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This article is about 3000 words.
Khitan After the founding of the People's Republic of China, it actively sought out development, and successively confronted and and in the Central Plains. At this time, after the establishment of the Northern Song Dynasty in the south, it also actively developed to the north, prompting Liao to strongly support and the Northern Han to confront the Northern Song Dynasty. After the Northern Song Dynasty destroyed the Northern Han regime, Liao Dynasty directly confronted the Northern Song Dynasty. After several major battles, Liao, Song and Xia formed a three-legged situation.
1. Strong in the flames of war
□Liao Dynasty Military System
Liao Army
Military status, and the Liao Dynasty army is divided into the main army and the family. The main army of the Liao Dynasty consisted of the Forbidden Army and the tribal army. Among them, the imperial army was composed of the imperial tents and the palace guard cavalry, which were the elite troops of the Liao army. The tribal army is the private guard of the prince minister, or the frontier army based on the tribe. Jiading was served by slaves and tribes, mainly engaged in miscellaneous duties, not as a formal army. The historical annals record that when the Liao Dynasty was the strongest, there were more than 1.64 million soldiers. Become a strong pillar for the Liao regime to maintain its rule.
□Liao vs. Zhou and the Northern Song Dynasty
In the spring of 954, Later Zhou Shizong Chai Rong sent troops to attack the Northern Han Dynasty. The two sides started a fierce battle in Gaoping (now northeast of Jincheng, Shanxi). The Liao-Han coalition forces first won a small victory, and then the Zhou army fought desperately under the command of Sejong Chai Rong and generals Zhao Kuangyin , and finally turned defeat into victory. The Liao-Han coalition army retreated to Taiyuan. Soon, Liao Muzong ordered Nanyuan Great King Talie to lead the army to reinforce the army, and finally repelled the army in the next week.
In 960 AD, Zhao Kuangyin established the Northern Song Dynasty. Liao occupies and Yanyun sixteen states ,Become a confidant of the Northern Song Dynasty. In 979 AD, Song Taizu attacked the Northern Han Dynasty and defeated the Liao Dynasty by victory in an attempt to regain the lost land of Yanyun. Liao defeated the Song Army in the battle of Gaoliang River. In 986 AD, the Northern Song Dynasty once again made a major expedition to the Liao Dynasty, but failed again. Since then, the offensive and defensive trend of the Liao and Song Dynasties has changed suddenly. In 987 AD, the regent Queen Mother Xiao sent Yeluxiu to attack Song Dynasty as the general, and defeated the Song army. In 1004 AD, Shengzong of Liao and Empress Dowager Xiao sent the Liao army to the bank of the Yellow River. However, the commander of Liao, Xiao Tat, died while visiting Zhongfu, and the morale of the Liao army was frustrated. Song Liao signed a covenant in Chanyuan, Song Yun promised to give Liao a large amount of "year-old tribute", and Liao withdrew his troops to the north. After Tanyuan Alliance , the Song and Liao parties temporarily stopped fighting and lived in peace for nearly a hundred years.
□Liao's conquest of Xixia
In the summer of 1044 AD, the party item to which the Liao belonged all tribes rebelled against Xixia. In September, Liao Xingzong decided to conquer Xixia. Lord Xia Yuan Hao sent people to discuss peace with the Liao, but the Liao Xingzong did not allow it. Xingzong led a 100,000 army to fight against Xixia in three routes, and the Liao army drove straight forward, but no effective resistance was encountered. In October, the two sides fought a decisive battle under Helan Mountain , and the Liao army defeated Xixia. Yuan Hao made a tactic of slowing down his troops. On the one hand, he expressed his willingness to surrender to the Liao Dynasty, but on the other hand he launched a fierce attack on the Liao army camp. Liao army was unprepared, the army was defeated, Liao Xingzong escaped by chance. After that, Yuan Hao decided to surrender the party branches that betrayed Xixia, and the two sides of Liao and Xia reached a peace.
Second, the rule of the Liao Dynasty
□The division of Hu and Han
The land of the Liao Dynasty
The Liao Dynasty includes many ethnic groups, in addition to the Khitan, there are also Han, Bohai, and Jurchen, Shiwei and other tribes. The socio-economic conditions of these ethnic groups are quite different, and can be roughly divided into two categories: one is mainly Han people, and Bohai people .The main feature is that "the crops are used for food, the city is for residence", and they live a settled life based on agriculture; the other type is dominated by Khitan people, "fishing and hunting are based on food, carts and horses are home", and they live a nomadic life . According to this different situation, during the Taizong period of the Liao Dynasty, the Liao Dynasty formulated a system of "divided rule between Hu and Han", "ruling the Qidan by the state system and the Han people by the Han system." Specifically, the Khitan nobles were used to rule the Khitan and other nomadic peoples. Since their offices were located north of the emperor’s tent, they were called "Northern Officials." However, the landlords and Khitan nobles who ruled the Han people and the old Bohai people were called "Southern officials" because their offices were located in the south of Emperor Yazhang. The southern officials are mostly Han people, while the northern officials are mostly held by the Khitan nobles, so their power is much greater than that of the southern officials.
In terms of law, there are obvious differences between Hu and Han. At the beginning of the founding of the Liao Dynasty, the law was extremely simple, and its criminal law had only four classes, namely, death penalty, flow penalty , imprisonment, rod penalty . It was in the sixth year of Shenshe (921 AD) that Emperor Taizong of the Liao pacified the tribes before he began to formulate detailed criminal laws. People of Khitan and ethnic minorities in Northeast China commit crimes under the rule of Khitan law. For the lighter, the stick is determined, and for the severer, there are death sentences such as cannon throwing and dismemberment. The crimes of the Han people were punished in accordance with the laws and regulations of the Central Plains dynasty of the previous generation. According to the "Liao History-Criminal Law Records", the Liao Dynasty had "noble and low different laws", and if the Khitan and the Han committed the same crime, the Han would be severely punished. It was only when Shengzong Liao began to follow the principle of the same crime and the same punishment. However, until the end of the Liao Dynasty, the phenomenon of Khitan and Han people's different laws still existed in large numbers. These phenomena all show that Liao's laws have distinct characteristics of ethnic oppression.
