Do you know? The title "Wang" has a very long history, as early as the pre-Qin period, it was mainly used as an honorific title for the "Son of Heaven". However, since "king" became a kind of title and formed the royal system, all dynasties have had a policy of sealing kings, and there are many types of kings, such as princes, kings, princes, county kings, county kings, vassal kings, zongwangs, and so on.
Therefore, with so many kinds of "kings", it is easy to confuse, and even many history bloggers can make mistakes.
In the Ming Dynasty's vassal system, there was a strict distinction between the titles of prince, county king, and vassal king. Recently, I found that many history bloggers called the vassal kings when introducing the Ming Dynasty clan, regardless of the prince of the county, which made people feel a little troubled.
In order to correct this misunderstanding, today we will discuss in detail how to properly address the Ming dynasty. Prince was the highest title in the Ming Dynasty's vassal system, and only members of the royal family could be crowned princes.
The title of a prince is usually named after an ancient country or state or county, such as the king of Chu, the king of Qin, the king of Zhao, the king of Teng, etc. Although there is a word for the title of king side by side, this is just a fiction in **, in fact, the status of the prince is far from being comparable to that of the emperor.
During the Ming Dynasty, the princely system followed the historical tradition, and the emperor's sons were all named princes, and their titles consisted of single characters. Excluding the Southern Ming period, all the princes of the Ming Dynasty were sealed by the lineage of Zhu Yuanzhang, the Taizu of the Ming Dynasty.
As the second heir to the emperor, the prince's books were made of gold, and the seal was also made of gold, and he wore a nine-chapter crown and a nine-chapter crown, and was given a one-character nickname after his death.
Since the words "Wen" and "Wu" cannot be used as nicknames, "Zhuang", "Xuan", "Xian", "Su", "Jian", "Zhao" and so on are the highest level of nicknames.
The term "county king" first appeared in the Western Jin Dynasty, when Sima Ling was named the king of Dongguan county, and Sima Liang was named the king of Fufeng county. However, there is an essential difference between the county kings of this period and the county kings as we usually understand them, they are princely kings.
In the early days of the Western Han Dynasty, the fiefdoms of the princes and kings crossed the prefectures and counties, which gave them the ability to resist the imperial court, which was the root of the Seven Kings Rebellion. In order to consolidate the centralization of power, the imperial court used various means to split the large vassal states, and later the feudal fief of the princes and kings was only as big as a county, so the title of the county king came into being.
At that time, the counterpart to the county king was the county king, and their fief was only the size of a county.
The county king is a kind of prince in the Tang Dynasty, which is given by the emperor's grandson and meritorious officials, and usually uses the word two as the title of the knight. The Ming Dynasty continued this tradition, using the word "two" as the title of the prince of the county, and conferred on members of the clan who were one rank lower than the prince.
Compared with princes and county kings, the concept of feudal kings is broader, and its name is derived from the meaning of "dividing feudal feudal domains and defending the royal family". The vassal king generally had his own feudal territory or vassal state, had military power, was responsible for guarding the local area, and could be a member of the clan, a military meritorious hero, or a leader of a local power, and had a certain degree of independence.
In the Western Han Dynasty, vassal kings began to appear, but the princes and county kings of the Tang and Song dynasties were not. The Ming Dynasty implemented the policy of feudal feudal statehood, granted feudal lands to vassal kings, and established a kingdom political system.
The political structure of each vassal state includes the Changshi Division, which is in charge of the affairs of the kingdom, the Chengfeng Division, which is in charge of the internal affairs of the royal palace, the guards and herdsmen who are in charge of the king's affairs, and the Honor Guard Division, which is in charge of the honor guard and guard of the vassal king.
In addition, the feudal lords also had sacrificial places such as shrines and mountain and river altars where they worshipped their own gods, as well as exclusive musicians who performed ceremonies. Unlike the princes and kings of the Han Dynasty, the vassal kings of the Ming Dynasty "divided the feudal feuds but did not tin soil, and the lords did not come to the people".
The vassal system of the Ming Dynasty included princes and county kings, but did not include all clan princes. A prince who died young, even if he was made a prince, could not be called a vassal king. Only the king of Jingjiang was divided into vassal kings, responsible for guarding Guangxi, and had a complete kingdom political system.
The Ming Dynasty also had foreign vassals, including kings of Korea, Ryukyu, Annam, and Mongolia. Zongwang is the abbreviation of the prince of the clan, whether it is a prince or a county king, as long as he belongs to the clan members, he can be called the king.
Kings with different surnames existed in all dynasties in history, including the princes and kings of the Han Dynasty and the princes of the Sui and Tang dynasties.
Although the Ming Dynasty adhered to the policy of "no king with a different surname" (not counting the Southern Ming Dynasty), this does not mean that kings with different surnames did not exist. In fact, there are not many kings with different surnames who were posthumously crowned, such as Xu Da, King of Zhongshan, Chang Yuchun, King of Kaiping, Li Wenzhong, King of Qiyang, Deng Yu, King of Ninghe, Tang He, King Tang He, King Muying of Qianning, Zhang Yu, King of Hejian, and Zhang Fu, King of Dingxing.
Ah Yue wants to emphasize that there is a big difference between the prince, the prince of the county, the king of the domain, and the king of the sect, and it cannot be confused at will. Some history bloggers deliberately confuse these concepts in order to gain eyeballs and traffic, which is very wrong.
If this is the case, Ah Yue can only express contempt. Related articles: Ming Chengzu cut the land and borrowed troops? He is also worthy of the three guards! Peasant rebels? Qing army? Who destroyed the palace of the Datong Dynasty?
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