Wei Wenhou (? -396 BC) China was the ruler of Wei during the Warring States Period. Ji surname, Wei surname, Ming Si. He succeeded to the throne in the first 445 years, was made a vassal by Zhou Weilie together with Han and Zhao in the first 403 years, and died in the first 396 years.
Wei Wenhou was included in Historical Records Biography of the Scholars by Sima Qian, and was known as a "studious man". Wei Wenhou often asked Confucius' disciples Xia Zi, Tian Zifang, Duan Ganmu and other disciples for advice. Legalist Li Kui was appointed as Prime Minister, and the reform was implemented on the principle of "having a good job and eating, rewarding and using, and punishing and using". After turning France into a powerful country, Wei attacked Zhongshan with Yang Le as the general and captured five cities of Xihe (now between the Yellow River and Luoshui) in Qin State with Wu Qi as the general. Taking Ximen Bao as the imperial edict, taking Ziziphus jujuba as the imperial edict, and Huang Zhai as Shangqing, they reformed water conservancy and became a powerful country in the early Warring States period.
When the third monarch, Hui Wang, ascended the throne, he mainly paid attention to economic development, including the development of the Yellow River irrigation plan. But at the same time, Wei's national strength is slowly declining. Due to Wei's continuous eastward invasion during this period, its advantage in the East was frustrated many times in a series of wars, including the Battle of Maling in 34 BC1year. In the west, Qin captured the Xihe area (an important animal husbandry town on the west bank of the Yellow River on the Shanxi border of Shaanxi Province), and has been harassed by Qin since then.
To sum up, Wei's political reform is that three generations are not rich. Under the condition that the national economy was not consolidated enough, he forcibly expanded his territory, ignoring the drastic changes of the surrounding governors, which led to the final decline.
The Wuqi political reform was carried out with the direct support of King Mourning of Chu, who was founded by "China people" after his father Chu Shengwang was killed by "thieves", and his regime had a new feudal nature. Wuqi came from Wei, and its reform measures were the same as those of Li Kui. Therefore, the reform of Wuqi is actually a feudal reform under the auspices of the emerging regime. Because of this, the reform is decisive, immediate and effective.
First of all, it dealt a heavy blow to the old nobles and accelerated the process of feudalism in Chu. Wuqi's political reform, which made everyone equal, was "changeable" (Shuo Wen Yuan Zhi Wu), mainly aimed at the old aristocrats, so the old aristocrats were "very indifferent" (Historical Records and Biography of Wuqi), indicating that Wuqi's political reform hit the shortcomings of Chu and dealt a very powerful blow to the old aristocrats and forces. At the same time, Wuqi paid attention to solving the imbalance of regional development, and let the old nobles move to sparsely populated areas (of course, they also brought labor) to open up wasteland for production. Obviously, this is conducive to the growth of the emerging feudal landlord class forces and yeomen in Chu, and greatly promotes the profound changes in social relations and class relations. This directly affected the continued development of Chu society, especially the prosperity of Chu Xuan and Wang Wei.
Secondly, the national strength of Chu increased rapidly, and in foreign relations, it changed passive beatings into active attacks, causing panic in all countries. At that time, Sanjin, which posed a serious threat to Chu, gradually deepened the rift between them with the fierce competition for land. In 383 BC (the 19th year of the King of Chu's mourning for the public), Zhao Zhugang Ping (now southwest of Qingfeng, Henan Province) attacked Wei on a large scale, which made him exhausted and asked Wei for help. Wei Wuhou sent troops to save Wei and defeated Zhao in Rabbit Station. The next year, Zhao besieged Wei, and Wei turned to Wei for help. Wei then sent troops to attack Zhao, captured Gangping, then attacked Zhongmou (now west of Lingbi, Henan) and took the east. Zhao was frightened and had to ask Chu for help. The king of Chu did not hesitate to send troops to save Zhao, and Wei Jun "fought in the west of the state, went out to Liangmen, the army shed forest, and the horse drank in the river" ("Five Strategies of Warring States"), and arrived on both sides of the Yellow River. Zhao took the opportunity to counterattack and took Wei Jipu (now south of Wei County, Hebei Province) and the Imperial City (now northwest of Henan Province). Chu, Zhao and Chu prestige.
