In May of the seventh year of Jiayou's reign, Bao Zheng suddenly fell to the ground and fell unconscious while working in the Privy Council. He did not get better after going home to recuperate. Bao Zheng died of illness soon after. On that day, a total of twenty-one coffins were

In May of the seventh year of Jiayou's reign (1062), Bao Zheng, who was working at the Privy Council, suddenly fell to the ground and fell into a coma. He did not get better after going home to recuperate. Bao Zheng died of illness soon after.

Compared with his sudden death, what made the local people even more puzzled and unacceptable was the weird way Bao Zheng carried out his funeral!

On that day, a total of twenty-one coffins were carried out from Bao Zheng's mourning hall and transported to the outside of the city from seven city gates, with different destinations.

This made the people who wanted to see Bao Zheng off were "dazzled!" and had no idea which team to follow.

This can be called a "unique" funeral method, which is completely a helpless move by the Bao family.

There was a secret behind it. Even the tomb robber understood it deeply and set a rule for Bao Zheng from then on!

So, why did Bao Zheng’s tribe prepare so many coffins for him? And what kind of rules did the tomb robbers set?

(Portrait of Bao Zheng)

All this must start from Bao Zheng’s actions and officialdom relations during his lifetime.

He was extremely filial in his early years.

Song Zhenzong In the second year of Xianping (999), Bao Zheng was born into a family of officials. His father Bao Lingyi once served as the magistrate of Fuhui'an County, a member of the imperial court's Yu Department, and a stayer in Yingtian Mansion.

Portrait of Song Zhenzong

Following the footsteps of his father in fulfilling his duties, Bao Zheng traveled around the world since he was a child. In addition to reading history books, he also experienced various folk customs. The seeds of becoming an official for the people were quietly sown in his heart, and gradually changed him. life trajectory.

Bao Zheng once commented that he was "born in grass and learned from officials", which means that he was born in an ordinary family and received Confucian education since childhood.

In Bao Zheng's life, apart from his father, the teacher who had the greatest influence on him was undoubtedly Liu Jun.

So, who is Liu Jun?

Liu Jun was a famous minister in the Northern Song Dynasty. He was a bachelor of the Imperial Academy and was awarded a bachelor's degree in Longtuge.

In the later years of Song Zhenzong's reign, he was bedridden due to illness for a long time. The power of the court was controlled by the sycophant minister Ding Wei. However, Ding Wei was obsessed with using power for personal gain, and Liu Jun, who did not want to be associated with him, angrily said: "The traitor is using his own power, An." You can live here for a day!"

then voluntarily applied to leave the central government and be transferred to Luzhou (now Hefei) as magistrate.

(Illustration of Bao Zheng)

It must be said that Liu Jun was quite valuable as a famous official in the Northern Song Dynasty. After scolding the prime minister and ministers who were in power in the dynasty, he could still serve in local places according to his own wishes without any harm.

By chance, Liu Jun and Bao Zheng met.

As a well-known young talent in Luzhou, Bao Zheng was valued by Liu Jun for both his conduct and talents.

More importantly, Bao Zheng's upright and upright spirit, which would rather break than bend, made Liu Yun see his own shadow.

Therefore, Liu Jun naturally accepted Bao Zheng as his disciple and became his mentor.

Under Liu Jun's guidance, Bao Zheng made rapid progress. In the fifth year of Emperor Renzong's reign (1027), Bao Zheng became a Jinshi and was awarded the title of Jinshi. He was appointed as a Dali judge and the magistrate of Jianchang County. It can be considered a promising future.

But at this moment, Bao Zheng made a decision that stunned everyone. He resolutely refused the transfer from the court and chose to go home to serve his parents.

After that, the imperial court recruited many candidates, but all of them were rejected by Bao Zheng. It was not until Bao Zheng's parents passed away and Bao Zheng's filial piety period expired that he went to Beijing to listen to the election after repeated hesitation.

Although Bao Zheng was nearly forty years old at this time, nearly ten years of polishing and precipitation had made him more clear about his original intention to be an official and his will became firmer.

2. Serve the people with one heart

As the saying goes, knowledge and action unite, after officially entering officialdom, Bao Zheng began to stride forward on the path of his faith.

Today's Duanzhou (Zhaoqing)

In the first year of Kangding (1040) of Emperor Renzong of the Song Dynasty, Bao Zheng was appointed magistrate of Duanzhou, and this Duanzhou was the production place of Duan inkstone .

