Land annexation became a serious social problem in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. With the privilege, the royal family plundered the land crazily and occupied the expanding area in the name of Huang Zhuang. In this year, Zongshen Huang Zhuang occupied 2 1.4 million mu of cultivated land. His son Zhu once gave him two million mu of fertile land. Because Henan has no land, he also took advantage of the geographical advantages of Shandong and Huguang. Zhu Yi, king of Huguang and Lu, also owns 4 million mu of land. By the end of the Ming dynasty, Zhu Changrun and Zhu obtained as much as 3 million mu of Huguang land only once. At this time, the land of Huguang has been annexed, and only 600,000 mu is levied. Therefore, Xi, Ming Taizu, ordered that the rent of silver be distributed to the people of counties and states, which meant that there was no land rent. The royal family seized the land, and the bureaucratic tyrant seized it by force. In the seventh year of the apocalypse, Wei, a big bureaucrat, wanted to enjoy 400 thousand mu of land. And Wei Zhongxian, the eunuch, was given horizontally, especially. She was given more than one million mu of land before and after. Coupled with the looting and occupation of cloth by local strongmen and landlords, the cultivated land of the people is very few. Shandong people have run out of land. Of the ten counties in Chengdu, seven are in the palace, twelve are in the army, and only one is in the folk. A large amount of land is concentrated in the hands of a few powerful people and landlords, but most farmers have lost their land and become homeless refugees and hungry people, which has caused a serious social problem, that is, the number of land owners is 1 1, and the number of tenant farmers is 19. Land annexation intensified, and a large number of farmers went bankrupt, which also reduced the income of the court sharply. However, corruption in the Ming Dynasty, especially Ming Di's profligacy, aggravated the financial crisis of the imperial court. In order to solve the financial crisis of making ends meet and meet the needs of the rulers, the Ming government tried its best to pass the crisis on to the people and increased the intensity of exploitation and exorbitant taxes. The powerful people who occupy a large amount of land enjoy the privilege of tax exemption or tax reduction and exemption by virtue of their power, so there is a situation in which the rich have no food for cultivated land, the poor have no land for the weak, the rich have no money, the land has no food, and the house has no tax. In the early Ming Dynasty, there were 8.5 million hectares of tax fields in China, while Hongzhi had only 4.2 million hectares, a decrease of nearly half. In the early years of Jiajing, the tax fields in Huguang area decreased from 2.2 million hectares to 230,000 hectares, and the tax fields in Henan area also decreased from 1.448 million hectares to 1.4 1.000 hectares, which actually accounted for an overwhelming proportion. Most of these lost tax fields are occupied by the government or seized by powerful people. Since the end of Wanli, the annual income of the Ming court was 146 12000 yuan, of which about 6.02 million yuan was used by the imperial court for the expenses of the emperor and the court, and the rest was used by the household department as the expenses of the court. At that time, the bureaucracy was huge and the number of officials soared. However, the Nuzhen nationality in the northeast rose again, established the post-Jin regime in Liaodong, and transferred troops to rebel against the Ming Dynasty, which led to serious troubles in the Ming Dynasty border. Frequent wars and rapid increase in military expenditure. To this end, the Ming regime continued to increase taxes. In addition to the regular tax, there are all kinds of tax increases, among which Liaoning, suppression and training are the most disturbing. Since the forty-sixth year of Zongshen Wanli, the Ming court began to collect Liao salaries in the name of fighting against the late Jin Dynasty. The yield of silver per mu was 3.5%, which was increased to 9% two years later. In three years, except for 9%, the income increased by 3%. Wage suppression is to suppress peasant uprisings, while wage training is to train the army. In one year, Liao paid 9.02 million yuan, suppressed 3.32 million yuan and trained 7.32 million yuan. The sum of these three salaries can reach 22 million yuan a year, twice the regular tax revenue. Except for the three r's