Historical Records Biography of Wuqi said that Wuqi Reform was "to be in Qiang Bing", "so Nanping Baiyue; North and Chen, Cai, but Sanjin; Sivachin The princes suffered from the strength of Chu. " "Nanping Baiyue" means winning with southern operations. "Northern annexation of Chen and Cai" refers to the remnants of Chen and Cai, not to Chen and Cai who were wiped out during the reign of King Hui of Chu. "Refusing the Three Jin Dynasties" refers to the above-mentioned incident of aiding Zhao and defeating Wei. The collapse of the situation in Sanjin actually lifted the threat of Sanjin to Chu. "Cutting Qin in the West" is not recorded in ancient literature. During the political reform, Chu and Qin lived in peace, and Qin was afraid of Chu and continued to make friends. "all princes suffer from the strength of Chu." Chu swept away the poverty and weakness in the past, defeated Wei, the leader of the great powers at that time, and drank horses from the Yellow River, which may revive the hegemony of the Central Plains in the past, so all countries in the Central Plains were afraid.
Third, continue to merge and expand, and further explore the territory of Chu. In addition to the "northern merger of Chen and Cai", it is mainly the merger and development of the south. Biography of Wuqi in Historical Records refers to "a hundred leaps in Nanping" and "Three Strategies in the Warring States Period" refers to "YueYang in the South", all of which are about the expansion to the south. "The Biography of Nan Man in the Later Han Dynasty" said: "Wu Qi mourned for the king, and outside Nan Man, there were Dongting and Cangwu." Dongting refers to today's Dongting Lake area; Cangwu, in the present Nanling area, from the south of Dongting to this point, is where Gu Baiyue lives, further clarifying the statements in Historical Records and Warring States Policy. Since then, the economic and cultural exchanges between Lingnan and the Yangtze and Yellow River basins have been further strengthened.
Just as the political reform was going smoothly and Chu was vigorous and active on the international stage, in 38 1 year BC (the twenty-first year of King Chu's mourning), King Chu died unfortunately. Long-term hatred for Wuqi's political reform, the old aristocratic forces who attempted to kill Wuqi took the opportunity to make an insurrection and besieged Wuqi. Wuqi tactfully fell on the king of Chu, and the old aristocrat hit Wuqi with an arrow, which also hit the king of Chu's body. Some ancient documents also said that after Wu Qi was shot, his body was dismembered or cracked (Historical Records, Biography of Wu Qi, etc. ) and was shot by the old aristocracy. "The Warring States Policy Qin Ce" and others said that Wuqi was dismembered; "Huainan Miao Zi said" and others said that Wuqi was cracked by a car. On this basis, Guo Moruo thinks that after Wu Qi was shot, he was dismembered again, using the dismemberment method (The Complete Works of Guo Moruo, History Compilation). "Lu's Spring and Autumn Annals: Noble Men" said: "The law of the State of Jin: Those who wish to attack the king's corpse will do their utmost to aggravate their crimes and detain the three families." After Su Wang, the son of the King of Chu, acceded to the throne, according to his law, "Yin shot Wu Qizhe and tried his best to seize the corpse of the king and shoot more than 70 dead people" (Biography of Wuqi in Historical Records). ) Yang fled abroad for fear of sin, and was also "tolerated by his country" ("Lu Chunqiu Suntech"). Although Wuqi died, the old forces of the old aristocracy were also dealt a great blow. Wuqi's political reform, to the point, fully conforms to the national conditions of Chu. Due to the untimely death of the king of Chu, Wuqi lost his powerful backer. Although the old aristocratic forces suffered a heavy blow in the political reform, the political reform time was not long after all, and the results of the political reform were not fully consolidated. Thus, with the death of King Mourn of Chu and Wuqi, a vigorous reform movement in the history of Chu died. Since then, Xuanwei once flourished in Chu, but the general trend was downhill until it died. "Chu is weak without Wuqi, Qin is rich and strong" ("Han Feizi asked Tian"), which was completely confirmed by the later historical development.