Duan inkstone grinding ink not only produces ink quickly, but also the ink is smooth. The handwriting written with it will remain unchanged for a long time. There is even a legend of "grinding ink with breath".

As a result, Duan Inkstone had a very high status in the literati circle and became the object of many scholar-bureaucrats' pursuit.

Things are rare and valuable. At that time, the Northern Song Dynasty court's requirement for Duanzhou was "Ten annual tribute inkstones from Duanzhou" ("Song Jiuyu Zhi"). This output was actually not high, so Duan inkstones were rare. Price has no market value.

But this does not prevent people from deliberately causing trouble.

I don’t know since when, the governor of Duanzhou who went to work would secretly tamper with the imperial decree and require the inkstone people to provide several times the standard Duan inkstone every year. These extra Duan inkstones were not only used to line their own pockets, but also used to bribe superior officials. Make connections.

Although the people worked hard, they received nothing. In addition, due to the protection of the officials, the actual situation in the local area was never reported, and the local people could not tell the story of their sufferings.

This situation became clear after Bao Zheng took office.

After Bao Zheng came to Duanzhou, he first went to the Duan inkstone mining site for on-site investigation.

It turns out that Duan inkstone mining usually occurs in the cold winter when the water dries up. The inkstone workers have to pull a rope from the entrance of the cave and slowly slide it from the ground into the 30-foot-deep mine. After carefully exploring the veins of the mine, they slowly carve out the stone wall. , and then transport the inkstone back to the ground piece by piece.

After seeing the difficult working conditions of inkstone workers, Bao Zheng felt deeply guilty.

In anger, he punished the officials responsible for the tribute inkstones one by one, and ordered people to post notices not to expand the number of tribute inkstones at will.

The current inkstone worker

During the three years that Bao Zheng took office in Duanzhou, he not only set an example and implemented the official style of being gentle with two sleeves, but also led the local people to control floods, dig wells, and treat epidemic diseases.

Three years later, when Bao Zheng resigned, Duanzhou was now prosperous, sweeping away the decadence of the past. When

left office, Bao Zheng did not take away a large number of Duan Inkstones like the previous governors, and he did not even take away a piece of Duan Inkstone, leaving the reputation of "returning without even one inkstone" .

In addition to being an honest official, Bao Zheng also acted impartially and enforced the law impartially, whether facing princes, nobles, or his own relatives and friends.

A great scholar of the Song DynastyZhu Xi once commented that he "should not do anything for personal gain...as a long-term official, he has nothing to do with his subordinates, and he likes to humiliate people."

(Bao Zheng's sculpture)

When Bao Zheng was the magistrate of Luzhou, he had already He is a well-known official, and many relatives from his hometown come to seek refuge with him.

Unlike Bao Zheng, this group of relatives does not have a high degree of ideological awareness and still adheres to the pedantic concept of "when one person attains enlightenment, chickens and dogs ascend to heaven".

Taking advantage of Bao Zheng's identity, they ran rampant in the countryside, oppressed the people, and committed many shameful acts.

As time passed, complaints arose among the people. There is no impermeable wall in the world, and the evil behavior of relatives eventually reached Bao Zheng's ears.

Bao Zheng was naturally very angry. Once, Bao Zheng's cousin was caught breaking the law.

Just when people were curious about how Bao Zheng would handle it, Bao Zheng directly escorted his uncle to the court, arbitrated the case in front of everyone, and dealt with him severely.

According to the "Records of the Words and Deeds of Famous Officials of the Five Dynasties", from then on, relatives and relatives no longer dared to use Bao Zheng's name to cause harm. Officials and people were impressed by Bao Zheng's righteous behavior of killing relatives.

3. Remonstrance to Minister Bao Zheng

For fellow high-ranking officials, no matter how strong the other party's backing is, even if the emperor gives the other party a side, as long as his moral character is deficient, Bao Zheng will pursue him and impeach him.

Wang Kui was a Jinshi in the third year of Zhenzong's Tianxi (1019), eight years earlier than Bao Zheng, and he had more than ten years of experience and connections in the ups and downs of officialdom than Bao Zheng, who served his parents at home.

During his tenure as a local governor, because he was good at squeezing the people and taking away their wealth, he could always pay more taxes than his colleagues. His performance on paper could be said to be unique. For this reason, he was highly praised by the emperor and some officials in the capital. favorite.

After Bao Zheng took office to supervise the censor, it became his duty to supervise all officials.

