Ming Yuzhen

Biography

Origin, Family and Early Years

Ming Yuzhen was born on the ninth day of the ninth month of the jisi year, 2 October 1329, at Meiqiu village in Sui County, Suizhou, then in Huguang province and today in Liulin town, Sui County, Hubei. The transmitted sources differ over his native place: some make him a man of Suizhou in general terms or specify "Yusha village in Suizhou", one makes him a man of Mianyang, while the Xuangong zhi stele unearthed at Chongqing states plainly that he was "a man of Meiqiu, Sui County, Suizhou". His original name was Rui, his courtesy name Yuzhen, and one account holds that his surname was originally Min and was changed to Ming after he embraced the White Lotus teaching; his father was Ming Xuewen and his mother a lady of the Zhao clan. The Mingshi shilu says his family "made its living from the fields", the Veritable Records of Ming Taizu calls him "a farmer's son of Suizhou", the Pingxia lu "of farming stock for generations", and in the spring of 1360 he described himself in an order as "a country farmer". Another account asserts that his family "held more than a hundred mu of land and were middling landlords", but no such statement appears in the History of Yuan, the History of Ming or the other histories, and modern scholars therefore hold that the label of middling landlord is not well grounded, the more likely position being that of a self-cultivating farmer or poor villager who commuted labour service for a middling household.

Of his early years the sources record that at ten he entered the government school at Suizhou together with the son of a teacher named Zhang, Wenbing, and two villagers, Dai Shou and Zou Xing; after six years of study, at sixteen, he was already seven chi tall. He later served in a low capacity at the inspection office at Meiqiu: Ye Ziqi's Caomuzi records that he was a "watchman and squad head of the local archers", and since archer service in the Yuan was a corvée obligation legally assigned to middling households, which these households often shifted onto self-cultivating farmers, his early status lay between the small farmer and the village constable.

As to his character the sources agree: the Xuangong zhi stele calls him "a man of martial spirit and great ambition, free of any craving for music, women, goods or profit, and a good rider and archer"; the Mingshi shilu says he "had an unusual appearance, stood eight chi tall, and had a double pupil in one eye" and was "always of great ambition, disdaining" farm work; later accounts add that he was alert and full of plans, strongly built, upright by temper, fair and decisive in his dealings and fond of helping others, so that quarrels in the neighbourhood were brought to him for settlement. In religion he belonged to the Manichaean-White Lotus current: its teaching prescribed plain clothing, simple burial and frugality, treated fellow believers as brothers and sisters who helped one another in trouble, and spoke of expelling evil and honouring light, and he joined it together with the poor peasants of Pinglin.

Raising Troops: Qingshan and the Camp on Qinglin Mountain

In 1351, when fighting broke out between Yingzhou and Caizhou, Ming Yuzhen asked the village elders what was to be done, saying that with the Yuan ruler without the way and troops rising everywhere the people would suffer. They answered that with his courage and judgement, trusted and feared as he was, he should gather local troops and camp at Qingshan, judging his strength and the times, "advancing if he could and defending himself if he could not". He accordingly deployed the local strongmen, occupied the passes, built palisades and walls, and with more than a hundred thousand followers was made their leader. Other accounts add that when the people of Pinglin, having killed the Yuan officials who controlled the kitchen knives, feared government retaliation, they asked him to organise the young men to protect the district; he selected more than a thousand, camped on Qinglin Mountain, drilling them in the slack season and sending them home for the harvest, with the villagers taking refuge in the camp when raiders came. They made him their head.

For the long term he strengthened the walls, divided the passes among his men and built drill grounds and a riding ground on the mountain. Though of farming stock he had always valued letters and arms, and having served among the archers he was skilled with spear and bow and a firm horseman; in demonstrations he vaulted onto a galloping horse, rolled and hid in the saddle and picked out an arrow's direction in the din, catching the shaft in his hand amid the cheers of the crowd. He also trained his men at night, and the men famed as uncanny fighters, "Night-Eye Chen" and "Flying Zhang", learned their skills here and later became noted commanders of the Red Turbans. He put Dai Shou in charge of camp affairs and Zou Xing of military matters, so that the camp was well ordered; because it was safe the people round about Mount Dahong came in, and the numbers grew.

