On modern maps, different territories are often marked with the help of the same color, and on the historical map of China, although since the Qin and Han dynasties, the southwest has been marked by the same color as a uniform whole; However, it was not until this era that Zhao learned that, unlike the continuous borders of modern states, the vast areas within this traditional perception of territory were not actually included in the direct rule of the Central Plains Dynasty.

This area, which was not under the jurisdiction of the Central Plains Dynasty, is often referred to as Yidi, Shedi, or Miaojiang, and generally refers to the mountainous area of today's eastern Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, where the Miao and other southwestern ethnic groups live. The various ethnic groups living here were collectively called 'sheng slang' by the Central Plains Dynasty, that is, they did not obey the king's teachings, did not pay taxes, did not accept forced labor, and were enemies of the government.

As early as in the middle of the Warring States Period, after Qin destroyed Bashu, in order to facilitate the management of Ba Di far away from Xianyang, in addition to military conquest, it also allowed the Ba people to be autonomous, and through marriage, and knighthood to envelop them, but with little effect, the Slang people still often rebelled. Therefore, the Eastern Han Dynasty and its successor regimes had to change their tactics and use the Huairou strategy to win over them, so as to give the barbarian leaders seals, titles, and property to recognize their status.

In order to strengthen the control of the imperial court over the descendants of the Ba people who flowed into Guizhou, Gaozu of the Han Dynasty divided Qianzhong into You, Yuan, Chen, Wu, and Wu Wuxi. This is where the word fetters come from.

After the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties to the Sui Dynasty, the fetters policy was increasingly perfected and institutionalized. After the founding of the Tang Dynasty, Tang Gaozu Li Yuan issued a special edict to officially implement the fetters as a system. That is, the imperial court set up prefectures in ethnic minority areas, and ruled by customs, which is different from ordinary prefectures and counties. The system of "desolate and desperate, Xing Zheng is different from Hanxia" was born.

In the middle of the Tang Dynasty, in the Anshi Rebellion and successive court party disputes, the empire was declining day by day, and the feudal towns were divided into one side. The leaders of the ethnic minorities under the fetters took the opportunity to expand their power, attacked each other, and became the emperor of the land who dominated one side. Of course, in the late Tang Dynasty and the five dynasties, the strength of these local emperors was not enough to compete with the strong Central Plains Dynasty, and compared with the Khitan who was also a minority, it was even more insignificant.

After the rise of the Northern Song Dynasty, it inherited and perfected the fetters system, in addition to recognizing the political status of the local minority leaders, the more powerful of them were also given officials or territories, making them the spokesmen of the Northern Song Dynasty emperor in the region. After the development of the Tang and Song dynasties, the fetters system formed characteristics in the southwest region, and evolved into the Tusi system in the Yuan Dynasty.

Relying on these nominally subordinate and de facto independent local governments, the Central Plains Dynasty was only able to maintain formal rule over the southwest, but could not exercise effective rule. Zhuge Liang's Nanfu Yiyue included both the Nanban in the Nanzhong region including Meng Shu, and the Wuxi Man who responded to Liu Bei's call to threaten Wu in the south of Jingzhou during the Battle of Yiling.

The Tang Dynasty set up a wide range of prefectures in the southwest, and although there were hundreds of them, the boundaries between these prefectures and vassal states and vassal tribes were very blurred. Often, like vassal states, they merely accept canonization and pay tribute, and remain virtually independent. Because the Tang Dynasty often apportioned heavy military service and tribute to the frontier states, many of them turned away from the Tang Dynasty, and even like the Southern Zhao, completely broke away from the Central Plains Dynasty and embarked on the road of self-reliance.

The Song Dynasty, which had learned the lessons of the Tang Dynasty, listed the frontier prefectures as "extreme border" places, and easily did not interfere in their affairs or include them in their direct rule. In addition to paying tribute and providing soldiers, the chiefs of the prefectures who received official positions maintained a de facto independent status of their families. At the beginning of the founding of the country, Taizu Zhao Kuangyin sent Wang Quanbin to level Shu, and he wanted to take advantage of the situation to take Yunnan and present a map. Zhao Kuangyin painted the west of the Dadu River with a jade axe and said: In addition, I don't have it!

Since then, the emperors of the Great Song Dynasty have followed this strategy of Emperor Taizu and acquiesced in the independence of Dali, and the two countries coexisted peacefully for three hundred years. The root cause was nothing more than the fear that the barbarians would rebel against impermanence and thus involve the energy of the empire, so they simply abandoned it. Of course, the Song Dynasty did not completely abandon the policy of restraint and implemented this system in parts of the northwest and southwest.

