The concubines of the Ming Dynasty, their stories are also wonderful, compared with the emperors' conquests, border life or cultivation of immortals and alchemy, the concubines' open and secret battles are more fascinating.
Empress Zhou, the concubine of Zhu Qizhen of Yingzong of the Ming Dynasty, went through the five dynasties of Orthodoxy, Tianshun, Jingtai, Chenghua and Hongzhi, a total of four monarchs, but she died regrettably. She has cultivated ** people since she was a child, although the emperor she personally raised failed to realize her wishes, but her story will forever be recorded in history.
How did she die in the harem? What kind of challenges and stories is her life full of? Let's review the three stages of the Empress Dowager Zhou's journey from her mother to her son, unremitting struggle, and her death with regrets, and to enter the harem of the Ming Dynasty in that era.
In the twelfth year of the orthodoxy of Yingzong of the Ming Dynasty (1447), the Zhou family gave birth to Zhu Qizhen's eldest son, Zhu Jianshen. The Zhou clan was still unknown at the time and failed to gain the favor of the emperor.
Zhu Qizhen devoted himself to the eunuchs and often mingled with them. Two years later, instigated by the great eunuch Wang Zhen, Zhu Qizhen decided to go to Mongolia in person to show his strength, but the Mongols were too enthusiastic and kept him directly.
Queen Qian was concerned about the safety of her husband Zhu Qizhen in Mongolia, and cried day and night, so much so that she was blind in one eye. In order to stabilize the country, Wang Wen, Yu Qian and other ministers suggested that Zhu Qizhen's younger brother Zhu Qiyu be appointed emperor, and as a condition, Empress Dowager Sun agreed to first make Zhu Jianshen the crown prince, and then agreed to make Zhu Qiyu the emperor.
This decision forced Zhu Jianshen, who was only two years old, to leave his biological mother Zhou.
In the first year of Jingtai, Zhu Qizhen, a foreign student, was placed under house arrest by his younger brother in Nangong, although Emperor Jingtai treated Zhu Qizhen badly, he still sent Zhou as a companion. In the sixth year of Jingtai, Zhou gave birth to the sixth son of the emperor, Zhu Jianze.
In the third year of Jingtai, Zhu Qiyu abolished Zhu Jianshen's crown prince and let his son succeed him, and Zhu Jianshen's position became dangerous. In order to protect the "waste prince", Empress Dowager Sun sent Wan Zhen'er, who had followed her since she was a child and was more than ten years older than Zhu Jianshen, to accompany him.
She did it unintentionally, but she achieved a good relationship.
Zhu Qiyu was addicted to his desires and fell ill. Zhu Qizhen took this opportunity to unite the eunuch Cao Jixiang and the minister Xu Youzhen to launch a coup d'état, regain the throne, and make the Zhou family a concubine.
After that, Emperor Tianshun died, and Zhu Jianshen of Ming Xianzong succeeded to the throne and became Emperor Chenghua. Since then, by virtue of her status as the son of the emperor, Zhou Guifei has been promoted to empress.
The Ming Dynasty had an ancestral system, and only the original empress was eligible to be buried with the emperor. Yingzong even made a special decree that he only wanted to be buried with the Queen Qian who was crying for him, and had nothing to do with the Empress Dowager Zhou.
Therefore, for the Empress Dowager Zhou, being able to be buried with Yingzong is her last wish.
After Ming Xianzong succeeded to the throne, in order to express his respect for the two queen mothers, he decided to give them emblems at the same time. However, the Empress Dowager Zhou was jealous and privately ordered the great eunuch Xia Shi to only announce her emblem.
Xianzong ascended the throne, and the two queen mothers were respected together, which was originally a matter of course, but the concubine relied on the identity of her son to secretly supervise Xia Shi and participate in the cabinet discussion, so that Xia Shi could use his position to bully the minister.
If it weren't for Peng Shi and other ministers sticking to their principles, I'm afraid it would be difficult to resist Xia Shi's arrogance. The ministers Li Xian, Peng Shi and others adhered to principles and fought on the basis of reason, and finally made the two queen mothers respected.
However, even so, the Empress Dowager Zhou was still uneasy, and she began to play the idea of the underground palace.
The gate of the emperor's underground palace is made of stone, and the unique design makes it so that after the gate is closed, the groove behind the door will jam a "top door stone" cut out of the whole stone. This design makes the gate, the top door stone, and the ground form a stable triangle that cannot be opened no matter how you hit it.