Joining the Tianwan Red Turbans and the Mianyang Years

After Xu Shouhui's forces rose at Qishui and he took the imperial title, he sent an envoy to summon Ming Yuzhen, saying that he had raised troops to expel the Yuan and pacify China, and that if Ming joined him they would undertake great things together, while if he did not, he would send troops against him first. The Mingshi shilu records that Ming Yuzhen, "fearing him and wishing to protect his district, had no choice but to comply"; the Tianwan regime received him with exceptional courtesy, appointing him grand marshal commanding troops against the Yuan, leaving his own forces under him and adding men so that he held Mianyang. The Xuanggong zhi stele tells it differently: "In the gengyin year the men of the Huai set up Lord Xu as emperor at Qiyang, issued the Wanshou calendar, took the era name Zhiping and the dynastic title Song. The next year the Taizu took up his sword and followed him, winning great credit in battle, and after eight years reached the office of general of the state-supporting upper guards and grand marshal." On this account Ming Yuzhen joined voluntarily rather than under duress, and the two versions stand side by side in the sources.

In Xu Shouhui's armies he took part in the fighting on the lakes against the Yuan commander Hamatu, in the course of which he lost an eye to a stray arrow. In the autumn of 1354 the Mianyang region suffered successive years of flooding and the people lived on wild greens and fish, so that both the army's supplies and the people's food were short, which is the immediate background to his grain-gathering expedition to Sichuan.

Gathering Grain and the Seizure of Chongqing

In 1355 Ni Wenjun ordered Ming Yuzhen to take more than ten thousand men and fifty boats to Kuizhou to obtain grain. Yiling was then held by Jiang Jue for the Tianwan, so that Ming Yuzhen could sail up the Wu gorge and return with full cargoes without the people of Sichuan being disturbed; the success solved the Red Turbans' supply problem and prepared the way for his entry into Sichuan.

In the winter of 1356, as Ming Yuzhen was about to return from the Wu gorge, the Yuan right chancellor of Sichuan, Wanzhedu, was recruiting troops at Chongqing, and Yang Han, a commander of volunteer troops from Chenzhou, was camped at Xiping village with five thousand picked men. In the third month of 1357 Yang Han came to Chongqing and camped north of the river, where Wanzhedu lured him to an interview and killed him at table, intending to take over his troops; Yang Han's men, unable to avenge him, seized boats and sailed downstream, meeting Ming Yuzhen in the Wu gorge. They told him of the affair and reported that Chongqing was weakly held, that Wanzhedu and the left chancellor Hamatu were at odds, and that if he turned his boats about he could take the city as easily as turning his palm. Ming Yuzhen hesitated, and the myriarch Dai Shou advised him that as birds in trouble turn to the woods and men in trouble turn to others, and as both his army at Mianyang and his grain-gathering in Shu were for the people's sake, he should divide the boats, sending half the grain back to relieve the famine at Mian and using the other half with Yang Han's men against Chongqing: if successful he would hold the city, and if not he would still bring back plunder; and that the expedition would also give him a view of Long and Shu, the upper reaches of the river, the protection of Jing and Xiang and a new grain route. Ming Yuzhen followed this plan and moved on Chongqing by forced marches with Yang Han's remaining men.

Sichuan had long been at peace, and the sudden appearance of a mass of boats alarmed the whole region. Wanzhedu fled by night to Guozhou, Hamatu was defeated and captured, and the elders of the city welcomed Ming Yuzhen in; he forbade plundering, calmed the people and kept the city as it had been, so that those who submitted from the surrounding districts came in an unbroken stream. He sent Hamatu to Xu Shouhui, who in the autumn appointed him right vice director of the Longshu province. Later accounts stress that the Yuan garrison collapsed without a fight and that the city was taken chiefly by conciliation.

