Huizhou merchants rose during Chenghua and Hongzhi in Ming Dynasty, and after more than 3 years of glory, they became the miracle of China business circles. In the middle of Ming Dynasty, social economy made great progress, and many important trading towns appeared in the southeast of China. In addition to selling local bamboo, wood, porcelain clay, raw lacquer, tea and other local products, Huizhou merchants also promoted the development of trade with products such as inkstone, Hui ink, Chengxin Tang paper and Wang Boli pen. At that time, the output of salt was not high and it became the most scarce commodity. There are more and more people engaged in salt industry in Huizhou merchants, until the Shanxi and Shaanxi merchant groups, which have always been mainly engaged in salt industry, are defeated. Huizhou salt merchants in Yangzhou at that time were either market merchants (buying salt from kitchen households) or transporters, each with its own way of making money. Wang Fuguang, a native of Xiuning, is engaged in selling salt between Jianghuai and owns thousands of ships. At this time, Huguang is the best-selling port of Huai salt, and the salt sold accounts for more than half of Huai salt.
the wealth of Huizhou merchants in Ming and Qing dynasties can be called "as rich as the enemy". During the Qianlong period of Qing Dynasty, only the total capital of Huizhou salt merchants could be equal to the total revenue of the whole country in one year. The capital of Huizhou merchants engaged in salt industry in Yangzhou was 4 million to 5 million taels of silver, while the national treasury at the peak of Qing Dynasty was only 7 million taels. At the end of Qianlong period, China had a huge foreign trade surplus, with a tariff surplus of 852, yuan per year, among which tea monopolized by Huizhou merchants ranked first. Due to the prosperity of the salt market in Yizheng and Huai 'an in northern Jiangsu, there was a saying that "there is no town without emblem". Huizhou merchants completed the primitive accumulation of capital through salt business, and their activities reached Huainan in the east, Yunnan, Guizhou, Guanlong in the west, Youyan and Liaodong in the north and Fujian and Guangdong in the south. Huizhou merchants have traveled as far as Japan, Siam, Southeast Asian countries, Portugal and other places, ranking first among all merchant groups in China, regardless of the number of employees, business and capital.
Pawnshop has existed since ancient times. Compared with other industries, it has less risks and stable profits. Therefore, Huizhou merchants have entered the pawnbroker industry in a big way after salt industry. According to historical records, there are 5 pawn shops in Jinling, most of which are owned by Huizhou merchants. Later, they set up pawn shops in rural towns, and since then, the proverb "no code, no emblem" has spread in the society. Even the shopkeeper of the pawnshop is called "Chao Feng", which also comes from the saying of Huizhou merchants. Huizhou dialect has become the common jargon of pawn shops, and the relevant contents reflected in novels of Ming and Qing Dynasties such as Ancient and Modern Novels and Surprise of Anger are mostly drawn from Huizhou merchants.
With the further commercialization of cotton cloth in the south of the Yangtze River, Huizhou cloth merchants soon spread all over the towns and cities where cotton cloth was produced in Jiangsu and Zhejiang. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the cloth woven by Madame Ting in Qianmentang, Jiading County was very excellent in texture. A Hui merchant rented a house in the hutong where she lived, and bought this kind of cloth and sold it all over the country. So towns like Waigang, near Qianmen Pond, followed Madame Ting's weaving method in succession, and the woven cloth was called "Qianmen Pond Cloth", which became a best seller in the hands of Huizhou merchants. In the Qing dynasty, Huizhou merchants generally concentrated on setting up cloth villages near Suzhou towns. In those places where cotton is not produced and the cotton weaving industry is very developed, Huizhou merchants also set up a tooth shop to exchange cotton for cotton cloth, which is called "flower cloth shop". In order to build their own brand, they all mark the special logo with their own name on the head of the colored cloth they process. During the reign of Kangxi, Wang, a Hui merchant, had a great reputation for opening the name "Yimei" in Suzhou, and sold one million pieces of cloth in a year. In the next 2 years, Yimei colored cloth was regarded as a famous brand everywhere. Huizhou merchants were also the most active cotton cloth traffickers, and the business of Richengxiang cloth shop opened by Huizhou merchants outside Qianmen in Beijing during Kangxi was very prosperous.
rice merchants are also an important branch of Huizhou merchants. After the mid-Ming Dynasty, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, known as the "land of plenty", could not be self-sufficient in food because of the increase of urban population. So the Hui people quickly expanded their operations and became the main business groups engaged in grain trade between Wu Chu. According to historical records, Wu Pengxiang, a native of Xiuning, Huizhou, trafficked Sichuan rice along the east of the Yangtze River during the Qianlong period, and it happened that there was a famine in Hanyang, Hubei Province. He sold tens of thousands of stones of Sichuan rice at once, which shows the scale of trafficking.