In the first year of Chongzhen, Wang Jiayin, a native of Fugu County, Shaanxi Province, led an army to meet Wang Er, with a population of * * * five or six thousand. Later, Ansai, Zuogua, Yanchuan Wang and others took what they needed. Get up. In the third year of Chongzhen, Zhang Ye, a native of Mizhi, Shaanxi Province, led an uprising in the village. Miren, a former servant, also took refuge in Wang Zuo's melon department by cutting postal wages, leading the post-servant uprising. Wang Zuo Guaxiahou _ defeated and surrendered, and Li Zicheng led all the troops to confront the American rebels in Alina Zhang Village. After Zhang Mengcun's sacrifice, he led all the troops to leave the Ming army and continue to fight the loyalist. Facing the growing rebel army, the Ming court adopted the strategy of combining kindness with prestige and courtship in an attempt to divide and disintegrate the rebel army. At this time, the insurgents went their separate ways. At that time, the most powerful Wang Jiayin was once elected as the leader. After being killed, he chose the king as his leader. But in fact, the rebels are still not unified and their forces are scattered. In the fourth year of Chongzhen, rebel armies from all walks of life moved to Shanxi due to successive years of famine in Shaanxi, and joined forces with old rebel armies who had defected, such as Ma Shouying, Luo Rucai, Zhang, Eight Heavenly Kings and Li Zicheng, to form 32 battalions with more than 20 people, and marched into Pingyang, Ze, Lu and Taiyuan in Shanxi in three ways. The Ming court was shocked when the rebels moved from Shaanxi to Shanxi. Ming Di and Zhu Youjian changed the strategy of inviting the emperor and turned to extinction, thinking that the military affairs of Shaanxi Governor and the Governor's Trilateral made him organize hundreds of thousands of cronies to surround the rebels. After a fierce war, the scattered rebels moved to Hebei. Soon the king died for his own use, and the rest went to Li Zicheng. At this time, with strong strength, United with Zhang, Li Zicheng, Ma Shouying, Luo Rucai and other leaders, broke through the encirclement of the Ming army and crossed the Yellow River in the south. In the eighth year of Chongzhen, the Ming court ordered Hong Chengchou to lead the troops out of Shaanxi, and another Ming general, Zhu Dadian, led the army out of Shandong, taking the strategy of attacking from both sides in an attempt to cut off the peasant uprising army in one fell swoop. In a very critical situation, thirteen seventy-two battalions of the rebel army held a meeting in Xingyang, Henan Province to discuss the operational plan. At the Xingyang meeting, Li Zicheng, as the leader, put forward the strategy of joint operations and short radius to meet the enemy, which was adopted by all the generals. So he divided thirteen battalions and seventy-two battalions into four roads: East, South, West and North, and the other road was used as a coordination to preside over the weakest east road of the Ming army. After the meeting, Li Zicheng, Zhang and others led the Eastern Route Army to break through the encirclement of loyalists and moved from Henan to Anhui. Only after more than ten days, the enemy arrived at the gates of Fengyang, wiped out more than 6,000 defenders in Fengyang, and left Zhu Yongtang to commit suicide. The rebels burned the ancestral graves of the imperial tombs here and suppressed more than 65,438+000 rebellious officials, students and eunuchs. Zhang erected the flag of Emperor Yuan Zhenlong on the city. What Yu Fengyang did made Emperor Chongzhen grieve and cry. While committing crimes against himself, he quickly dispatched troops, appointed Lu Xiangsheng, the governor of Huguang, as the prime minister of military affairs in the five provinces of Hebei, Luchuan and Huguang, and divided his forces with Hong Chengchou to suppress the rebels, controlling the northwest, as if he were in the southeast, and launched a series of offensives against the rebels. After winning in Fengyang, Gao Yingxiang led his troops into Henan and then into Shaanxi. Lu Xiangsheng gave chase, the two sides fought in Zhulongqiao, Gao Yingxiang was defeated, and then suffered setbacks repeatedly, and was forced to lead the troops to break through Hanzhong. Finally, Gao Yingxiang was unfortunately captured and killed. The rest will be led by Li Zicheng, who succeeded to the throne, and continue to play loyal subjects. Zhang led the troops south, captured Luzhou and Macheng, and defeated the repression of the Ming army.