In order to conquer Meishan, Taizong set up several camps around Meishan, stationed heavy troops to block Meishan, and did not allow the Han people to interact with Meishan. But it was not until the time of Shenzong that the imperial court sent a large army to conquer and appease at the same time, and the Meishan area was brought under the jurisdiction of the Song Dynasty, and in the name of the new land of Wanghua and the enlightenment of Ren'andehua, two counties of Xinhua and Anhua were established here. However, the Western Song Dynasty failed to prevent the independence of the Western Xia, so the Great Song Dynasty had to use force and fought with the Western Xia for decades, but failed to win, but instead spent a lot of military money and lost hundreds of thousands of troops.

As a later generation, Zhao Yu naturally knew what happened after the Song Dynasty. It is a turning point in the official implementation of the policy of restraint in this era, but it is somewhat dramatic, but it is the Mongols who have also been regarded as barbarians by the Central Plains Dynasty who have completed the historical turning point, and the tool that enabled them to achieve their rule over the barbarians in southern Xinjiang was actually the post road.

In the Second Mongol-Song War, in order to avoid the natural danger of the Yangtze River and achieve the strategic goal of detouring back to the belly of the Song Dynasty. Kublai Khan led the Mongol army from the Sichuan-Tibet border area south to attack Dali, placing Yunnan under the direct jurisdiction of the Central Dynasty for the first time. In order to connect Yunnan Province with the interior, the Yuan Dynasty successively built three post roads, namely Jiandu Road and Wumeng Road leading to Sichuan and Pu'an Road leading to Huguang.

Because the Meng Yuan occupied Dali after the political center moved from Dali to Kunming in the east, all the way east, after entering Huguang, the status of Pu'an Road to the capital of Yuan became more and more important, and this post road happened to cross the Miao River. At this point, through the post road built by the Yuan Dynasty, the whole style of southern Xinjiang finally entered the field of vision of the Central Plains Dynasty.

After the Meng Yuan seized southern Xinjiang, they began to adopt the 'Tusi system' to control the newly occupied areas. In fact, Tusi is not an official name, but a title for similar officials. In Zhao Hao's view, the Tusi system was also born out of the Tang and Song Dynasty fetters system, which of course also makes the two similar and special:

First of all, the position is hereditary, and the local officials, like the princes and kings of the Central Plains Dynasty, can pass the position to their children and grandchildren, or other relatives; secondly, the Tusi had greater power in his own territory than ordinary magistrates, and he could appoint subordinate officials in his own jurisdiction; In addition, Tusi can have a certain number of private soldiers, servants, and servants in his territory to maintain his ruling authority.

Of course, the imperial court was not unrestrained by Tusi, in addition to being a nominal minister, Tusi also had other obligations to the Son of Heaven. Tusi had to pay tribute to the emperor in the same way as the tributes of overseas vassals, which could also be seen as a form of maintaining an alliance between the two kings and ministers. In addition, on the occasion of the change of dynasty, Tusi had to swear allegiance to the new emperor and obtain the recognition and seal of the new dynasty in order to continue the legitimacy of the regime.

However, the Tusi system of the Yuan Dynasty still could not be regarded as a success, and after Zhao Yuji's rebellion in the Red Turban at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the Tusi took the opportunity to expand his power, attached himself to local warlords or simply set up his own door, and participated in the competition among the heroes in the last years of the Yuan Dynasty. However, it also caused trouble, because Tusi was too active in the process of changing the dynasty, so that it was regarded as one of the threats to dominate the world by the final victor Zhu Yuanzhang.

In the eyes of the Central Plains Dynasty, the most important task in governing Miaojiang was to transform the 'raw seedlings' who did not understand the language and were not under the jurisdiction of the government or local Tusi into 'mature seedlings' who were fluent in the Han language and paid taxes to the government or Tusi, so as to make Miaojiang a place of civilization. In order to achieve this goal, the Ming and Qing dynasties took great pains.

After the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, the Tusi in the southwest region was used to conquer the seedlings and guard the Miao territory. In order to prevent and contain the Tusi, dense guards and military cantonments were set up around the jurisdiction of each Tusi, forming a situation of interlaced dogs and teeth and mutual containment. However, by the end of the Ming Dynasty, the southwestern guards were in decay and abandonment, and the Ming Dynasty had to recruit a large number of native soldiers under the Tusi to fill the void of the guards. It is conceivable that relying on the requisition of Tusi native soldiers to maintain the stability of Miao Xinjiang will only make Tusi carry Miao with its own weight, and the tail will not fall.

Later, in order to focus on resisting the threat from the north, the Ming Dynasty had to completely abandon the plan to conquer Miaojiang, and even thought of using a side wall to simply isolate the seedlings outside the wall. Therefore, in the western region of Hunan far south of the Yangtze River, a Tingziguan on the border of Hunan and Guizhou was built, and the magpie camp in Guzhang County, Xiangxi Prefecture was built in the north, passing through the two major towns of Phoenix and Jishou in western Xiangxi, with a total length of more than 380 miles, and the Great Wall running through the entire Xiangxi region. It can be seen how helpless the rulers of the Ming Dynasty were, and how difficult it was to achieve control.

