If you want to reopen the Silk Road, you have to march west and conquer the countries of the Western Regions.

With Wang Zezhi's current strength, he can't do this at all, which is why the Ming Dynasty did not reopen the Silk Road.

I can't go by land, so I can only find a way to take the sea route.

After the middle of the Ming Dynasty, the Ming court adopted a policy of closing the country to the outside world, and at the same time, shipbuilding technology and navigation technology continued to develop, and maritime traffic took its place, which led to the decline of Silk Road trade.

As early as the Song Dynasty, the Maritime Silk Road had gradually replaced the original land Silk Road.

Sea transportation is not only convenient, fast, large transport volume, and the key is that the Song Dynasty ceramics are unprecedentedly developed, gradually replacing silk as the main Chinese export commodity, ceramics are not only heavier, but also very easy to break in the long-distance bumps and repeated loading and unloading of land transportation, and it is much safer to switch to sea transportation.

Therefore, from the Song and Yuan dynasties to the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, places like Quanzhou have been famous international trade ports.

Zheng He's voyage to the West has long been regarded as a pioneering achievement in the history of Chinese navigation, but Zheng He's seven voyages to the West did not bring much economic benefit to the Ming Dynasty at that time, but instead increased the economic burden of the Ming Dynasty through this system of tribute.

In order to prevent the coastal people from entering the sea for trade, the Ming Dynasty law stipulated severe punishment methods: "If the traitors and tyrants and the military and civilians build illegal ships of more than three masts without permission, they will take the prohibited goods to the sea, go to the country to buy and sell, sneak into the pirates, conspire to gather, and plunder the good people as a guide, and the offender will be punished according to his own law, and still show the head to the public, and the whole family will send border guards to fill the army."

It builds the sea ships mentioned in the previous paragraph, sells them to those who make profits, and compares them with those who will go to sea with forbidden weapons, so they leak the law of military affairs, behead those who are the leaders, and send the border to fill the army for the servants."

The Ming court did not let go of the residents who participated in the buying and selling of foreign goods, "those who dare to have a private mutual market, must be put on the heavy law, all incense, goods are not allowed to be sold, and the existing ones are limited to three months." ”

However, since the direct targets of the maritime ban policy were the subjects and not the anti-Ming forces at sea, it not only failed to become an effective means of coastal defense, but even intensified some contradictions in the coastal areas.

In May of the second year of Jiajing, two tributary missions of the Japanese vassal marquis broke out in Ningbo over the issue of tribute qualifications, resulting in the killing or exile of many innocent Chinese soldiers and civilians.

After that, the rulers of the Ming Dynasty believed that "the trouble of the Japanese began in the city, and then stopped", and "closed the tribute road" to Japan, and implemented a more severe maritime ban policy.

Therefore, the imperial court accepted the suggestion and blockaded the coastal ports, destroyed the ships going to sea, and cut off sea traffic.

Under the policy of strict maritime ban, private overseas trade was regarded as illegal, and they were forced to embark on the path of abnormal development, that is, forced to turn into smuggling and armed smuggling, and some large armed smuggling groups at sea appeared.

During the Jiajing period, Wang Zhi, the leader of the largest armed smuggling syndicate, became the recognized leader of many smuggling syndicates, and "all of them obeyed the command" of the 36 islands, with hundreds of thousands of people, first called "King Jinghai", then "King Hui", and even "called Gu in the south".

The Ming Dynasty launched a military attack on these armed smuggling groups, and the smuggling groups united and used the Japanese Japanese to confront them, thus causing the so-called "Japanese Rebellion" that lasted for more than 40 years in Jiajing.

In fact, the rebellion was the inevitable result of the policy of strictly prohibiting non-governmental overseas trade, and it was in the nature of a struggle between prohibition and anti-prohibition.

The rebellion of the Japanese invaders was fought repeatedly, and even the more they struck, the more intense they became, so that the Ming Dynasty consumed a lot of troops and material resources, and was tired of coping, which became a major trouble.

During this period, the policy of strictly prohibiting non-governmental and private overseas trade was very backward, ran counter to the requirements of social and economic development, and violated the interests of the broad masses of the people, especially the people in the southeastern coastal areas, and caused huge losses to the normal social and economic development of the Ming Dynasty, especially the southeastern coastal areas, and seriously hindered the normal economic and cultural exchanges between China and foreign countries.

After Sejong's death, Mujong succeeded to the throne and began to adjust the policy of strictly prohibiting private overseas trade.

In the first year of Longqing (1567), Tu Zemin, the governor of Fujian, wrote a letter saying, "Please open the market, and the smugglers are public sellers" (smugglers refer to smugglers, and public traders refer to legitimate merchants).

In the same year, Emperor Longqing (Ming Muzong) announced the lifting of the sea ban, adjusted the overseas trade policy, and allowed private people to sell the east and west oceans, which was known as the "Longqing switch" in history.

Private overseas trade has gained legal status, and non-governmental overseas trade in various parts of the southeast coast has entered a new period. The Ming Dynasty had a relatively comprehensive opening up.

At that time, the products of the Ming Dynasty, such as silk fabrics, porcelain, tea, ironware, etc., were widely welcomed by countries around the world, and many countries lacked famous and high-quality goods to meet the domestic needs of the Ming Dynasty, so they had to pay for the goods purchased in silver, resulting in a large amount of silver flowing into the Ming Dynasty.

From the first year of Mingshenzong Wanli (1573) to the Chongzhen period of Mingsizong, the silver dollars imported into the Ming Dynasty from Portugal, Spain, Japan and other countries were at least more than 100 million yuan, which effectively promoted the development of the domestic commodity economy and social economy in the Ming Dynasty, promoted the improvement of people's livelihood and social progress, and also provided an opportunity and stage for Chinese merchants in the Ming Dynasty to actively participate in the East Asia and Pacific trade circle that had been established at that time.

The land Silk Road could not be passed, and the ports of the Maritime Silk Road were not under the jurisdiction of Wang Zezhi.

There was no way for a while, so I could only put this matter down first.

Wang Zezhi ordered the three of them and the sergeants who came back alive to go down to rest, and called Yu Zhong, Wang Xian, Wang Shan, and Yu You to discuss business matters.

"Yu Zhong, tell me about the information you have gathered."

"According to the subordinates, the merchants who targeted us this time were headed by Fan.

He gathered the wealthy merchants and squires of Shanxi, Xuanfu, and Beizhili, as well as Jiangnan.

These people are all rich and rival countries, so the semicolons we opened out, as well as the merchants who joined the Chamber of Commerce, are almost unable to operate. ”

After Yu Zhong finished speaking, he gave a salute and retreated.

"Recently, the parity grain store has received a lot of fake food stamps, qualification books, and ticket numbers have also received many fake silver stamps. Wang Shan took out some fake tickets and presented them to Wang Zezhi.

"Tut-tut... The real image of the forgery, this paper and pen and ink are exactly the same, but unfortunately, even the lines and numbers on the ticket are exactly the same. ”

In order to prevent counterfeiting, Wang Zezhi has put a lot of effort into the pattern and code, which is also the reason why the staff of the ticket number and the grain store can identify the authenticity.

"The place of counterfeiting is unstoppable, fortunately, I have thought of this for a long time, the people cannot use food stamps and silver stamps, these things are only useful for ticket numbers and grain stores, otherwise there is really some trouble."

Wang Zezhi had thought of this a long time ago, so he had not allowed silver stamps and food stamps to circulate between people.

The food stamps and silver stamps he sent out could only be circulated between people and ticket numbers, and between people and grain stores.