At this time, the drought in Shandong, Hebei, Henan, Shanxi and other places is serious, locust plague is rampant and hunger is everywhere. This situation has provided an extremely favorable turning point for the uprising struggle that has fallen into a low tide. In May of the 12th year, Zhang rose again in Gucheng, moved from Hubei to Sichuan, and even surrendered his army to reverse the passive situation. When Li Zicheng heard the news, he immediately went out of Shangluo Mountain, assembled his staff, rallied and moved to southern Shaanxi. /kloc-in September of 0/3, Li Zicheng broke through the siege of Yang Sichang royalist army and entered southern Henan in winter. The situation in drought-stricken Henan province is very favorable to the rebels. Thousands of hungry people flocked to Li Zicheng, and Niu Jinxing, Yan Li, Song Xianqian and other scribes also joined the rebel army. The rebels grew rapidly. In view of land annexation and exorbitant taxes and levies, the rebels explicitly proposed to provide farmland and free grain to help the hungry people from the property confiscated by the government and landlords. This move was immediately supported and welcomed by poor farmers, and the slogan of contiguous farmland and free grain planting was deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. On this basis, the insurgents also formulated the principles of "fair trading" and "fair trading", which were widely welcomed by the citizens. More and more people joined the insurgents, and the ranks of the insurgents quickly expanded to 500,000, and their strength grew rapidly. In the first month of the fourteenth year of Chongzhen, the Ming generals led the main forces of loyalists into Sichuan to pursue Zhang. Taking advantage of the emptiness of the Central Plains, Li Zicheng resolutely led the army into Luoyang, executed Zhu and the rich man of Zhu's family, seized fertile land and seized the people. Zhu He and other officials were executed, and people inside and outside Luoyang applauded. After the capture of Luoyang, Li Zicheng continued to attack Kaifeng. Zhu Zao, who refused to defend Kaifeng, was prepared, but failed to capture Kaifeng. However, reinforcements were wiped out in Henan. In February, Zhang returned to Huguang, captured Xiangyang and executed the king of Xiangyang. Instead of destroying the rebels, Yang Sichang executed the royal relatives and nobles in Lianke Town and committed suicide. Chongzhen was replaced by Shaanxi Governor Ding, and the Ministry of War and Baoding Governor attacked Li Zicheng, and Li Zicheng and his troops were completely annihilated. After Zhang occupied Xiangyang, he was complacent. Luo Rucai and other rebel generals were at odds with him and led troops north to Li Zicheng, so the power of Li Zicheng and the United States increased again. At the end of the year, Li Zicheng sent his troops to attack Kaifeng again, but he was forced to abandon the siege because he was injured by an arrow in front. In April of the fifteenth year of Chongzhen, the rebel army besieged Kaifeng for the third time, adopting the strategy of encircling without fighting, and defeated the main force of loyalist reinforcements in Zhuxian Town near Kaifeng. In the subsequent battle with the government forces that came to suppress, the American rebels in Li Zicheng won again and again, completely reversing the passive situation on the battlefield. At the end of the year, Li Zicheng went south and attacked Xiangyang, an important town in Hubei. After the capture of Xiangyang, the insurgents fought continuously and quickly occupied dozens of counties, controlling the vast areas north of Lizhou and Changde, west of Macheng and Huangzhou, east of Guanghua and Zhou Jun, and Zhang also led his troops to the two lakes and Sichuan. The main force of the two rebel armies echoed north and south, which made the military repression policy of the Ming Dynasty almost bankrupt, and the rule of the Ming Dynasty was already crumbling. In the first month of the sixteenth year of Chongzhen, the rebel ministries elected Li Zicheng as the leader, named Marshal Fengtian Chongyi Wu Wen, and Luo Rucai as the general who loved the people, weeding on behalf of heaven. In May, the rebel army changed Xiangyang to Xiang Jing, made Li Zicheng the king of Xinshun, restored the palace, set up civil and military officials, and established the Dashun regime. In the same month, after Zhang Lingbing captured Hanyang and Wuchang, he claimed to be the King of the West, changed Wuchang to Tianfu, established political power, and later entered Sichuan through Hunan and Jiangxi, claiming to be the King of the West.

Faced with the rapid attack of Dashun Army, Emperor Chongzhen hastily ordered himself to atone, and then made a request to Dashun regime to cede territory for peace, but it was flatly rejected. /kloc-in March of 0/7, Dashun army surrounded Beijing, and three military camps outside the city surrendered without a fight. 18, Beijing was breached. Emperor Chongzhen tried to escape, but it was too late. He summoned officials of civil and military affairs urgently, but no one was called into the palace. In desperation, Emperor Chongzhen committed suicide in Jingshan Park, and the Ming Dynasty perished. Note Wu Chuanye: Volume VIII, A Brief Introduction to Sui Kou.

History of the Ming Dynasty Volume 77 Food Record. Volume 130, recorded by Ming Shizong. Volume Ming Shenzong Record 42 1. Gu: Volume 10 of Rizhilu. Volume Huang Ming Shi Jingwen compiled 359. Zheng Lian: Volume I, Introduction of Bian Yu.

Dietary records in Ming history. Biography of Wang in Ming Dynasty is an annex to Biography. Ming Gong recalled the third volume of Military Affairs of Prime Ministers in Five Provinces. Cha Jeju: Volume 3 1, the crime is only recorded in the Biography of Li Zicheng. Volume 20, volume. Zhao: I'm going to the North next season.