□A mixture of livestock and farmers
The animal husbandry industry in the Liao Dynasty was extremely developed, "between the deserts, it is cold and windy, the animal husbandry (tan) fish for food, fur for clothing, moving at any time, carts and horses as home". The animals kept by the Khitan people are mainly camels, horses, cattle, sheep and so on. Camels can be used to pull carts and carry goods; cows can provide milk in addition to carts and loads; sheep mainly provide meat, and their fur can also be made into clothing; horses are mainly used for hunting, grazing, transportation, and combat. The Liao Dynasty set up the "Farming Division", "Horse Division", "Sheep Division" in various regions as specialized agencies for the management of animal husbandry.
In the economic life of the Khitan people, animal husbandry has always been at the forefront.However, after acquiring Bohai State and Yanyun Sixteen Prefectures, the importance of agriculture in Liao Dynasty society must increase. Near the Linhuang Mansion in Shangjing, "the land is fertile and suitable for farming", farmers of the Han and Bohai ethnic groups were moved there to engage in farming. The rulers of the Liao Dynasty all implemented policies to reward the reclamation and set up farms in various coastal areas. Especially in the Liaodong area, agricultural production has developed greatly. In this way, in the Shengzong and Xingzong reigns, the territory of Liaoning had "organized hundreds of thousands of households and cultivated more than a thousand miles." At that time, more than 50 cities had set up "Helai (di) warehouses", which shows that the grain output was very abundant.
Third, the decline and fall of the Liao Dynasty
□Political chaos
In the last year of Liao Shengzong, national power began to decline from prosperity. After the death of Shengzong, the ruling group launched a struggle for power and profit, coupled with political corruption, the rule of the Liao Dynasty became perilous.
After the death of Liao Shengzong, the concubine nuo (nuo) established herself as the empress dowager, known in history as the "Queen of Sorrows". She imprisoned the Shengzong’s main room Qitian Empress in Beijing and forced her to commit suicide. At the same time, she controlled the government and even conspired to abolish the Liao Xingzong. When the conspiracy was revealed, Xu Jin was imprisoned and his party members were liquidated. After that, Xingzong became pro-government.
Liao Xingzong
When Xingzong reigned, the Liao Kingdom had been in decline, political corruption, and traitorous servants were in power. In order to turn the domestic contradictions, Xingzong launched several wars against Xixia and Northern Song Dynasty, which on the contrary caused more damage to the society of the Liao Dynasty. After the Liao Xingzong, the Liao Dynasty went through the "Chongyuan Rebellion" and " Yelvyixin dictatorship" and other turbulences, and the country was declining.
□Gao Yongchang against the Liao Dynasty
When Emperor Tianzuo of the Liao Dynasty, Gao Yongchang, a native of Bohai, served as a general in Tokyo (now Shenyang, Liaoning). In 1116 AD, the Bohai people living in Tokyo killed the Liao and Tokyo and left behind. Gao Yongchang took advantage of the situation to fight against Liao and occupied Tokyo, claiming to be the emperor of the Bohai Sea. Afterwards, Gao Yongchang fought dozens of battles with the Liao army. At a disadvantage, he turned to Jin Guo for help. Jin Taizu Wanyan Aguda is in the name of reinforcements,Attacked the rear of the Liao army, causing the Liao army to be defeated. Subsequently, the Jin army took advantage of the situation to conquer Gao Yongchang, occupied Tokyo, and captured Gao Yongchang. Gao Yongchang rebelled against the Liao Dynasty, and the fruit of his victory was captured by the Kingdom of Jin, and 54 states including Liaodong and Tokyo were merged into the territory of the Kingdom of Jin.
□The Kingdom of Jin defeated Liao
Jin Mieliao
At the end of 1121 AD, the Jin army attacked Liao in a big way, and it was as powerful as a bamboo. At the beginning of the next year, it attacked Zhongjing, and Xijing, . Emperor Zuo of Liao Tian led the remnants to retreat into the desert area. At this time, the Northern Song Dynasty also sent troops to attack Yenching, but they were all repelled, so they had to ask the Jin army to attack Yenching. In December, the Jin army moved south from the Juyongguan Pass by and captured Yanjing. After repeated negotiations between Jin and Song, it was agreed that the Kingdom of Jin would return Yenching and the four weeks to the Song Dynasty, and Song would deliver 1 million Guans of money to the Kingdom of Jin as "Yenching to be taxed money" every year. In the fall of 1123 AD
, Aguda died of illness on the way back to Beijing. His younger brother, Wanyan Sheng , succeeded to the throne. It was King Taizong. In 1125 AD, Jin Taizong sent troops westward and captured Emperor Tianzuo of Liao, and the Liao Dynasty was destroyed.
□ Yelv Dashi Established the West Liao
When the Liao Dynasty was about to fall, the noble Yelv Dashi led the Khitan part to go west, defeating various tribal forces along the way, until Central Asia. Yelv Dashi rebuilt a country dominated by the Khitan people. Its territory Amu Darya in the west and Hezhou (now Xinjiang Harahezhuo) in the east. In the 88th year of the founding of the West Liao Dynasty, it was destroyed by the Mongolian army in 1218.
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