A recent TV series about Emperor Renzong of the Northern Song Dynasty, "Qing Ping Le" is now on the air, bringing the two famous queens of the Northern Song Dynasty (later later empress dowagers) Empress Liu and Empress Cao into our sight again. This issue of Sledgehammer History is for readers and friends, telling the historical stories of these queens .
Before opening this issue of the story, Sledgehammer still has to represent the entire team and pay tribute to the retrograde forwards who are still fighting at this moment in the fight against COVID-19.
The book is back to the main story. In the Northern Song Dynasty, there were 9 emperors before and after, and there were 20 empresses. Among them, Empress Liu and Empress Cao are special representatives, because they have another identity besides the eminent identity of the empress and the empress dowager, that is, remarrying.
Before marrying Song Zhenzong, Empress Liu was the daughter-in-law of Yizhou silversmith Gong Mei. Later, because Gong Mei was poor, she dedicated her to Song Zhenzong Zhao Heng who was still the king of Han at the time. After Song Zhenzong became the throne, Liu Because of his popularity, he was finally established as a queen by Song Zhenzong after several twists and turns.
Before marrying Song Renzong, the Empress Cao had also married Li Shiheng’s grandson, Li Zhi, but it is said that Li Zhi likes to cultivate the way. On the day of the wedding, after welcoming the bride in, He actually said that he had hallucinations, claiming to see a large number of ghosts and gods in front of the bride Cao, so Li Zhi went straight over the wall and ran away. The marriage fell through, but the Cao family actually didn't do anything here, so they got the title of remarriage. However, Empress Cao has a huge advantage, that is, she is the granddaughter of Cao Bin, a famous general in the Northern Song Dynasty. In fact, it is to consider maintaining a bond with the family of military commanders and ministers, Song Renzong will marry Cao as the queen.
So these two women who remarried directly to the emperor played a very important role in the evaluation of the status of women in the Northern Song Dynasty. Many later generations will sigh when they look at this period of history: You see that the queen can be married second, and there is no restriction on keeping festivals. The Northern Song Dynasty is open enough.
In fact, this phenomenon of women remarrying in the Song Dynasty is not limited to these two queens . Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin's same mother and sister once married Mifford and Gao Huaide. The mother of Fan Zhongyan, a famous official in the Northern Song Dynasty, also remarried with her children, and Fan Zhongyan's daughter-in-law also remarried after her husband died. These are relatively common things.
In the era of Empress Cao, the court also had a political battle, which was also caused by a widow. At that time, it was reported that the courtier Xiang Minzhong and Zhang Qixian competed for Xue Weiji's widow, and finally Xiang Minzhong failed in the competition. A series of political and personnel changes. Even the brother of Er Cheng, a famous philosopher in the Northern Song Dynasty, after the death of Cheng Hao's son, his daughter-in-law was remarried; and after Cheng Yi's niece became widow, Cheng Yi also participated in the remarriage of his niece.
The loose remarriage of women in the Northern Song Dynasty was actually the result of many factors. The first factor is the historical inheritance . In fact, before Neo-Confucianism rose to the social order pushed by the ruling class, the issue of female remarriage by the ancients in my country was indeed not as strict and conservative as the later Ming and Qing Dynasties. There were many famous remarriage women in the Han Dynasty and the Sui and Tang Dynasties. For example, the princess Pingyang remarried Wei Qing in the Western Han Dynasty, and Cao Cao asked his concubines to remarry before his death. This type of remarriage in the Tang Dynasty was widespread even in the royal family. According to statistics from later generations of scholars, there were more than 20 people among the princesses of the Tang Dynasty who had remarried, including not only the second but also the third. In the Northern Song Dynasty, this style of remarriage of women actually continued.
The second factor is the Song people’s perception of such things. The reason why some people support this kind of remarriage, and it is regarded as human nature, the main reason is not the modern concept of women's liberation, but it is actually an extension of the cognition of husband's power in feudal society. People at the time of believed that women must marry Men reproduce their offspring, so after the death of the man or separation for other reasons, it is natural for a woman to remarry another man , so this type of remarriage was awarded at that time.Encouragement of dividing people.
However, this kind of loose remarriage of women is actually still a relative concept. In fact, so far, the academic circles have studied the issue of women's remarriage in the Song Dynasty. Although most opinions believe that women's remarriage in the Northern Song Dynasty was loose, some scholars even believe that remarriage is encouraged, but there are also objections that the Song Dynasty advocated women. There are also many cases of observing festivals. It is possible that in the Northern Song Dynasty, women’s remarriage and women’s observing festivals existed at the same time .
The reason why this kind of situation occurs is that there are basically only two types of women's remarriage in the literature of the Song Dynasty. One is the remarriage of women of the literati class. This document has more records. However, at that time, whether the lower-level people with a larger number of people recognized such remarriage customs, in addition to the scattered records in the historical notes, generally can only be found from the litigation judgments of the Song Dynasty at that time, but this kind of litigation materials Property issues are inevitably involved. Many women's remarriage lawsuits in the Song Dynasty were triggered by the issue of property division. Therefore, it is still not clear whether the people who opposed or supported women's remarriage were based on ideas or economic considerations.
Here is an example of sledgehammer. The Empress Liu E in the TV series "Qing Ping Le", from the trajectory of her struggle in the harem, we can also see that this kind of later generations look like a counterattack history of remarried women. In fact, it is not the case. It is said that the Zhao Song royal family prefers women who prefer second marriages. Liu E became the queen and even the empress dowager in the past is very rugged -when Liu E remarried to the Han King Zhao Heng mansion, Zhao Heng was not the prince, he It’s just that Song Taizong’s third son was neither a protagonist nor a long-term son. He had no hope of succession. It was just that his eldest brother Zhao Yuanzuo, who ranked ahead of him, became mentally ill. His second brother Zhao Yuanxi died unexpectedly, and Zhao Heng became a The opportunity of the prince, and this time is already several years after Liu E entered the Han Dynasty.
And even if Liu E entered the Prince’s Mansion but the Prince’s Mansion, he was under considerable pressure. At that time Song Taizong heard that his third son had gotten a woman of unknown origin from the people, so he was very angry and directly. He asked his son Zhao Heng to expel Liu E out. Zhao Heng drove Liu E out because he liked Liu E, and actually hid her in his confidant’s house, and went to see Liu E’s private meeting from time to time.
But after Song Taizong ousted Liu E, he was not relieved, and arranged for his third son the daughter of Song Dynasty famous general Pan Mei. Pan Mei's daughter passed away, but this has nothing to do with Liu E. He continued to take over. The princess is the daughter of the famous Guo Shouwen. And Liu E needs to wait ten years after Song Zhenzong ascended the throne, the former Queen Guo and now Empress Guo passed away before she waited for the chance to be promoted to the queen. And it was this time that Jin Empress, Song Zhenzong had a fierce quarrel with courtiers Kou Zhun, Xiang Min and others who firmly opposed the matter.
From this perspective, this glorious history of remarrying to marry the emperor is indeed not as easy as it seems.
