Xiahetun is very close to the sea, and it can be reached quickly within a few miles.
Before we even reached the beach, we were greeted by a sea breeze and the fishy smell of the sea. From a distance, we could see rising smoke and smell the smoke from burning vegetation.
"Burning straw?"
"No, there aren't any fields by the seaside. Where can I find platycodon to burn?"
Liu Jin looked at the thick smoke rising from the seaside, and began to check the memory of the original owner in his mind, trying to figure out what happened.
"It turned out to be boiling salt."
Soon, Liu Jin knew what the white smoke was about. At the same time, he was about to reach the beach, turned around a low hill, and his field of vision suddenly broadened.
I saw thatched huts built one after another at the foot of the hillside near the beach. The thatched huts were filled with firewood. Next to each thatched hut, there was a stove built with stones. Every stove was busy here.
"That's right. This place is close to the sea. There has been a tradition of boiling salt since ancient times. If I remember correctly, drying salt was first started from Wudi in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties. It should be called Haifeng now."
Soon, Liu Jin came to the place where the villagers of Xiahe Village were cooking salt. He also remembered some contents from the historical novels he had read before. The history of boiling salt with sea water is very long, which can be traced back to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period.
The tradition of boiling salt was gradually eliminated until the emergence of the sun-dried salt method.
Liu Jin looked at the salt cooking place carefully. The entire salt cooking place was backed by a hill by the sea. Hundreds of salt cooking stoves were built along the hill. At this time, half of the stoves were busy.
.
Some people picked up the brine from the brine pool on the beach, and some chopped firewood and made a fire; some had already been cooked on the stove, and the villagers happily shoveled the salt out of the pot and put it in jars.
"Brother Jin~"
A rough voice came.
Liu Jin followed the sound and looked over, only to see a long, muscular man with a strong back and waist, about 1.9 meters tall. He looked like a fool and was walking swiftly from the beach with two buckets of brine.
From the memory in my mind, I knew that this man's first name was Zhao Erhu and his nickname was Gouzi. He had a particularly good relationship with Liu Jin since he was a child. There was no gap between the two because Liu Jin was a scholar.
"Two Tigers~"
Liu Jin said with a smile.
"Brother Jin, next time Tang Huhu bullies you, tell me and I will beat him to death."
Zhao Erhu put down the brine, came to Liu Jin's side with a smile, and said very angrily.
"Dog, if you don't work hard, why are you barking?"
Not far away, Zhao Erhu's father, Zhao Heishan, heard this and couldn't help cursing at Zhao Erhu.
"You can tell me about Mr. Tang. Otherwise, you won't know how you died. You don't know how high the world is."
Obviously, Zhao Heishan, an honest farmer, was very afraid of Tang Laohu. In this crowded place, he did not even dare to say a word.
"Uncle Heishan~"
Liu Jin smiled and greeted Zhao Heishan. Zhao Heishan was a very nice person and often helped Liu Jin's family. The reason why he said so now about Zhao Erhu was because there were so many people here and he was afraid of people snitching behind his back.
"Brother Jin, are you okay?"
Zhao Heishan still respects Liu Jin very much. After all, Liu Jin is also a scholar. He is the only scholar in Xiahetun who can read and write. Moreover, he is already a scholar at a young age. In the future, he may be able to become a scholar.
That's when he became famous.
"it's okay no problem."
Liu Jin smiled and shook his head, then walked over and looked carefully.
"Is this pot almost ready?"
Liu Jin saw that the water in Zhao Heishan's pot was almost dry, and white and slightly yellow crystals had formed around the pot.
"Isn't that right? It has been cooked for almost three hours."
Speaking of this, Zhao Heishan couldn't help but smile and said, this Zhao Heishan is also very tall, but he is an honest farmer. He is timid and very afraid of getting into trouble, but he is very warm-hearted. If you have anything to do, come to him.
There is nothing wrong with helping, except borrowing money and food.
It's not that Zhao Heishan is stingy, but because Zhao Heishan's family is really poor, and Zhao Heishan is very good at giving birth. Starting from Zhao Dahu, he gave birth to nine children in a row, and he was very lucky. None of the nine children died.
With nine children to support, the life of Zhao Heishan's family can be imagined. What's more important is that Zhao Heishan's family only has 2 acres of land, which is simply not enough to support a family.
Therefore, Zhao Heishan's family not only cultivates their own fields, but also cultivates land for Mr. Tang's family, and then makes some money by boiling salt to make ends meet.
"I'm afraid there are 5 kilograms of salt in this pot."
Liu Jin looked at the full pot. There was only some water in the middle, and the surrounding area of the pot was already covered with salt.
"Is this kosher salt?"
Liu Jin looked at the salt in the pot carefully. This salt was very different from the salt eaten by later generations.
In later generations, the edible salt bought in supermarkets was all snow-white and in the shape of tiny granules. However, the salt in the pot was white with yellow and formed into lumps. It looked similar to the shape of rock sugar, but there was no rock sugar.
