How did Shen Wansan, the richest man in the south of the Yangtze River at the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty, get rich?

About 600 years ago, at the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty, there was a richest man named Shen Wansan in Jiangnan. It is said that his fortune was 2 billion, and Zhu Yuanzhang was spending money to build the largest city wall in the world at that time? Shen Wansan donated one third of Nanjing.

How did Shen Wansan, as rich as an enemy, get rich?

(A) the huge sum of money borrowed by Lu

Shen Wansan got a huge sum of money from Lujia, and with his good management skills, he became the richest man in Jiangnan.

"Zhouzhuang Town Records" has such a record: Shen Wansan became rich because of Wu's surname Lu.

There is also: Lu Daoyuan, the rich man of the Yuan Dynasty, used his assets to pay him back in his later years, and Shen Wansan was one of them.

(b) Accumulation of land and real estate

Some evidence of this statement can be found in the epitaph of Shen Wansan's grandson Shen Boxi, which reads: His ancestors started from crops. In other words, Shen Wansan got rich by farming.

Later, people quoted epitaph records, and at the same time, according to some miscellaneous notes, it was concluded that Shen Wansan reclaimed wasteland, paid attention to irrigation and fertilization, and became rich.

In the article "The Rise and Fall of Shen Wansan, a Rich Man in the Early Ming Dynasty", Mr. Chen systematically and perfectly put forward the theory of getting rich by accumulating real estate and land.

The article puts forward Shen Wansan? Starting from humble origins? What else? Is it rich and tired to open a farm house? , slowly developed into? With huge capital, land preparation ranks first in the world? .

In other words, Shen Wansan started by farming, and later accumulated a lot of real estate and fields, so it seems unimaginable to have a super rich man.

(3) Through business and international trade.

As can be seen from the records of Wujiang County Records, Shen Wansan has a residence in Zhouzhuang, the twenty-ninth capital of Wujiang, which is rich in the world. Legend has it that they come from the same family.

This statement has also been endorsed by the famous historian Wu Han. He said: Suzhou and Shen Wansan have become rich because of overseas trade.

Zhouzhuang, this place is very important to Shen Wansan. Zhouzhuang at that time was probably between Shanghai, Suzhou and Hangzhou today.

In other words, Shen Wansan entered Zhouzhuang not to reclaim wasteland, but to do business by taking advantage of natural geography.

Another advantage is that in the Yuan Dynasty, the government encouraged people to engage in international trade.

At that time, the government promulgated the policy of investing and choosing smart and ambitious people for overseas trade: listening to maritime trade and taxing them.

What did the Ming Dynasty have for Shen Wansan? Become a sea Jia, running between emblem, pool, ning, Thailand, Chang and Zhen, and trade? Record.

Since then, Zhouzhuang has become a treasure trove for Shen Wansan to get rich. Later generations recorded that Zhouzhuang changed from village to town, which was entirely due to Shen Wansan and his son.

The above three statements cannot be isolated. Shen Wansan is now receiving financial support from Lu, which may be the first bucket of gold in his life. But instead of standing still, he reclaimed wasteland, accumulated real estate and made continuous progress. Later, he abandoned agriculture and became the richest man in Jiangnan in the late Yuan and early Ming Dynasties.