After the death of the emperor, the queen mother needed to pass through the tunnel on the side to put the coffin into the underground palace, and then seal it to complete the joint burial.
After the death of Empress Qian, Empress Dowager Zhou resolutely opposed Zhu Jianshen to let Empress Qian be buried with Ming Yingzong. Zhu Qizhen tried his best to persuade his mother, emphasizing the importance of the overall situation, and even mentioned that if the Empress Dowager Zhou blocked him, he would come to the other side in the future, and Zhu Qizhen's father would not be able to explain.
In the end, the Empress Dowager Zhou no longer objected. However, just after Zhu Qizhen breathed a sigh of relief, he found out that his mother had secretly done something that caused problems in his father's mausoleum.
Empress Dowager Zhou ordered the drawings of the underground palace to be revised, completely cutting off the way for Queen Qian's joint burial.
Empress Dowager Sun arranged an aunt for the young Zhu Jianshen, who became the sustenance of his soul and accompanied him through the lack of maternal love. As he grew older, Zhu Jianshen began to experience the love between men and women, and the woman who gave him a sense of security and was always by his side gradually entered his mind and body.
They met in their best years, an eighteen-year-old youth and a thirty-five-year-old depressed woman, and finally composed a moving love story together. Since then, Zhu Jianshen has poured almost all of his love into her.
After Zhu Jianshen ascended the throne, he hoped to crown Wan Zhen'er as the queen, but was strongly opposed by the Empress Dowager Zhou. Empress Dowager Zhou and Wan Zhen'er are the same age, if a queen mother is the same age as a queen, it is indeed a little unreasonable.
For Wan Guifei, Ming history and folklore describe her violent temperament, cruelty to concubines, and various blows to the imperial concubines with children after the death of their children. However, Qianlong specifically refuted this after reading the History of the Ming Dynasty.
In the "Qianlong Imperial Approval Tongjian" volume 11 "From Ming Renzong to Ming Wuzong", there are two chapters, namely "Ming Yingzong and Ming Jingdi are both at fault" and "Refutation of Ming Xianzong's pregnant concubines were forced by Wan Concubine and had a miscarriage".
Among them, the original text mentions: "The affairs of the palace are unfathomable, and the stories that circulate may not all be credible." If, as the saying goes, 'there is a pregnancy in the harem, and they are all secretly harmed by Concubine Wan', then the one who was born before that, was born in Chenghua for five years, why is he alone and unharmed?
Even after the prince was born, if Zhang Min drowned, even if Zhang Min wanted to protect him, he would definitely hide in secret in the outer court and raise him secretly, so how could he still stay in his room near Anle Hall?
Empress Wu still often comes and goes, don't you think that Concubine Wan will be a little aware? ”
Emperor Qianlong refuted the smear of Wan Guifei in the history of the Ming Dynasty logically and in a clear and detailed manner, and successfully corrected Wan Guifei's name. Although Zhu Jianshen dotes on Wan Guifei, he is not a fool.
The History of the Ming Dynasty itself recorded that after Zhu Jianshen succeeded to the throne, "Renxuan's rule was restored to Si", how can this be explained as Zhu Jianshen letting Wan Guifei mutilate his own flesh and blood? During the Chenghua years, the Yao people in southern Xinjiang rebelled, and the Chenghua Emperor sent people to exterminate them.
After returning victoriously, a young girl was captured from the front line, Ji. At that time, the ministers advised Zhu Jianshen to put the country first and "rain and dew evenly" to stay behind for the Ming Dynasty.
While Zhu Jianshen told the ministers that he had a good relationship with Concubine Wan, he began to work hard with the concubines to create people, and soon gave birth to the little prince Zhu Youji.
When Zhu Youzhu was born, he understood that he would not be eligible for a joint burial in the Chenghua Dynasty. As a result, Empress Dowager Zhou decided to raise him herself, and hoped that by cultivating feelings from an early age, he would be able to agree to be buried with her imperial grandfather after he ascended the throne.
In the end, Zhu Jianshen died, and Zhu Youzhu inherited the throne and became Emperor Hongzhi of Ming Xiaozong. He was very filial to this grandmother who raised him, and was even praised by the history books as "the most filial piety".
In March of the seventeenth year of Hongzhi, the empress dowager, who had gone through five dynasties, finally came to the end of her life. Before dying, her most beloved grandson Zhu Youzhi was by her side, which made her feel comforted, and all her efforts were rewarded.