In the Qing Dynasty, Miaojiang, located on the border of Hunan and Guizhou, including southeast Guizhou and western Hunan, became the last living territory in the southwest that was not under the jurisdiction of the government. The emperors of the past dynasties also broke their hearts and adopted the measures of soothing and soothing at the same time, and both hands were hard to carry out the conquest.

During the Yongzheng period, Zhang Guangsi, a member of the Miao Jiang University, once suggested that the quota of Miao students who study Chinese and participate in the scientific examination be specially approved as a reward. During the Qianlong period, there was a clear stipulation: seedlings were not allowed to participate in the examination, in order to show preferential treatment for mature seedlings. The mature seedlings taking the examination must indicate the new nationality, which is not only different from the Han candidates, but also convenient for the care of admission.

At the same time, the Qing court also relaxed the ban of the previous generation in the Miao Xinjiang region, allowing the seedlings to engage in appropriate trade and even intermarriage with the Han and mature seedlings on the premise of registering with the government and obtaining documents and licenses. Not only that, as long as there is no rebellion, the Miao Jiang Miao people are also allowed to solve the case by themselves with the 'Miao case', even if it is a criminal case such as murder and theft, it may as well be a little more lenient.

In the Ming Dynasty, in order to strengthen the administrative intervention in the Tusi jurisdiction, the government continued to abolish the local Tusi officials on the grounds that the Tusi had no heirs or violated the national law, and replaced them with non-hereditary officials (liuguan) from the central government.

Under the auspices of Ortai, the Qing government first launched a large-scale land reform and return to the flow in the Yunnan-Guizhou region, with the strategy of "planning and capturing the top, and suppressing the troops as the bottom", while striving for the Tusi to voluntarily surrender the territory, the Tusi dared to stubbornly resist at the same time, and eliminated by force. For the Tusi who took the initiative to cooperate with the diversion, the imperial court mostly granted the current military position or other hereditary official positions to show preferential treatment. In addition to re-establishing prefectures and counties, military institutions were also set up to check household registration and measure land for ease of management.

However, after the arrival of some of the liuguans, due to poor governance, sudden tax increases, and corruption and other reasons, the contradictions with the local people intensified. Let the Tusi in many places rise up, the three generations of Kang, Yong, and Qian, and Miao Jiang have not been able to get rid of the so-called Miao Trouble of 'a small anti in 30 years, and a big anti in 60 years'.

In particular, in the Miao uprising in the last years of Qianlong, the Qing court mobilized 180,000 officers and soldiers from the seven provinces of Lianghu, Liangguang, Yunnan, Guichuan and Sichuan, and it lasted for more than ten years before it was quelled. And Fukangan and He Lin, two important ministers of the Qianlong Dynasty, both died of illness in the army of the conquest of Miao Jiang. After entering the Jiaqing Dynasty, the Great Wall was built to isolate Miao Jiang, and it was strictly forbidden for Miao and Han to mix, which also became the last resort of the Qing Dynasty against Miao Jiang.

The Qing Dynasty incorporated the Han and Miao people on both sides of the Great Wall into their respective military tuns and incorporated them into the unified management of the state, making them tenants who lived in the peasants and were the tenants of the state's tuntian. The trade between the Han and Miao Jiang was also carried out under the close supervision of a small number of border cards. Any entry and exit of the border card must be handled with a 'passport', otherwise it will be punished as illegally crossing the border.

Under the airtight control, after the Miao Xinjiang was transformed into a tunken border area for production and construction by the Tuntian soldiers, the Qing government had to abolish the taxes in the new area and respect the local folk customs to maintain the results of the reform, so that the stability of the Xiangxi region gradually restored. However, during the chaotic period from the end of the Qing Dynasty to the Republic of China, the Tunzheng also quickly disintegrated, and the soldiers who lost their fields wandered around, turning Xiangxi into a region where soldiers and bandits were rampant......

Therefore, in Zhao Yu's understanding, the essence of the fetters system is actually to basically maintain the original social organization structure and management mechanism under the premise that the ethnic minorities are formally subservient to the Central Plains Dynasty, appoint local minority leaders or those with high moral standing as local officials, and manage all local affairs by themselves except for regular tribute to the central government. This strategy is beneficial for maintaining rule and regional peace for a certain period of time, but when the dynasty's power declines and its control declines, it becomes a problem for henchmen.

Zhao Hao is deeply aware of this, Qiongzhou is also regarded as the territory of the Great Song Dynasty, and the establishment of official institutions such as prefectures and counties, but in fact, it is impossible to achieve effective rule over Qiongzhou, but will be harassed by the slang people from time to time, just relying on these nominal and de facto independent local powers, only formally maintaining the rule of the feudal region. However, in fact, the specific situation of the various tribes and regions under the rule of the feudal people is often unknown. It is precisely because of this that it is located deep in the mountains and even the fetters are rarely involved......