The Conquest of Sichuan

In the second month of 1358 Wanzhedu came from Guozhou to Jiading, where he joined the Sichuan chief minister Langgedai and the assistant administrator Zhao Zi in planning to recover Chongqing. Ming Yuzhen sent his sworn younger brother Ming San, afterwards known by his original name Wan Sheng, a man of Huangpi of outstanding courage and intelligence whom he had married to his brother's widow, upstream to besiege Jiading; the siege lasted half a year without success. Ming San sent the soldier Chen Yeyan over the wall by night to storm the Wuniu stockade and the city of Jiading, both of which fell, only the Dafo stockade holding out; Ming Yuzhen came in person and within ten days its garrison collapsed. Zhao Zi, Wanzhedu and Langgedai had all fled, met at Longzhou and were brought to Chongqing by roving troops. Ming Yuzhen wished to employ them and lodged them in the Zhiping temple, sending word of his intentions, but they answered that their state was destroyed and their families lost and asked only for a quick death; when word came that relief troops were approaching, he had them executed in the Great Cross Street and afterwards buried them with honours, and the people of Shu called them the Three Loyal Ones.

One episode from this fighting was long remembered: when Ming San took the wives of Langgedai and Zhao Zi, Langgedai's wife declared in the boat that her family had held office for three generations and that she would not suffer dishonour, and threw herself into the river; Ming Yuzhen treated Zhao Zi's wife with courtesy and said that Zhao Zi, himself a Chinese, should not be fighting for the barbarians, and that if she could bring him to submit he would grant him land. The next day, at the meeting of the two armies, Ming Yuzhen placed Zhao Zi's wife and son in the front; Zhao Zi cried that the foolish woman should long since have died, shot her through the chest, and tried to shoot his son before the soldiers shielded the boy. The episode appears in the Mingshi shilu and the Pingxia lu and is markedly dramatic in detail; it may be read alongside the name of the Three Loyal Ones rather than taken as a verbatim record.

In the spring of 1359 Ming Yuzhen advanced west along the Fu river. The western route army of the northern Red Turbans under Li Xixi, Wang Hu and Guo Cheng had entered Sichuan after their defeat in Shaanxi and occupied Chengdu and other places, calling themselves the Blue Turbans; in the sixth month Ming Yuzhen defeated the Yuan general Li Zhongxian at Puzhou, drove him back to Chengdu and returned in triumph. Xu Shouhui then raised him to assistant administrator of the Longshu-Sichuan province. When Chen Youliang was scheming and removing his opponents, Ming Yuzhen memorialised Xu Shouhui exposing his crimes, for which Chen Youliang bore a grudge and sent the assassin Chen Heng to lurk in Chongqing; the attempt failed, and when Ming Yuzhen was on campaign at Guang'an, Chen Heng and his men killed seven men including the supernumerary Bao Yu and fled.

In the spring of 1360 Ming Yuzhen was transferred to the offices of general of the state-supporting upper guards and grand marshal; in the summer of that year he captured Li Juncheng at Wumian Mountain, raided the Shu family stockade, and drove off Tian Cheng and Fu De; in the southwest of Hezhou the local man Dong Xiaowen held out with village troops at Jieshiping and Hutou stockade for several days before they were taken. In the intercalary fifth month Chen Youliang killed Xu Shouhui at Caishi and made himself emperor with the dynastic title Han, sending an envoy to announce the death to Ming Yuzhen; Ming Yuzhen, in grief and fury, killed the messenger and burned the letter, ordered the whole army into mourning, put the general Mo Renshou in charge of Kuizhou with orders to have no dealings with Chen Youliang, and built a temple to Xu Shouhui south of the city with sacrifices in spring and autumn.

King of Longshu and the Founding of Daxia

The sources differ over the year in which Ming Yuzhen took the title King of Longshu: most give the gengzi year (1360), some the fifth month, some the eighth, some no month at all, while the Pinghu lu, the Hongyou lu and the History of Yuan give the renyin year (1362), the annals of Shundi specifying the xinmao day of the fifth month. The Xuanggong zhi stele records that "on the full moon of the tenth month of that year he took the royal position in his residence at Chongqing", that is, the fifteenth day of the tenth month of 1360.

