The story of "Fengshen Bang" must be familiar to everyone, this is in the background of the story of King Wu of Zhou leading the princes to crusade against the king of Zhou, the famous battle of Muye took place during this period, and this battle was also a decisive battle between King Wu and King Zhou. According to the "Historical Records", the army of King Wu was 700,000, and there are other classics that record 170,000 people, while the allied army of the princes on King Wu's side is 4About 50,000 people. Although the military strength cannot be compared with the Shang Dynasty, the final result is still the fall of the Shang Dynasty, the King of Zhou**, the King of Wu established a sacrificial chamber in Muye, and won the victory to the ancestors, thus laying the foundation of the Zhou Dynasty for 800 years.
This battle is a famous example in history of winning more with less, establishing the rule of the Zhou Dynasty, whether in the political, cultural or military fields have milestone significance, but also reflect the strong combat effectiveness of the Great Zhou soldiers. But when it comes to combat power, many people may have questions, how did Zhou Tianzi evolve from having absolute appeal to the vassal states to the declining situation in the Spring and Autumn Period?
In fact, after the destruction of Shang, King Wu of Zhou also rewarded a number of royal children and meritorious ministers, forming a large number of vassal states, which can enjoy hereditary rule in the feudal country, but need to obey the orders of the Son of Heaven and regular tribute, and also have the important responsibility of maintaining the safety of the royal family.
Regarding the reason for the weakening of the Zhou royal family, many people think that it has a lot to do with the implementation of the feudal system, the power of the vassal states is too large, and the royal family does not have the absolute control of the princes. Indeed, in the Spring and Autumn Five Hegemons, the world was looking forward to the overlord, and Zhou Tianzi became an ornament, especially the monarch of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, Zhou Yunwang Jiyan, finally ended up borrowing money to fight, and after the defeat of the army, he was collected by the creditor and had to flee to a high platform, leaving the allusion of "high debts".
The rulers of all dynasties attached great importance to the army, after all, this is the basis for maintaining rule, so why didn't Zhou Tianzi control the army himself, but finally ended up in Ji Yan's step? Is it because of the implementation of the sub-sealing system?
In fact, Zhou Tianzi originally had a strong army, and the strength mentioned here is not only that it can suppress the combat effectiveness of any prince, but also that the emperor has a certain control over the princes' army. At the beginning of the Zhou Dynasty, the army under the command of the Son of Heaven reached 14 divisions, while the large vassal states had 2 divisions, and the ordinary princes had even fewer divisions, only 1 division. According to the regulations at that time, the "qing" who commanded the "division" was directly appointed by the Son of Heaven, so even the army of the princes was actually under the orders of the Son of Heaven. The successive emperors also attached great importance to the military power in their hands, so what happened to make all this change?
First of all, King Zhou Zhao's southern expedition occurred a shipwreck, so that the Son of Heaven himself and the six divisions in his hands were gone, this incident dealt a great blow to the military strength of the Zhou Dynasty, although the successor of King Zhou Zhao Zhou Mu rebuilt the six divisions, and won in many battles, to a certain extent revitalized the prestige of the Son of Heaven, but under the conditions of productivity at that time, in order to produce the chariots needed for the war and cooperate with the soldiers for training, the time required was very long, and the loss of national strength can be imagined. Therefore, some battles of King Zhou Mu and his descendants, although they won, could not consolidate the fruits of victory, but the war was delayed again and again, and the longer the time, the greater the economic pressure.
When King Zhou Yi died, some princes began to openly claim the throne. After King Zhou Li succeeded to the throne, he carried out reforms to expand his financial resources and fought in battle, which made the princes who claimed the title of king frightened and canceled the title of king himself. However, many policies implemented by King Zhou Li harmed the interests of the nobles of Wangji near the capital, which led to the occurrence of the "national rebellion", and the rebel crowd finally drove King Zhou Li **. This incident also revealed the fact that Zhou Tianzi's "Western Sixth Division" was not absolutely loyal to the Son of Heaven, and the generals who commanded the soldiers were all hereditary nobles, and they would plan more for their own interests.
During the period of King Xuan after King Zhou Li, the "Eight Divisions of Cheng Zhou" and the "Division of the Southern Kingdom" became dependent, although they were also powerful, but several failed expeditions also exhausted Zhou Tianzi's family base. By the time of King You of Zhou, even the close branches of the royal family began to focus on the development of their own strength as the main goal like ordinary princes. In addition, the nomadic dog Rong took the opportunity to cause chaos, and the Western Zhou Dynasty was destroyed. Zhou Tianzi lost Guanzhong, and all he had was left with hundreds of miles of land near Luoyi, and his strength could only be regarded as a medium prince, and then he simply became the nominal "co-master", and could only watch the major powers compete for hegemony.
From this point of view, Zhou Tianzi's military strength has gradually weakened due to various reasons, so some people may say, if there was no feudal princes at the beginning, would there be no later princes to fight for hegemony? Liu Zongyuan said in "On Feudalism" that if it is not a saint's will, it is also powerful. That is to say, according to the social conditions at that time, the productive forces were extremely underdeveloped, and the communication was backward, and the Son of Heaven was powerless even if he wanted to manage it, so he had to adopt the method of divide and rule, and it was also helpless to divide the princes.
From the perspective of political economy, the relations of production should adapt to the development of the productive forces, and the productive forces in the Zhou Dynasty decided that the sub-feudal system could only be adopted, which played a role in promoting the development and progress of society at that time. It's not that Zhou Tianzi doesn't want to master the army, it's just that he can't influence the course of history!