However, at this moment, what she is most concerned about is whether she can reunite with her husband underground.
After the death of the Empress Dowager Zhou, the emperor ordered that Empress Zhou and Ming Yingzong be buried in Yuling, and gave her the nickname of Xiaosu Zhenshun Kang Yi Guanglie Fu Tiancheng Shengrui Empress. However, this decision was strongly opposed by scholars Liu Jian, Xie Qian, Li Dongyang and others in the Hongzhi Dynasty.
These civil officials of the Ming Dynasty have always been nosy, and they even did not hesitate to force each other to death for the sake of etiquette.
Emperor Hongzhi did not expect that he planned for his grandmother's death, but it caused an uproar in the court. The Ming Dynasty no longer had a prime minister, and the decision-making power of the country completely fell into the hands of the emperor.
This deprived the ministers of their responsibilities, resulting in two very different situations: the success of great things depended on the collective wisdom of the officials; If he failed, the emperor was accused of incompetence.
And the ministers can also take this opportunity to make fierce admonitions according to the truth, and win a lot of praise.
Hiroji seems to have been overly cautious in handling the matter and was intimidated by the ministers. Eventually, he followed their advice and offered sacrifices to the Empress Dowager Zhou in the Fengci Temple, and her ranking was rearranged in the Taimiao.
In addition, Hongzhi also removed the emperor's name, from Xiaosu Zhenshun Kang Yi Guanglie Fu Tiancheng Shengrui Empress to Xiaosu Zhenshun Kang Yi Guanglie Fu Tiancheng Shengwei, and removed the Rui character in Yingzong's name.
However, since the coffin had already been sent to the underground palace, the ministers could no longer pull it out, and could only regretfully agree to this decision. In fact, Hongji is fully qualified to accept this name, because he has achieved filial piety and fulfilled his last wish for his grandmother.
However, it was a group of civil officials, scholars, and Confucians who had learned "filial piety and faithfulness" since childhood, who prevented the emperor from fulfilling his filial piety. Is this really a matter of etiquette?
Indeed, the Ming Dynasty stipulated at the beginning of the founding of the country that only the Empress Yan could accompany the burial. But this is only an internal matter of the royal family, so what's the point of the ministers outside worrying about the royal etiquette?
Is this a continuation of tradition?
The actual purpose of these ministers was to control the emperor, using etiquette as a constraint to ensure that the emperor would not overstep the norms. They used so-called "rules" to limit imperial power.
As I said before, the Ming Dynasty abolished the prime minister system and gave the emperor the power to the prime minister, but the emperor did not have the right tools to suppress the hundred officials, so he could only be suppressed by the hundred officials.
A common phenomenon among the ancient literati was that they bullied the weak and feared the hard. Those literati who dared to challenge authority and stand for the truth went down in history, while those who tried to imitate them could not replicate their tenacity and courage.
The literati in the history books have forged a glorious history with their own blood and soul, while these imitators are only bluffing for their own selfish interests.
During the Ming Dynasty, there was a ridiculous deception incident, and at the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Donglin Party was pretentious, talking about the rise and fall of the country and their own depression all day long, but how many people really paid practical actions for the mountains and rivers of the Ming Dynasty?
Wen Tianxiang bravely sacrificed his life for the country, and Lu You was still concerned about the mountains and rivers in the north before he died. The literati at the end of the Ming Dynasty either took the initiative to shave their hair and surrender, or they were dissatisfied with the water being too cold.
When he arrived in the Southern Ming Dynasty, although he suffered a heavy blow to the Qing army, he could not save the mountains and rivers in one go, and in the end he would only fight and fight party on half of the mountains and rivers.
The defeat of Emperor Hongzhi stemmed from the last wish of Empress Zhou, which became a tool of struggle between the civil and official groups and him. Although Empress Zhou failed to gain the status she deserved in later generations, she always lay by her beloved side.
And Emperor Hongzhi, with his wisdom and tenacity, created Hongzhi Zhongxing, which was evaluated by the "History of the Ming Dynasty": "No peace, no return, no hardship and no blame." ”
Perhaps, only Emperor Xiaozong can be so well versed in this. References: "History of the Ming Dynasty", "Refutation of Ming Xianzong's Pregnant Concubines Were Persecuted by Ten Thousand Concubines and Had Abortions", "Ming Xiaozong Jing Emperor Record", "Ming Shilu". Records of Ming Wuzong and "Ming History Chronicle".