongba".

From Zhongba to Chongba, during the six generations, each person had an average of three sons.Calculated according to this figure, in more than a hundred years, the number of men surnamed Zhu in this branch of the Zhu family tree has accumulated from Zhong Bata to 243.The vast majority of these 243 people, like their ancestors, lived in extreme poverty all their lives.From the example of the Zhu family, we can see how amazing the fertile passion of the lower class Chinese in the traditional era was. It was the population pressure that caused Zhu Yuanzhang's ancestors to flee for generations and keep moving.

Zhu Yuanzhang heard from his father when he was a child that they left Zhujiaxiang outside Nanjing in the generation of his grandfather.Because the several acres of Susukida near Nanjing could not support his growing children, his grandfather Zhu Chuyi fled to Xuyi, Jiangsu Province. At that time, not long after the war between Yuan and Song Dynasty, Xuyi was sparsely populated and had a lot of barren land.The grandfather "reclaimed the barren land after the soldiers" (Lang Ying's "Seven Revised Class Drafts"), worked hard to get married, and the family worked hard from dawn to dusk, and gradually acquired some family property, "purchasing land property" (Lang Ying's "Seven Revised Class Drafts") , One copper coin was accumulated one copper coin, and both sons married daughters-in-law.

Just as the grandfather hoped, the family was thriving, and the two sons together soon gave birth to five grandchildren.The few acres of hard-earned land could not support the rapidly multiplying population. Once the grandfather passed away, the two sons had to change their businesses and find places with more land and less land to make a living. Zhu Wusi fled from Nanjing to Xuyi, Jiangsu with his father when he was just eight years old. After marrying a wife and having children, he moved to Wuhe, Anhui, and then to Lingbi, and within a few years to Hongxian, Anhui. Dongxiang, this time he lived the longest, lived there for ten years, and gave birth to Zhu Yuanzhang here.When Zhu Yuanzhang was eleven years old, he moved to Xixiang again, and a year later, he moved to Guzhuang Village, Taiping Township (now the Twenty Camp about ten miles southwest of Fengyang County, Anhui).In total, in Zhu Wusi's sixty-four-year-old life, Fan migrated seven times.In each place, the maximum is no more than ten years.

It's not that this honest farmer likes to wander, it's because the Jianghuai land is vast, but it's hard to find a few acres of land that can support his humble and lowly grassroots family.I can't afford to grow my own land, so I have to be a tenant for others. "Records of Ming Taizu" said that Zhu Wusi was "diligent, thrifty and loyal", honest and honest, and led his family from morning to night to work hard on the dozens of acres of land they rented.However, at the end of the year, most of the food was given to the landlords, and the rest was still not enough to eat.In addition, in the process of moving all the way during the May Fourth Movement, they continued to have children, and the burden became heavier and heavier.The hard work earned throughout the year can't fill more and more mouths.What's even more exasperating is that sometimes rented and planted a piece of raw land, and finally cooked it with blood and sweat, and the family finally had enough to eat for a few days, but the landlord immediately came to increase the rent. Seize the tenants and drive them away, and find another way out.I have moved home for a lifetime, endured hardships, and sweated for a lifetime, but I have never eaten a few meals of meat and worn a few pieces of clothes without patches.

Of course, sweat is definitely not in vain.Zhu Wusi spent his whole life working as a cow and a horse, in exchange for six children who grew up one by one, got married and started a career.Yuanzhang's eldest brother married a daughter-in-law and gave birth to two grandchildren on May Fourth.Although the second brother and the third brother stepped in the door backwards, they could be regarded as a family anyway.Both daughters are also married.Although all the sons and daughters are illiterate and doomed to spend their lives in half-starvation, the blood of the Zhu family has finally grown further in the land of China, where most people struggle to find food On the land, they stubbornly squeezed out a piece of living space for themselves.This cannot but be said to be a major victory in the struggle for survival in the biological sense.

It's a pity that the ancestors of the Zhu family were not able to see in person what amazing achievements their filial grandson Zhu Yuanzhang made in the birth competition.After Zhu Yuanzhang became emperor, he exerted all the potential fertility of the Zhu family to the limit.He himself bore twenty-six sons and sixteen daughters.He also encouraged his descendants to have more children, without having to undertake any work, and only need to receive salary according to the head.Therefore, in the fifth year of Hongzhi in the Ming Dynasty (1492 A.D.), we saw a surprising news reported by Shanxi Governor Yang Chengchou in the history books: Qingcheng King Zhu Zhongyi of the Jin Mansion once again refreshed the birth record of the old Zhu family. In August of a year, there were ninety-four children and one hundred and sixty-three grandchildren.

The population growth of King Qingcheng's Mansion is just a microcosm of the population explosion of the royal family in the Ming Dynasty.According to estimates by historian Wang Shizhen, the number of Ming clans increased by 50% every ten years.According to Xu Guangqi's calculations, the number of Ming clans doubled in about thirty years.At the beginning of the founding of the country, Zhu Yuanzhang distributed his descendants to various places. "At the beginning, there were only forty-nine princes and generals." In 1553 A.D.) it increased to 19,611 people, and in the 32nd year of Wanli (1604 A.D.) it increased to more than 80,000 people (Chen Wutong's "Biography of Emperor Hongwu").According to estimates by An Jiesheng and other population history experts, by the end of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang's descendants had multiplied to nearly one million.If the Ming Dynasty can "live another five hundred years", then sooner or later the descendants of the Zhu surname will collapse half of the earth.

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