(Bao Zheng Sculpture)

Bao Zheng had heard about Wang Kui's situation for a long time and always felt that something was wrong.

After an on-the-spot investigation, Bao Zheng learned that Wang Kui did not hesitate to fish in the lake in order to collect more taxes. The high taxes forced the people to live in ruins and many people became bandits. For this reason, Wang Kui led many The armed forces forcibly suppressed the peasant uprising.

After learning the true situation, Bao Zheng immediately drafted a memorial and reported it to the emperor to impeach the cruel official Wang Kui!

Although Emperor Renzong wanted to keep this "capable minister" who could increase GDP, he could not cover up Wang Kui's crimes, so he had to demote Wang Kui to Chizhou as the magistrate.

Although he was demoted, Wang Kui did not restrain himself. He secretly contacted Chen Zhizhong, the prime minister of the dynasty, and others, and asked them to speak favorably for him in front of the emperor. Within a few years, Renzong promoted him to Jiangxi as a transshipment envoy. Squeeze the people even harder.

After hearing that Wang Kui was reinstated, Bao Zheng immediately visited and investigated. After obtaining Wang Kui's charges, Bao Zheng impeached him three times in a row. However, at this time, Renzong not only did not bother to pay attention to Bao Zheng's advice, but also continued to promote Wang Kui.

The emperor's favor went to Wang Kui's mind. With the power in his hands, his ambitions continued to expand, so much that he thought he could cover the sky with one hand. When Wang Kui learned that Bian Xian, the former magistrate of Hongzhou, had secretly contacted Bao Zheng to report his crimes, Wang Kui was furious and used his power to imprison more than 500 people related to Bian Xian.

This move was too arrogant, causing both the government and the public to scold Wang Kui. Wang Kui's past protective network was no longer working well. Bao Zheng took the opportunity to impeach him three times, and Wang Kui was demoted again. Xuzhou Zhizhou.

Peking Opera Image of Bao Gong

Unexpectedly, this Wang Kui was like an unbeatable Xiaoqiang. He made a comeback in the second year of Huangyou (1050) and was promoted to Huainan Transport Envoy. After the news came out, both the local and the central government were shocked. !

The tragedy a few years ago is still vivid in my mind. God knows how capable Wang Kui is, but he can still be promoted.

Bao Zheng began the seventh impeachment. In his memorial, he bluntly stated that the imperial court protected cruel officials. This was equivalent to pointing a finger at the emperor's nose and scolding him. Thanks to the Song Dynasty, which valued literature over military affairs and had the tradition of "punishing officials without punishment", it would have been different in other dynasties. It is estimated that Bao Zheng was taken down in court.

This time, because there were more objections from the court and Bao Zheng's words were sharper, the emperor finally made up his mind to directly remove Wang Kui from his position without giving him a chance to sit up.

Bao Zheng seems a little unkind, but in fact, as long as it is beneficial to the country, Bao Zheng will fully support it.

Qingli New Deal

During the Qingli New Deal, the court was divided into two factions, one was the New Deal faction and the other was the conservative faction.

Bao Zheng is an important conservative figure. Quan Yushi Zhongcheng Wang Gongchen recommends entering the dynasty. Logically speaking, he should be on the side of the conservatives, but in fact he is not.

Bao Zheng was never willing to take sides or join forces with other parties. Bao Zheng believed that most of the policies in the New Deal would make the country prosperous and powerful, so he supported them openly.

At the same time, Bao Zheng also bluntly expressed his opposition to the unreasonable aspects of the New Deal.

After the failure of the Qingli New Deal, leaders Fan Zhongyan and Ouyang Xiu were demoted to various places. The New Deal faction completely collapsed. The conservatives took the opportunity to add insult to injury and suppress New Deal officials.

Portrait of Fan Zhongyan

At this time of great turmoil, Bao Zheng stood up and opposed excessive correction. He advocated screening and hiring New Deal officials who were "unjustly condemned". This approach greatly reduced the brain drain of the court.

Even the leader of the conservatives Sima Guang could not help but praise him: "When Renzong was a weak man, Bao Zheng was the most upright."

4. Retaining the name after death

In May of the seventh year of Jiayou (1062), Bao Zheng, who was working in the Privy Council, suddenly fell to the ground and fell unconscious. He did not get better after going home to recuperate. Soon after, Bao Zheng died of illness. He died at the age of sixty-four.

