The emperor who built the city of Beijing on a large scale during the Ming Dynasty was
Yongle Emperor Zhu Di - the first emperor in the Forbidden City in Beijing
Emperor Yongle was the fourth son of Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang. His name was Zhu Di. He was born in Yingtian (now Nanjing, Jiangsu Province). In the second year of Hongwu, we know that Zhu Yuanzhang formulated the system of feudal kings. In the second year of Hongwu, on the third day of April, Zhu Yuanzhang proposed to the ministers a strategy he had considered for a long time, and decided to enfeoff all his sons to various places to serve as emperors. The vassal king, in the third year of Hongwu, that is, 1370, Zhu Di was named King of Yan. In the thirteenth year of Hongwu, that is, in March 1380, King Zhu Di of Yan led two guards and 5,770 soldiers to leave Nanjing, the capital of the Ming Dynasty at that time, and headed for his fiefdom, Peiping, which is today's Beijing. This year, he turned 21 years old. Peiping is the old capital of the hometown, and it is also the choke point leading to the Liaodong area beyond the Great Wall. The Mongolian forces that retreated to the northern part of the Great Wall gathered at the border, spying from time to time. The young King Yan shouldered the important task of guarding the border for the country and supporting the royal family. He participated in military activities in the north many times, and was ordered to march to the north twice. Starting from Beijing and galloping across the battlefield, he always won a complete victory and returned in triumph. This greatly strengthened his influence in the northern army and strengthened his military strength.
Later, we learned that Zhu Yuanzhang’s son, Prince Zhu Biao, died very early. King Yan was Zhu Yuanzhang’s fourth son. His eldest brother, the prince, died. His later brothers, King Qin and King Jin, also died one after another. Zhu Di He became the head of the kings in terms of family succession, and also became the biggest threat to Emperor Jianwen who later succeeded Zhu Yuanzhang to the throne. Emperor Jianwen was actually the son of Prince Zhu Biao, who was also the grandson of Zhu Yuanzhang. In his later years, due to the early death of Prince Zhu Biao, Zhu Yuanzhang named Zhu Biao's son Zhu Yunwen as the "Emperor Grandson" in order to maintain the system, which was the later Emperor Jianwen. Just one month after Emperor Jianwen ascended the throne, he suddenly arrested the king of Zhou who was in Kaifeng of the old vassal. King Zhou was deposed as a commoner on the charge of treason, and was later exiled to Yunnan, a remote and barbaric land at the time. For this reason, the entire government and the public shock. But this is just the beginning.
In order to weaken the power of the vassal kings, Emperor Jianwen began the policy of reducing the vassal vassals as soon as he came to the throne. In less than a year, four vassal kings were convicted one after another, and the King of Hunan was also convicted. In an accident, he led his whole family to set themselves on fire and died. Emperor Jianwen quickly eliminated the titles of the five kings: King Zhou, King Dai, King Xiang, King Qi, and King Min, which frightened all the kings. In July of the first year of Jianwen (1399), King Zhu Di of Yan launched an army to suppress Jingnan in the name of the Qing emperor. This battle of Jingnan lasted for more than three years, and after many bloody battles, in 1402, Zhu Di invaded Nanjing and later succeeded to the throne. This situation will be discussed below.
Generally speaking, Emperor Yongle Zhu Di was a monarch with great talents and great strategies. Although he used bloody methods to attack his political opponents and brutally killed the courtiers of the Jianwen Dynasty, he gained the reputation of a tyrant. , but during his twenty-two years in office, he was a very accomplished emperor in the politics, economy, culture, military, and diplomacy of the Ming Dynasty, and achieved outstanding achievements. In fact, he can be regarded as a generation of British rulers. .
Among the 16 emperors of the Ming Dynasty, he had the closest relationship with Beijing. Because he moved the capital to Beijing, he became the first emperor in the Forbidden City in Beijing. And because of his relationship, we just said When the capital of Yuan Dynasty was first established in Xu Da, it was called Beiping Prefecture. It was after Emperor Yongle ascended the throne, in the first month of the first year of Yongle, just five months after taking the throne, Beiping was promoted to Beijing. This is The origin of the name Beijing. From here on, the name Beijing came into being.
Later he changed Beiping Prefecture to Shuntian Prefecture. Later in the fourth year of Yongle (1406), he ordered the construction of the Beijing Palace and prepared to move the capital to Beijing. We say that Emperor Yongle had a deep affection for Beijing. Although he was born and raised in Nanjing, he conquered Beijing at the age of 21 and served as King of Yan in Peiping for 20 years. He spent his youth and adulthood in Nanjing. Peiping has received political training, has become full-fledged, and has grown stronger. Therefore, it can definitely be said that Zhu Di has deep feelings for Beijing.
Some historical records record that Zhu Di had a preference for the north and northern food. At that time, the king of Korea once sent a Korean chef to serve him. For Yongle Emperor Zhu Di, Beijing was his Longxingzhi. Land is the fundamental place for his establishment, so we say that the Ming Dynasty moved its capital to Beijing only under Emperor Yongle. This has a lot to do with his deep affection for Beijing. In addition, although Zhu Yuanzhang made Nanjing his capital in the early Ming Dynasty, the military threat at that time came from the Mongolian tribes in the north, which resulted in the separation of the political center and the military center. In terms of geographical situation, Beijing has a majestic terrain, with the Great Wall at its back and Juyong in the north. With Taihang to the west, Shanhaiguan to the east, and the Central Plains to the south, the terrain is easy to defend but difficult to attack, making it very convenient to "control the four barbarians to rule the world." Moving the capital to Beijing is very necessary even in the context of military defense.
Other scholars believe that the move of the capital to Beijing may have something to do with Zhu Di's improper access to the throne. He used force to overthrow and seize the throne of his nephew Emperor Jianwen. Nanjing was the administrative center of Emperor Jianwen, and he would live there for a long time. I feel uneasy. Moreover, if he were far away in Nanjing, Zhu Di would also feel that the military situation on the northern border was beyond his reach. Therefore, Emperor Yongle took a series of measures to develop Beijing's economy when he succeeded to the throne. For example, he ordered famous households from Shanxi, Zhejiang and other places to move to Beijing, initially used Beijing's labor force, reduced taxes, and sent people to resume shipping. In Yongle In the fourth year (1406), Emperor Yongle issued a summons to build the Beijing Palace in the following year. So he sent ministers to Sichuan, Huguang, Jiangxi, Zhejiang, Shanxi, Yunnan and other places to collect precious wood and build blue bricks in Linqing, Shandong. , went to Fangshan to mine huge stones. In the fifth year of Yongle (1407), he recruited 200,000 to 300,000 skilled craftsmen from all over the country, mobilized some troops, and began to build Beijing on the basis of the Yuan Dynasty and with reference to the regulations of Nanjing's city palaces. palace.