Huizhou mountain area is rich in famous teas, especially Songluo tea produced in Xiuning and Shexian. Therefore, tea trade has gradually become one of the main industries operated by Huizhou merchants. During the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, Huizhou people opened seven tea shops in Beijing, with 166 tea merchants and thousands of small tea shops. In Hankou, Jiujiang, Suzhou, Shanghai and other cities in the Yangtze River valley, there are activities of Huizhou tea merchants almost everywhere. In the heyday of the development of Huizhou merchants, the rise and fall of towns in the south of the Yangtze River was entirely dependent on the management of Huizhou merchants. Zhou Taibang, a businessman from Jixi, founded a business in Zhouzhuang, Suzhou, which promoted the prosperity of the town. According to the Wanli "Jiading County Records", Luodian Town, Jiading County, "Huizhou merchants gather together, and the trade is prosperous, and it is a few miles south."
from ma yue? To Hu Xueyan
The elegant demeanour of many Huizhou merchants is interesting even today. Ma Wei? As one of the representatives of Huizhou merchants in Yangzhou in the early Qing Dynasty, he was elegant and elegant, and loved writing poems, collecting books and making friends with literati all his life. During the Yongzheng period, he built the Xiaoling Mountain Pavilion < P > in Yangzhou. Famous scholars such as Quan Zuwang, Li E and Zheng Banqiao are frequent visitors to the Xiaoling Mountain Pavilion. Ma Wei? He used to be the leader of the alliance, and formed a "Hanjiang Yinshe" with Li E and others, composing poems and traveling in the mountains and rivers. Shen Deqian commented on his poems as "the precipitous mountains are carved, and the clear water is clear." It can be seen that the accomplishments are deep. Ma Wei? I love to test the classics, and I set up an engraving workshop in my home. For example, I spent a lot of money on engraving Zhu Yizun's book Jing Yi Kao. At that time, I called this batch of books "Ma Edition". Xiaolinglong Mountain Museum is another name of Ma's Library, with a collection of more than 1, volumes. In 1772, Siku Quanshu Museum was established, Ma Yue? Zhen Bo, his son, donated 776 kinds of books, which was the highest among private books in China, and Emperor Qianlong praised a book "Integration of Ancient and Modern Books". Ma Wei? And his younger brother, Ma Yuelu, are called "Two Horses in Yangzhou", and Ma Yue is listed in The Draft of the Qing Dynasty and Biography of Wenyuan. Pass, enough to prove that his name was really important at that time.
Jiang Chun and Bao Shufang are the most representative Huizhou merchants in modern times. They are both from Shexian County. Jiang Chun failed after having obtained the township entrance examination in his early years, so he abandoned school to do business and lived in Yangzhou, a commercial center. He is well versed in the combination of government and business. He went to Jiangnan for six times, and Jiang Chun lingered to pick up the driver, and personally donated 32, yuan. Ganlong had a good impression on him, and wrote a "Yixingtang" plaque for him, giving him the title of Minister of Internal Affairs and Minister of Public Affairs. There is a three-story brick white tower in Slender West Lake in Yangzhou, which looks like Lama Tower in Beijing Beihai Park. It is said that this tower was built by Jiang Chun. Jiang Chun's "handing over cloth to the Emperor" fully reflects the wealth of Huizhou salt merchants. Bao Shufang followed his father to manage salt industry in Yangzhou since childhood, and he had no experience in imperial examinations. He donated many times to help the court. In 185, the Yellow River and Huaihe River flooded and Hongze Lake burst its banks. He donated 6, meters of stone and 4, wheat stones to help hundreds of thousands of victims. To change Liutanghe River, it is necessary to start a mountain and return to the sea. He collected all the people and lost three million and two thousand silver. Bao Shufang's repeated donations won the appreciation of Emperor Jiaqing. Emperor Qianlong also personally wrote a couplet for Baojia Ancestral Temple, "In chinese odyssey, the first hometown in the south of the Yangtze River". Ziyang Academy was rebuilt with the donation of Bao Shufang, and it has been maintained to this day.
