When it comes to "yellow robes", it naturally reminds us of Zhao Kuangyin, the founding emperor of the Great Song Dynasty who "only wins and does not lose", but in fact, Zhao Kuangyin is not the first person in Chinese history to "add yellow robes", and there were at least Yang Jian, Emperor Wen of Sui, Li Yuan, Gaozu of Tang, Guo Wei, Taizu of Later Zhou and other pioneers. Today, the editor wants to introduce to you the legendary story of Guo Wei, the founding emperor of the Later Zhou Dynasty, who was seized by Zhao Kuangyin.

Guo Wei (904-954), a native of Yaoshan County, Xingzhou (present-day west of Longyao County, Xingtai City, Hebei), was the founding emperor of the Later Zhou Dynasty during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period (907-960). The more than 50 years of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms is the most chaotic era in China since the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. Guo Wei, living in this era of frequent wars, he was born a commoner, self-made, handsome, gradually grew from an ordinary soldier to a general, and finally became an emperor, and governed the country well, with outstanding political achievements, he can be called the best among the emperors of the five dynasties and ten countries, and is recognized as a good emperor who is honest and diligent in history.

Born in a humble background, a brave and martial boy kills Haoqiang

Guo Wei's character is Wenzhong, because he has a flying bird tattooed on his neck, so people call him Guo Que'er again. His surname was Chang, because his father was killed in his early years, and his mother was forced to take him to remarry to the Guo family because of his livelihood, so he changed his surname to Guo. His stepfather, Guo Jian, once served as the Shunzhou assassin in the Later Jin Dynasty, and was later killed by Liu Rengong. Guo Wei moved to Taiyuan with his mother when he was three years old, and soon his mother died, and Guo Wei became an orphan and was adopted by his aunt Han, who was also a dilapidated family with a poor family. When he was eighteen years old, Guo Wei went to Luzhou (now Changzhi, Shanxi) to join his biological father's relative, Chang's young Guo Wei was born with a tiger's back and a bear's waist, a burly body, and great courage, but he was aggressive, gambling and drinking, and liked to fight unevenly. One day, Guo Wei wandered on the street again, there was a butcher who bullied the market, very domineering, everyone was afraid of him, Guo Wei, who drank a little wine, went to the butcher unconvinced, asked him to cut the meat, and then found fault and scolded him, the butcher also knew that Guo Wei was not easy to mess with, but in the end he couldn't help it, so he ripped off his clothes and pointed to his stomach and said: "If you have the guts, you can stab him here!" Without saying a word, Guo Wei picked up a knife and stabbed him in the stomach, and the butcher naturally died.

At that time, Li Jitao, the son of Li Sizhao, the general of Hedong, was in Luzhou and was recruiting sergeants to expand the army. Guo Wei, who is brave and powerful, bold and negative, is deeply appreciated by Li Jitao. After Guo Wei was detained by the government for drunken murder, Li Jitao secretly let him go, and then recruited him to his command and kept him under the tent as a tooth soldier (that is, the personal soldier of the vassal marshal). Guo Wei was promoted to a military officer because of his knowledge of writing and calligraphy, and began his military career.

Rong Ma is handsome, and the yellow robe has become a hegemon

Later, Li Jitao's department was destroyed by Li Cunmiao, the Later Tang Zhuangzong, and Guo Wei was also incorporated into the rear ** team and served as Li Cunqing's pro-army "horse shop pawn", when Guo Wei was 21 years old. Guo Weixi read military books, studied with teachers, and began to pay attention to the study of survival and chaos, and the way to govern the country and use the army. Later, he followed Shi Jingjiao to attack, took charge of the military registration for Shi Jingjiao, and was loved; After Shi Jingjiao became emperor, he was subordinated to the Hou Yu Marquis and Liu Zhiyuan, a member of the Shatuo tribe, and became Liu Zhiyuan's confidant, taking him with him wherever he went, and letting him supervise the pro-army. When the Later Jin Dynasty was destroyed by the Khitan, Guo Wei, Su Fengji, Shi Hongzhao and others persuaded Liu Zhiyuan to become the emperor and become the founder of the Later Han Dynasty. After Liu Zhiyuan became emperor, Guo Wei was promoted to the privy deputy envoy in charge of military affairs and the inspector Situ, when Guo Wei was 43 years old. Liu Zhiyuan reigned for less than a year and died, Guo Wei, Su Fengji and other former generals and staff were also ordered to establish the crown prince Liu Chengyou (that is, Emperor Yin of the Later Han Dynasty), and among these ministers, only Guo Wei was far-sighted and had both civil and military skills.

