The Great Wall is known as the first military project in ancient China. It was built in the Zhou Dynasty, and the beacon fire drama about the princes is the earliest allusion to the Great Wall. As early as the Spring and Autumn Period in the 7th century BC, Chu State was the first to build the "Chu Fang City" to defend against invasion by other countries, which opened the curtain on the construction of the Great Wall recorded in Chinese history; during the Warring States Period, Qi, Wei, Zhao, Qin, Countries such as Yan and Zhongshan also built the "Great Wall for mutual defense between princes" one after another.
After the reunification of China, there was a frenzy to build the Great Wall for the first time in Chinese history. Nearly one million laborers were used to build the Great Wall, accounting for one-twentieth of the total population of the country at that time. Huan Tan, a philosopher of the Eastern Han Dynasty, recorded in "New Treatises": "Because Qin Shihuang was so powerful and had 400,000 men in armor, he could not see the west of the river, so he built the Great Wall to divide it.
" The Han Dynasty continued to carry out the construction of the Great Wall. It was built to resist the invasion of the Huns from the north. From Emperor Xuan of the Han Dynasty to the Han Dynasty, a Great Wall was built that started from Dayuan Ershi City in the west and ended at the north bank of the Yalu River in the east, with a total length of nearly 10,000 kilometers. Among them, the longest reigning emperor was an active promoter of the construction of the Great Wall. Thereafter, the Eastern Han Dynasty, Northern Dynasty, Sui Dynasty, etc. did not stop. Among them, only Yang Jian and his son in the Sui Dynasty had large-scale construction five times in the 38 years of their rule.
Later in the Song Dynasty, Song Taizu and Song Taizong brothers were active advocates of building the Great Wall. According to historians’ research: the Song Dynasty Great Wall now located in Kelan County, Xinzhou City, Shanxi Province, was the slave of Yang Ye’s wife She Taijun. It was built by my younger brother, Zhe Yuqing, a famous general in the Song Dynasty. In the Ming Dynasty, the method of building the Great Wall was once again created. What remains in the world today is the Ming Great Wall, which was mainly built under the supervision of Qi Jiguang, a subordinate of Zhang Juzheng. In the Qing Dynasty, Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty issued an order: Never build the Great Wall. At this point, the large-scale construction of the Great Wall came to an end.
Despite this, the small fights have never stopped, and they have not achieved the so-called "abandoning the Great Wall without using it": the Qing Dynasty during the Kangxi and Qianlong years built individual passes and walls of the Great Wall, and did not control the Shanhaiguan Pass. Important passes and sections of the Great Wall have been repaired and used on a considerable scale, and the "Dajingmen" located in northwest Hebei is one of the largest Great Wall passes built during this period.
During the Tongzhi period, the Great Wall of the Qing Dynasty was specially built to deal with the rebel Nian Army. It was distributed among what are now Shandong, Anhui, Henan, Shanxi, and Hebei, and the scale was not small. Of course, in the early 1980s, the call for "Love China and Build the Great Wall" was launched. It can be said that the history of building the Great Wall has almost run through the entire history of Chinese civilization. It has become a "reserved project" that emperors of all dynasties relied on the "national system", and the Great Wall has also become a "patented" object of official praise.
However, looking at Chinese history, we are surprised to find that there are only two dynasties in Chinese history that did not build the Great Wall: the Tang Dynasty and the Yuan Dynasty. The Great Wall of the Tang Dynasty and the Mudanjiang Border Wall (located in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province), which is now listed on the World Cultural Heritage List, were built by the Bohai State, a feudal separatist regime in Northeast Asia established by the Mohe people at that time, and have nothing to do with the Tang Dynasty itself.
Because the Yuan Dynasty was established by the Mongols, a nomadic people in the north, their ruling power was so strong and their territory was so large that there was no need to build the Great Wall. So, why didn’t the Tang Dynasty, which ruled China for nearly three hundred years, build the Great Wall? This must start with Tang Taizong, the second emperor of the Tang Dynasty.
A great man of a generation *** Among the "Qin Emperor, Han Wu, Tang Zong and Song Zu" mentioned in the poem, only Tang Taizong brought the construction of the Great Wall to an abrupt halt for a reason. Li Yuan relied on his son Li Shimin's peerless military talent to seize the power of the Sui Dynasty and establish the Tang Dynasty. In the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China, everything was in ruins. His main energy was to organize forces to carry out a unified war to unify the country. At the same time, he had no energy to strengthen political power. Go build the Great Wall.
Nine years later, Li Shimin bloodyly seized the power of the Tang Dynasty from his father and brother by launching the "Xuanwu Revolution". After succeeding to the throne, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty immediately adjusted his ruling policies and adopted a series of measures such as being honest in government, lax corvee and low taxes, uniting people of all ethnic groups, and developing production, which brought the country to an unprecedented prosperous age, which is known in history as "the Great Rebellion". However, because the Li Tang Dynasty was founded not long ago, it was still surrounded by foreign barbarians. There were East Turks in the north, Gaochang and West Turks in the northwest, Tuyuhun and Tubo in the west, and Khitan, Xi, Goryeo, etc. in the northeast. How to properly handle the relationship between the Tang Dynasty and the surrounding ethnic minority regimes has always puzzled Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty.