Hu Guangyong, that is, Hu Xueyan, is the most famous Huizhou merchant. Hu Xueyan was born in the third year of Daoguang reign in Qing Dynasty (AD 1823). As an apprentice in a bank, he was diligent and eloquent. Hu Xueyan's greatest success lies in his understanding of the general trend. When he was twenty years old, he met a poor scholar named Wang Youling, who lacked the travelling expenses and the "capital" to be an official in Beijing. Although Hu Xueyan didn't know him well, he immediately borrowed five hundred and twenty pieces of silver from the bank privately. Hu Xueyan lost his job because of this, but Wang Youling, who became an official, felt his kindness and regarded it as the difference between life and death. Hu Xueyan, who was in power, took advantage of Wang Youling's development in officialdom, opened money houses, pawn shops and drug stores, dealing in silk and tea, and became rich quickly. Making friends with Wang Youling also enabled Hu Xueyan's money house to represent the vassal treasury in Zhejiang Province, so that the country's wealth was
"A wanderer misses his relatives for one dollar and seven cents" (a medicine mystery), while Bai Mudan, a woman from Hangzhou, immediately solved the mystery, saying, "There is a saying that a wanderer misses his relatives and should return home (fennel)". Obviously, the homonym of "fennel" is also "returning home", which is synonymous with unemployment in Huizhou. Huizhou people do everything, but only two things are most taboo: fennel and dried radish-"radish" is because of its homophonic "falling into a trap".
Huizhou merchants have a strong clan concept. When they go out to do business, they always live together by blood and geography. Often, the father takes the belt, the brother takes the younger brother, the uncle takes the nephew, and the uncle takes the nephew. After Huizhou people go out to do business and settle down in towns, people in the clan will follow immediately, and then the township party will follow. This kind of clan group with kinship as the link participates in market competition, which has a strong advantage in gathering financial resources, material resources, manpower and unified action. However, Huizhou merchants don't just pay attention to human feelings. They pay attention to defining this human relationship by contract, so there are a lot of contract documents left in Huizhou. When dealing with internal or external business problems, Huizhou merchants have a special organization called Huizhou Merchants Guild Hall. Guild halls were very popular in the Qing Dynasty, but there were many Huizhou merchants' guilds. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Huizhou merchants' guilds were all over the country, and there were several in Nanjing alone. On behalf of businessmen, the guild hall negotiates business affairs with the government, and holds public welfare undertakings for Hui people. Some guild halls also extend their teachers to teach fellow villagers' children, and also deliver letters from fellow villagers and official proclamations on their behalf. The funds of the guild hall are provided by Huizhou merchants where the guild hall is located. The earliest Hui merchants' guild hall was Shexian Guild Hall in Beijing, which was founded in 156 and was initiated by Yang Zhong and Bowen, Hui merchants living in Beijing. Xin 'an Guild Hall in Hankou, Hubei Province, has gradually formed a "Xin 'an Street" from property acquisition to road expansion and wharf development. Huining Club in shengze town, Wujiang County, Suzhou has been built for more than 2 years, with real estate, land and revetment for loading and unloading goods.
at the end of Qianlong period, Yizheng salt boat caught fire, and 13 salt boats were destroyed, with more than 1,4 dead. This seems to be an omen: Huizhou merchants who started from salt industry went into decline. Several important events at the end of Qing Dynasty directly contributed to the defeat of Huizhou merchants. During Daoguang period, in view of the extremely high price of salt, the salt administration system in Huaibei changed. The Qing government abolished the franchise right of salt merchants to sell salt in the past, and separated transportation and marketing. Huizhou merchants lost their hereditary patent right to sell salt from now on, so a large number of salt merchants in Huaibei area went bankrupt. The Taiping Rebellion mainly affected the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, which was the main area where Huizhou merchants operated, and their business was greatly affected. After the defeat of the Opium War, the western powers opened the door to China, and the entry of foreign businessmen led to the emergence of national capitalist groups, which impacted Huizhou commercial gangs linked by patriarchal clan system, which also contributed to its disintegration.
from "Looking for Huizhou Merchants" by Li Ben Guangming Daily Press, 23
Wen Wei Po, January 18, 24.