The preparations for his imperial title are told at some length. In the fourth month of 1361 he made Liu Zhen his counsellor, with day-to-day instruction in the histories and a share in deciding affairs. Liu Zhen, courtesy name Weiguo, a man of letters and administrative ability who had served as registrar of the Dashi route and had retired to Mount Fangshan when the Blue Turban Li Xixi ravaged Sichuan, was visited by Ming Yuzhen in person, who after talking with him exclaimed that he had found his Zhuge Liang, brought him aboard his boat to discuss state affairs and appointed him interrogating officer. Liu Zhen one day dismissed his attendants and urged him that with the empire in chaos and no ruler in the Central Plain, Sichuan was a land of strategic advantage and rich soil, with the Qutang gorge to the east leading to the lower Yangtze and the Jianmen pass to the north looking towards Longyou, and that if he did not take a great title to bind men's hearts his officers, coming from every quarter, might think of home and leave, so that he could hardly hold Sichuan, let alone the empire. Ming Yuzhen at first refused; the next day Liu Zhen spoke again and Dai Shou and Zhang Wenbing strongly supported him, the talk spread, and he at last consulted his followers and agreed. His officers swore that they would support the royal house or be struck down by the spirits, and the elders of Chongqing pressed him not to leave the people without a ruler.

On the date of the founding the sources give the third day of the third month, the first day of the first month, the first of the fourth or third month, and the wuchen day of the third month. The Mingshi shilu has it that "in the first year of Tiantong, the renyin year, on the wuchen day of the third month he sacrificed to heaven and earth and took the imperial throne, making Chongqing his capital, with the dynastic title Daxia and the era name Tiantong", while the Xuanggong zhi stele states plainly that he received the imperial seal on the first day of the first month, and the History of Yuan also places it on the first day of the first month of 1363. The entry keeps the variants side by side and does not compute a single date from any one of them. After taking the title he gave Xu Shouhui the posthumous name Yingtian Qiyun Xianwu and the temple name Shizong, and established the ancestral temple, honouring four generations of his forebears with the titles of emperors and empresses and sacrifices with imperial music, his natural father Ming Xuewen being styled Emperor Xuanwu and his mother of the Zhao clan Empress Zhenshu.

Offices, Local Administration and Learning

At the outset the government "followed the Zhou model with six ministers", Dai Shou as chief minister, Wan Sheng as minister of war, Zhang Wenbing as minister of works, Xiang Daheng and Mo Renshou as ministers of justice, Wu Youren and Zou Xing as ministers of education and Liu Zhen as master of rites. In the spring of 1365, finding the Zhou-style titles unsuitable, Ming Yuzhen reorganised the central government on Song and Yuan lines, replacing the six ministers with a Secretariat and a Bureau of Military Affairs to handle civil and military affairs respectively, with Dai Shou as left chief councillor, Wan Sheng as right chief councillor and Xiang Daheng and Zhang Wenbing in charge of the bureau; in the provinces he appointed chief ministers and assistant administrators, with Zou Xing at Chengdu, Wu Youren at Baoning, Mo Renshou at Kuimen, Deng Yuanheng at Tongzhou, Dou Ying at Bozhou and Jiang Jue in Qiannan. Locally he divided Sichuan into eight circuits, with prefects in the fu, governors in the zhou and magistrates in the counties, and special arrangements in districts inhabited by minority peoples.

In learning he established a Hanlin Academy with Mou Tunan as its head and Shi Tianzhang as academician, where the crown prince Ming Sheng studied daily; a Directorate of Education within and supervisory and teaching offices without instructed the sons of officials and the students of the districts, so that a complete educational system ran from the centre to the localities, and examinations were held to test candidates. In religion the government "set aside Buddhism and Daoism and honoured Maitreya alone", in keeping with the Maitreya faith of the Tianwan Red Turbans.

Military Dispositions and the Campaign in Yunnan

After the founding Daxia continued the armed struggle against the Yuan. Ming Yuzhen made two great dispositions: a headquarters of the general who campaigns against the barbarians by imperial command at Hanzhong for the advance into Shaanxi, and one at Yiling for action against Chen Youliang. The aim was to secure Sichuan, take Shaanxi from the Yuan commanders Li Siqi and Zhang Liangbi and block Kuimen against Chen Youliang; in his letter to Zhu Yuanzhang in 1365 he claimed "a mere two hundred thousand men, to march north from Hanzhong and east down the Jing and Chu, to destroy the remnant barbarians and bring peace to the people".