So white.
"If you weigh 5 pounds, you shouldn't have it. If you weigh 4 pounds, you should have it."
After hearing Liu Jin's words, Zhao Heishan said with a smile.
"Four pounds is not bad."
Liu Jin smiled and nodded.
"No, boiling this pot of salt requires several pennies just for firewood. These 4 kilograms of salt can only be sold for about 20 pennies. Mr. Tang will also take out a few more pennies. After all, you can only earn seven or eight cents."
arts."
Hearing Liu Jin's words, Zhao Heishan shook his head helplessly. Although this pot can boil 4 kilograms of salt, in fact, the money earned is very, very little.
"Just a few cents?"
When Liu Jin heard this, he couldn't help being surprised.
These 4 kilograms of salt only cost 20 Wen, which means that this Wen is only 5 Wen. But Liu Jin knew that in ancient times, this salt was the same as iron. It was an official exclusive product. The price has always been relatively expensive, and it is definitely not cheap.
Goods should not be sold for only 5 cents per catty.
I remember that I had read a historical novel, and the author carefully checked the price levels of various commodities in the Ming Dynasty. During the Jiajing period, Zhu Tingli's "Salt Policy Chronicles" recorded that in the early years of Jiaqing, one pound of salt was sold in Huguang, Jiangxi, and Nanjing.
Silver was sold at three to four cents. By the seventh year of Jiajing, one pound of salt was sold for one cent and five cents of silver.
The fluctuations are huge and vary from place to place in each period. The difference is so huge in just eight years, but even at the cheapest time, a pound of salt can be sold for one and a half cents.
In the middle of the Ming Dynasty, one tael of silver was equal to sixteen coins, which was almost 1,000 coins. This was a relatively normal price, and by the end of the Ming Dynasty, it could be exchanged for 1,500 coins.
In the early Ming Dynasty, a large coin called "Dazhong Tongbao" could be exchanged for 4 cents for 1 cent of silver. According to official regulations, the copper coins minted by later emperors were 7 cents for 1 cent of silver, and only 70 cents for 1 cent of silver. However, the poor coins minted by private citizens were stolen.
It even takes thirty to forty to sixty or seventy coins to exchange for one cent of silver.
This was in the middle of the Ming Dynasty. It had been more than 100 years since the founding of the Ming Dynasty. One cent of silver was almost equivalent to 30 Wen. That means that at the cheapest time, a pound of salt cost more than 40 Wen. At the most expensive time, it cost even more.
It was sold for hundreds of dollars per catty.
Now the salt cooked by Zhao Heishan and others can only be sold for 5 cents, which is far from the market price. This is why Liu Jin was surprised.
"It's good to have a few articles. At least you can have something to eat."
Zhao Heishan was busy as he talked, shoveling the salt out of the pot and putting it into a jar for storage. Then he poured in the brine that Zhao Erhu had picked up just now and continued to boil the salt. It takes about 3 hours to boil a pot of salt.
I can cook almost two pots a day from morning to night.
"Then why do we still need to pump water for Mr. Tang?"
Liu Jin looked at Zhao Heishan who was so tired that he couldn't straighten his back, and couldn't help but ask.
"We are not kitchen households. Logically speaking, we cannot boil salt, but we rely on mountains and rivers to eat water. If we don't boil salt, we will starve to death. The water pumped is not all for Mr. Tang. He needs to work with the county master.
While building a good relationship, let the superiors turn a blind eye to our boiling salt."
Zhao Heishan looked at Liu Jin and felt a little surprised, but after thinking about it, he was relieved and explained to Liu Jin patiently.
"It's this damn household service system again!"
When Liu Jin heard this, he immediately understood.
Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, divided the household registration into many types, such as military household, craftsman household, kitchen household, etc., and strictly prohibited the change of household registration. This also means that what a grandfather is, what a son is, and what a descendant is.
, for generations to come.
Zhu Yuanzhang attempted to use such a system to maintain the entire Ming Empire for generations, stipulating the identity of everyone, and this identity would be continued from generation to generation without any changes.
If you want to cook salt, you must have the status of a kitchen household, but a Zao household is not an enviable status. Don't think that the life of a Zao household is easy just because the salt is so expensive. In fact, Zao households can only boil salt for food.
Life is even more miserable than that of ordinary people.
Under the salt and iron monopoly system, the salt produced by kitchen households can only be sold to the government, and the price is naturally extremely high. The government can easily earn a huge price difference by selling the salt, so this
This also gave rise to the emergence of private salt dealers.
Because the villagers in Xiahetun are not kitchen households, they cannot boil salt. However, any system is implemented by people. As long as parents and officials do not care about it, they can naturally boil salt. Mr. Tang is a well-known person in the village.
He is a human being, so he is responsible for liaising with the county boss. With enough money, naturally no one will take care of it.
Of course, there is no doubt that this Tang Laohu must have been full from it. Judging from the water extraction, almost one-third was taken away by him. How much of it went into his pocket? It is estimated that he is the only one.