In the third year after he succeeded to the throne, the leader of the Eastern Tujue, Jie Li, supported his troops and invaded the border areas. Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty followed the principle of "He who subdues the enemy's troops without fighting is a superior; he who is victorious in a hundred battles is a middle class;" The principle of "If there is a deep ditch and a high base, go down", and on the grounds that "Turkic disasters are still different, Jieli is not afraid but cultivates virtue, violence is rampant, flesh and blood attack each other, and people die day and night", he rejected the idea of ??all the ministers working hard for the people and losing money. A request to build a Great Wall on the edge of the desert. The Tang Dynasty was established on the ruins of the Sui Dynasty. Tang Taizong calmly summarized the experience and lessons of the failure of Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty, believing that the inability to treat the barbarians well was one of the important reasons.
He said that Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty "raised millions of people and built the Great Wall in the north, stretching from Yulin in the west to Zihe in the east, and stretched for more than a thousand miles. Too many people died" The common people built the Great Wall to prepare for the Turks, but it was of no use." "They are prone to guessing and guarding, believe in evil ways, and are taboo against barbarians. Yu Wenhua and his envoy Linghu Xingda killed him. He also warned his subordinates: "Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty could not select virtuous people to appease the border. He could only build the Great Wall to prepare for the confusion of the Turks. This is the end of the matter!" This shows that. He was determined not to follow in his footsteps, because he saw the disadvantages of building things up and wasting people's energy.
While listing all the shortcomings of Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty, Li Shimin believed that more than one person and more than one time, when court officials relied on the historical experience of resisting the Xiongnu in the Qin and Han Dynasties, to ask him to "repair the ancient Great Wall." I am clearing the desert for the Duke, so that I can use the labor of the people to repair the barriers far away!" He also said to the officials: "I have appointed Li Shiji to Bingzhou, so that the Turks fled in fear of the power, and the fortress walls were quiet, so it was not better than building the Great Wall from afar. Yeah?" The intention is very clear, that is, to use Li Shiji, what he values ????is "talent"; to avoid "laboring the people", what he values ????is "people's hearts."
In his opinion, clearing out foreign invaders, eliminating border troubles, creating peace, and building the Great Wall are not the right choices. The role of talents and people's hearts is more powerful and lasting. Of course, Li Shimin's grandmother Dugu (who is a biological sister to Emperor Yang of Sui) and Taizong's mother Dou are both Hu people. Li Shimin, who is half of the Hu people, has a lot to do with foreign politics, diplomatic and economic exchanges, and military struggles. In the process, on the basis of Gaozu's "One World, One Family" and "Hu Yue Family", he creatively summed up a brand-new Anbian concept of "one Chinese and barbarian people", which greatly amplified the idea of ??national integration in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. , believing that "Since ancient times, people have valued China and despised Yi and Di. I love the same, so all their descendants rely on me like their parents." "The traditional prejudice of the Great Wall broke the old pattern of dividing the north and the south by the Great Wall, extensively and wholeheartedly united the surrounding ethnic minority tribal countries, appointed ethnic minority officials wantonly, and adopted tea-horse trade, marriage and marriage, alliances to accept surrender, and governance according to customs A series of measures such as this demonstrated his broad mind and demeanor of "accommodating all rivers" and achieved great success.
Many tribal countries in the border areas were incorporated into the territory of the Tang Dynasty or became vassals, respecting Li Shimin as the "Khan of Heaven"; the capital city of Chang'an showed "orchids waving their bare hands, inviting guests to get drunk with gold bottles", "Nine Heavenly Palaces" With the palaces closed and all nations wearing their hats and hats, the Tang Dynasty went through the "Government of Zhenguan" and the "Government of Kaiyuan" and became the most open and powerful country in the world at that time.
If the king has peace on three sides, why bother building the Great Wall for thousands of miles? On the issue of building the Great Wall, Emperor Taizong Li Shimin had a unique vision and went his own way. "When I am here, the barbarians in the world are uneasy and unhappy, just like a fly on the tail, which can make the sun travel thousands of miles." Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty broke through the traditional thinking on the issue of Anbian and did not regard the Great Wall as the greatness of the Chinese nation. Symbol, his evaluation of the role and significance of the Great Wall was naturally not positive, and it influenced all subsequent successors to the Tang Dynasty regime.
Of course, there were still many people who disparaged the Great Wall in history, especially the literati of the Tang Dynasty (perhaps they were trying to flatter themselves!). Hu Zeng, a poet of the Tang Dynasty, wrote in the poem "The Great Wall": "The ancestors of Emperor Shun and Emperor Yao brought peace. Why did Emperor Qin suffer the common people? He didn't know that disaster would arise in the Xiao wall, but built a false defense of thousands of miles of Hu." Wang Han, a poet of the Tang Dynasty, wrote in the famous "Drinking" "Ma Changcheng Cave Tour" chanted: "I came back to drink at Ma Changcheng Cave, and there were many bones along the Great Wall Road. When I asked the elders who they were from, they said they were soldiers of the Qin King who built the city." This probably represents the voice of public opinion at that time.