In the winter of 1363 he sent Wan Sheng out through Hanzhong against Lataqan, whereupon the Yuan chief minister Puyan Dashi fled and Wan Sheng brought back his men and horses with a report of victory; this was a probing attack, the main effort being still devoted to securing the rear. In the third month of 1364 he ordered Wan Sheng, Zou Xing and the commander Zhima Li to attack Yunnan in three columns with a nominal force of a hundred and ten thousand, Wan Sheng by way of the Xuannan frontier, Zou Xing by Jianchang and Zhima Li by Guizhou; Wan Sheng's own troops numbered less than ten thousand and, advancing alone, they reached Yunnan on the eighth day of the twelfth month and took the provincial capital Zhongqing, the prince of Liang and the provincial officials having abandoned the city two days earlier and withdrawn to Mount Jinma.

In 1365 Wan Sheng pressed on towards Dali. Meeting the Wuman for the first time, the local chiefs brought grain and money for the army; at Wulong the defenders fled at the news, and along the roads the people came out in the rain to submit while officials bowed and begged pardon, Wan Sheng's troops taking nothing, so that the whole region is said to have been at peace. In the second month he waited in vain for the other two columns, sending envoys to proclaim the terms of submission so that those bringing in their warrants came daily in great numbers, and he sent the attendant Yang Yuan with a memorial and the captured elephants as tribute. In the fourth month the prince of Liang's general Fu Dada captured the pacification commissioner Ji Anli, learned from him that Wan Sheng had eight thousand men, and joining forces with Duan Gong of Dali attacked the isolated and sickly army, killing more than half of it at Guantan; unable to hold his position, Wan Sheng left Nie Qianhu of the Jianshui headquarters in charge at Zhongqing and returned with part of his troops to Chongqing.

Finance, Taxation and Relations with Zhu Yuanzhang

In finance Daxia issued paper money, the Yizhou tongxing chao, printed from wooden blocks on cotton-bark paper, with the five characters of its name in regular script in the upper panel, the seal characters "benefiting the people" and "profiting the state" at either side, and below them three compartments giving the seal of the Ministry of Works, the denomination "two strings of standard coin for circulation in Shu" and the text of the currency law, which explained that with the state newly founded, the people's livelihood exhausted and coin scarce in the market, the ministry had been ordered to print two-string notes for general circulation. He also confiscated the Yuan horse pastures and the lands of some great landlords, practised frugality and levied light taxes, so that Daxia was the least heavily taxed of the regimes founded by the peasant risings, with rites, music, punishments and government and a settled framework of law, which helped restore agriculture amid the fighting. His own frugality was noted: apart from the clothes he wore, the only precious objects among his grave goods were a gold cup and two small silver ingots, gifts from Xu Shouhui on his visit in 1359 which he had never used.

In foreign relations, in the autumn of 1365 Zhu Yuanzhang sent his commissioner Sun Yanghao to Chongqing, writing as the Prince of Wu to the Emperor of Xia that Chen Youliang, for all his land and armies, had been destroyed in three years, that the Yuan, originally dwellers in the desert, now occupied the Central Plain like a hat upon the feet, and proposing that the two states, neighbours like lips and teeth, join forces to recover the Central Plain and thereafter each keep its own borders. Ming Yuzhen replied through the counsellor Jiang Yan, addressing Wu as an equal, saying that with the Yuan's fortune waning heaven would surely send forth heroes to drive out the invaders, that few in the Central Plain understood this and many still served the Yuan, and that with two hundred thousand men he would march north from Hanzhong and east into Jing and Chu to destroy the remnant enemy and bring peace to the people. In the winter of the same year, when the Yuan prince of Wei-shun and the chief minister Puyan Dashi led troops from Yunnan by side roads towards Shaanxi, Ming Yuzhen sent his chancellor Dai Shou in pursuit as far as Qinzhou without catching them.

