When filming the Liao Kingdom in movies and television, there are often characters like the king of the North Courtyard and the king of the Southern Courtyard, which sounds very powerful, and the most famous king of the Southern Courtyard is Xiao Feng in Tianlong Babu.
However, those who know a little about the official system of the Liao State will know that the Liao State is divided into two systems: the northern officials are in charge of non-Han areas, especially the Khitan people, and the southern officials are in charge of the original Han areas.
Then the king of the southern courtyard has a southern character, he is the official of the south, and he is in charge of the Han nationality, and he is definitely not as good as the king of the northern courtyard, after all, he is in charge of the Khitan clan.
Similarly, the Liao State also has the northern and southern privy envoys, and the northern and southern prime ministers, according to the same logic, everything with the southern character is not as good as the northern character.
Of course, this is wrong, otherwise Sandstorm would not have needed to write this thing. Experts on this kind of mistake sometimes make mistakes, I remember reading Fairbank's book, which also contains mistakes in the official system of the Liao State.
In fact, the aforementioned kings of the north and south, privy envoys of the north and south, and prime ministers of the north and south are all officials in the north. In principle, they don't care about the affairs of the Han region.
The emperor of Liao was different from the Central Plains, he lived a wandering life, and he was sad - in fact, he maintained a nomadic way. His tent was facing east, so when he set up camp, the bureaucracy around him was distributed on the north and south sides of the emperor's tent, maintaining geometric symmetry.
This is how the name of the Privy Envoy of the North and the South, the Prime Minister of the North and the South, came about.
The privy envoy is often equivalent to Zaifu in the Central Plains, but not in the Liao State, and the power is not as good as that of the privy envoys of the Tang and Song dynasties, only equivalent to the ministry of the Central Plains. The Northern Privy Envoy is equivalent to the military department, and the Southern Privy Envoy mixes the functions of the official department and the household department. In fact, according to the standards of the Central Plains, the Southern Privy Envoy seems to have more power.
The Prime Minister of the North and the South is the staff of the emperor, in principle, the Prime Minister of the North Mansion is a member of the imperial family, and the Prime Minister of the South Mansion is a person from the Hou family, that is, the Empress Dowager Xiao and her family.
In many places, it is believed that the Prime Minister of the North and the South and the Privy Envoy of the North and the South have a subordinate relationship, and Sandstorm believes that it is absolutely wrong, and there is no subordinate relationship between them. To make an analogy, it is equivalent to that in old Japan, the Marshal's Office corresponded to the Prime Minister of the North and the South, and the General Staff Headquarters and the Military Command Department corresponded to the Privy Envoy of the North and the South.
Bei Nan Zai has a great influence on the affairs of the North and South Privy Envoys, after all, he is a staff officer around the emperor, but it does not mean that he is a superior administratively. Of course, the Prime Minister of the North and the South could never be a subordinate of the Privy Envoy of the North and the South.
Regarding these, just look at the official positions of Han Derang, Yelu Huge, and Yelu Xian.
And what about the king of the north and south?In many places, it is believed that the kings of the north and south are subordinate to the privy envoys of the north and the south respectively, but in fact they are not, which is also a big misunderstanding.
The ** of the king of the north and south is even older, and it was set up by Yelu Abaoji. He divided his tribe, the Diethorn Division, into two, called the North and South Courtyards, and each had a Yili Sumire, who was the leader of the tribe. So the king of the north and the south is the head of the tribe.
Why did you tear down your own tribe?This is equivalent to the emperor of the Central Plains dismantling the Han nationality and dividing it into the southern and northern ethnic groups, which is strange. Well, that's another story.
Therefore, the king of the north and south is actually a feudal official, and will not be a subordinate of the privy envoy of the north and the south and the prime minister of the north and south.
In fact, there are many kings in Liao, such as King Yi and King Xi.
In the early days of the Liao Kingdom, the power of the tribal leaders was great. But as time passed, the centralization of power gradually expanded, so the tribal leaders slowly became feudal officials and lost a lot of power.
All the official positions mentioned above are northern officials, and in principle, they do not care about the Han region. The Han region has an independent organization in Nanjing, and the official titles are all official names of the Central Plains.
But Sandstorm wrote the words "in principle". In fact, the core power must be in the hands of the emperor of Liao, so the prime minister of the north and south will definitely have a significant influence. Moreover, in addition to the early days of the Liao Kingdom, the military power of the Han region is actually not in Yanjing, which is of course very understandable.