After the news of Bao Zheng's death came out, "all the officials and people in the capital were sentimental; the sighs could be heard on the roads." Even Emperor Renzong decided to miss the day and personally rushed to Bao Zheng's home to express his condolences.

Bianliang, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty

The story goes back to the scene at the beginning of the article. When the people saw the array of twenty-one coffins, the monk Zhang Er was also confused.

Generally speaking, only the princes and nobles at that time would prepare multiple coffins when they were buried, in order to prevent tomb robbers from coming.

Why does that cool-faced Bao Zheng act like this? Did he secretly hide a lot of expensive burial objects?

is not the case. During his lifetime, Bao Zheng offended many people because he was too loyal and upright.

During his lifetime, these people may have been afraid of his reputation and did not dare to take any action, but after Bao Zheng died, they may not have dared to dig up graves and whip corpses.

At this point, the people could not tell which coffin actually contained Bao Gong's body, so they had no choice but to watch the funeral procession walk away, and those who were interested had no choice but to give up.

Even so, Bao Zheng still made arrangements for his death. The cost of coffins at that time was very expensive and ordinary people could not afford them.

For example, the later Ming Dynasty founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang , who was born in a poor family, could only wrap his parents' bodies in bamboo mats and bury them in the ground when he was young.

Therefore, Bao Zheng, who had always been thrifty, was unwilling to be extravagant and wasteful, so he made a will to give the remaining twenty coffins to ordinary people after the real coffin was buried.

Bao Zheng Sculpture

After the tomb robbers saw this scene, they established the rule of "not robbing tombs Bao Zheng's tomb ".

Firstly, it is respect for this upright official; secondly, in various folk legends, Bao Zheng became the Yama of hell after his death. The ancients had many superstitious thoughts, and tomb robbers were no exception, so they naturally stayed away from Bao Zheng's tomb.

Since then, except for the descendants of the Bao family, the whereabouts of in Bao Cemetery has become an unsolvable mystery.

Time came to 1973. Hefei Second Steel Group planned to build a lime kiln in Hefei City, Anhui Province. The local tomb of Bao Gong that had existed for more than 900 years had to be moved.

Today Luzhou (Hefei)

Although it is a suspicious tomb, people still set up an excavation team to explore the tomb out of caution.

Unexpectedly, the team actually found a golden nanmu coffin in a small corner of this tomb group, as well as the broken tombstones of Bao Zheng and his wife Dong.

According to the Song Dynasty, the golden nanmu coffin could only be used by officials of the second grade or above. Archaeological experts judged the age of the remains and determined that they were Bao Zheng himself.

However, based on the observation of the tomb chamber, both the specifications and the placement of the remains are somewhat inconsistent and quite messy. This is obviously not the original tomb of Bao Gong Cemetery, and is most likely the result of migration by later generations.

Just when the experts were thinking about the original tomb site, an old man named Xia Guanghong appeared with hobbling steps. He claimed that his ancestors had been favored by Bao Gong, so he volunteered to guard Bao Gong's tomb here.

Golden Phoebe Coffin

Under his guidance, experts found the real Bao Cemetery.

According to preliminary exploration, experts found that the scale of this tomb is significantly larger and more in line with regulations.

But what is irritating is that the original tomb has been opened using a "large-scale decapping" method. The method is very rough. It does not look like the work of a tomb robber, but more like an army looting.

Therefore, experts estimate that when the Jin soldiers went south, in order to prevent Bao Gong's body from being damaged, Bao's descendants hurriedly moved the body to the tomb of Bao Gong's wife Dong, and they were buried together.

The original tomb of Bao Gong was probably looted by the Jin soldiers, and all the burial companions were wiped out.

After that, the local government contacted the descendants of the Bao family and helped them rebuild Bao Cemetery in Hefei City.

"Some people are dead, but he is still alive, and the people hold him high, very high."

As a famous official of a generation, Bao Zheng's uprightness and breeze have always been regarded as a role model for officials. praised by the people.

Bao Cemetery

References:

"Bao Zheng, a traditional official model with both morality and law" Wang Jun - Anhui Provincial Party Committee Party School - 2006-5

"A brief discussion of Bao Zheng's Confucian style" Chen Yongqin - Liaocheng Museum - 2004-4

"Bao Zheng and Fan Zhongyan in the Clique Struggle" Kong Fanmin-Daoba Keke

Editor: Li Mianzhi

Editor: Lin Hua