Death and Aftermath

In the spring of 1366 Ming Yuzhen fell gravely ill and summoned his ministers, telling them that the Central Plain was not yet pacified and the barbarians not yet expelled, so that his ambition could not be fulfilled and this was perhaps heaven's will; that western Shu was protected by its passes, and that after his death they should work together, but could only defend themselves, taking care not to covet the Central Plain or to quarrel with the neighbouring states. He died soon afterwards. The Xuanggong zhi stele records that he was born on the ninth day of the ninth month of the jisi year and died on the sixth day of the second month of the bingwu year, aged thirty-eight, having reigned six years, which places his death on 17 March 1366, while the Mingshi shilu gives five years on the throne and an age of thirty-six. He was buried at Baogai Mountain north of the river at Chongqing in the Ruiling mausoleum, the ministers giving him the temple name Taizu and the posthumous title Qinwen Zhaowu; his testament had the crown prince succeed him, and envoys were sent to announce his death to Wu and the other states. Fang Xiaoru later observed that the ruler of Xia, minded to hold Shu, practised frugality, promoted learning, rejected heterodoxy, forbade plundering and lightened taxes, so that the region enjoyed a modest prosperity, but that he "could not be careful at the outset, the private households being twice the public treasure", leaving the treasury empty and his frontiers unextended, so that although his years were not long the people still speak of him with feeling.

His son Ming Sheng came to the throne at the age of ten, changed the era name to Kaixi and honoured his mother, Empress Dowager Peng, who held court behind the screen with him. Wan Sheng and Zhang Wenbing then fell out; Zhang Wenbing had Ming Zhao, the emperor's adopted son, forge the empress dowager's order to kill Wan Sheng, and Liu Zhen became chancellor in his place. Wu Youren rose in arms against this, and when Ming Sheng sent Dai Shou against him Wu Youren wrote that unless Ming Zhao were executed the state could not be safe and that he would come to court the day after the execution; Dai Shou had Ming Zhao executed and Wu Youren came to court to apologise. In 1369 Zhu Yuanzhang sent envoys to demand submission, which Ming Sheng refused, and in the spring of 1371 the Ming sent Tang He, Liao Yongzhong and Fu Youde against Shu, where Daxia's armies collapsed; in the sixth month the Ming forces reached Chongqing and Ming Sheng surrendered, ending Daxia after eleven years. He was exiled to Korea the following year, his descendants becoming the Ming clans of Yan'an and western Shu, with descendants in Korea today, and temples to Ming Yuzhen and the genealogy of the Ming clan continuing to be maintained in later times.

Major Activities

Government: Offices, Taxation and Learning

After founding Daxia, Ming Yuzhen first adopted the Zhou model of six ministers and later replaced them with a Secretariat and a Bureau of Military Affairs for civil and military affairs; locally he divided Sichuan into eight circuits with prefects, governors and magistrates and special arrangements for districts of minority peoples, combining three levels of administration with particular establishments. He levied light taxes and confiscated Yuan horse pastures and the lands of some great landlords, making Daxia the least burdened of the regimes founded by the risings; he established a Hanlin Academy, a Directorate of Education, supervisory and teaching offices, so that the crown prince, the sons of officials and district students could all receive schooling, and held examinations for candidates. In religion Buddhism and Daoism were set aside in favour of Maitreya alone. These measures helped restore farming and public order after the fighting.

Military: North to Shaanxi and the Western Campaign

His dispositions aimed at securing Sichuan, taking Shaanxi and blocking Kuimen, with headquarters at Hanzhong and Yiling; in the winter of 1363 he sent Wan Sheng on a probing advance through Hanzhong, and in the third month of 1364 ordered the three-column attack on Yunnan, which took Zhongqing in the twelfth month and pressed on to Dali in 1365 before being defeated at Guantan for want of the other columns, after which its troops withdrew with a garrison left at Zhongqing. This western campaign was the largest undertaken by Daxia and the reasons for its advance and retreat are recorded in some detail in the sources.

Relations with the Other Regimes

Towards the Yuan, Daxia continued the armed struggle and in the winter of 1365 sent Dai Shou in pursuit of the Yuan prince of Wei-shun; towards Chen Youliang it broke off all dealings after the murder of Xu Shouhui, killing his envoys and burning his letters while building a temple where Xu Shouhui was honoured; towards Zhu Yuanzhang it exchanged letters in the autumn of 1365, agreeing to work together to recover the Central Plain and then each keep its own borders; and towards the prince of Liang and Dali in Yunnan it first attacked and then offered terms. These dealings show that Daxia stood on its own in the pattern of contending powers at the end of the Yuan while keeping open the possibility of agreement with each of them.

Personal Relations

• Early ruler: Xu Shouhui
• Son and successor: Ming Sheng
• Political opponent: Chen Youliang

Historical Assessment

Assessment of this figure should be based on verifiable offices, activities, writings, and contemporary records.