Soon after Emperor Yin succeeded to the throne, Li Shouzhen, Zhao Sijuan, and Wang Jingchong, who were envoys of the Hezhong Jiedu, and Wang Jingchong, who were made of the Fengxiang Jiedu, successively supported the army and rebelled. Guo Wei was ordered to go on the expedition, and soon quelled the rebellion, Li Shouzhen ** died, Zhao Sijuan and Wang Jingchong surrendered one after another, so that the stormy Later Han regime turned from danger to safety. After that, Guo Wei moved to the Northern Expedition and defeated the Khitan. Guo Wei stayed behind in Fengye with merit, and the Tianxiong Army was the envoy and privy envoy, the school inspector and the servant, and the counties of Hebei all listened to Guo Wei's moderation. Since then, Guo Wei has become the most important minister of the Later Han Dynasty.

Emperor Yin and his favored ministers were very suspicious of Guo Wei and other meritorious generals, so in the third year of Qianyou (950), they conspired with their cronies to kill Guo Wei and others, but the secret envoy leaked the news. After Guo Wei learned of this, he immediately supported the army to fight in the name of "Qingjun's side". In the battle of Qilipo (located in the northern suburbs of Bianjing), the Han army was defeated, Emperor Yin was killed, and Guo Wei led a large army to flock into the capital, and the column army looted on a large scale. After entering Beijing, Guo Wei agreed to appoint Liu Zhiyuan's nephew Liu Yun as the emperor, and let the queen mother listen to the government, and the political affairs were decided by herself. At this time, he suddenly heard that the Khitan was going south, so Guo Wei led the army to the north to resist, passing through Shanzhou, the soldiers mutinied, and Guo Wei was added to the yellow robe (ten years later, Zhao Kuangyin and Chen Qiao mutinied, on behalf of Zhou Lisong, the same, it seems that this is also karma!). Seven days later, Guo Wei entered Beijing again and forced the Empress Dowager to appoint him as a "prisoner". On the first day of the first month of 951 A.D., Guo Wei officially ascended the throne as the emperor, changed the yuan to "Guangshun", changed the country name to "Great Zhou", and was known as "Later Zhou" in history.

Make every effort to open a good emperor who loves the people

After becoming the emperor, Guo Wei tried his best to stabilize the political situation, and while communicating with various countries and accepting tribute, he immediately began to govern the country and carry out reforms to strengthen the national strength.

Guo Wei has experienced a lot of hardships since he was a child and has personal experience of the people's suffering, so he first reduced the burden of the people. Guo Wei mainly did two things for this purpose: one was to abolish the unreasonable cattle rent, and the other was to abolish the camp and field affairs. "Let the people benefit, just like the country benefits, what do I want this money for?" For this reason, not long after his accession to the throne, he issued an edict ordering officials in various places not to use any excuse to increase taxes on the people, and to abolish all miscellaneous taxes other than regular taxes, which had been prevalent.

During Guo Wei's reign, he made great achievements in reforming the maladministration of previous dynasties. exempt from the additional harshness set up by the Later Han Dynasty and the "envy of the local officials" since the Middle and Tang Dynasty; issued an edict to abolish some extremely cruel criminal laws of the Later Jin and Later Han Dynasty; The people and the people of Tibet "traded privately as soon as they heard about it", and the officials sent by the prefectures were dismissed together; The bans on salt, wine, and leather, which were extremely harsh in the past dynasties, were slightly relaxed; Abolish monasteries and monasteries that do not have a quota in the capital. Guo Wei also took effective measures to restore agricultural production: grant land to hundreds of thousands of hungry people in Youzhou who returned to the Central Plains, and exempt them from taxes; The land was distributed to the existing tenants to fill the permanent business, so that the number of households increased by more than 30,000; The ownerless wasteland is allowed to be cultivated by the peasants as a permanent industry, and the peasants' enthusiasm for production is enhanced.

In addition to reforming and benefiting the people, Guo Wei also paid great attention to frugality and reduced the burden of the people as much as possible. He lived an unusually frugal life, and he was very frugal in food, clothing, housing and transportation. He said to the ministers: "I came from a humble background, tasted all the hardships of the world, and experienced the disasters of the country and the family, and now that I am the emperor, how can I pamper and drag down the people of the world!" Not only did he not allow Jin Feng to enter the palace, but he also had dozens of jewels and jade, luxurious beds and stools decorated with gold and silver, and eating utensils made of gold and silver smashed in public on the palace. When he was dying, he did not forget to be thrifty, Guo Wei solemnly left his last words, "To bury thinly, do not forcibly recruit migrant workers, and do not want palace people to guard the mausoleum for a long time", just send people to the mausoleum to pay tribute when the cold food festival is not busy every year; If no one goes, the festival will be done!