The vast grassland stretches as far as the eye can see, the sky is gray, and the fierce wind howls, as if it is about to turn the whole world into a land of ice and snow.
When the eclipse is approaching, the sun rises. Although the snow has stopped, the sunshine also disperses the dark clouds and illuminates the earth white.
But this kind of whiteness is like a pale white without any warmth, giving people a biting feeling.
There are about a dozen Xianbei settlements living near Danhan Mountain. Small tribes may have only a few dozen or hundreds of households, while large tribes may have thousands of households. They are dotted all over the place, and the stars and the moon generally surround the Chan Yu Ting.
According to historical records, the population of Xianbei was at its peak during the Tanshihuai period, reaching more than two million. However, after the alliance fell apart, the number of tribes that the Xianbei royal court could control was greatly reduced. The original twelve major clans fell apart, leaving only Tanshi.
The men and horses of Huai’s own tribe.
The number of tribes that the three brothers can directly control is more than 100,000. After excluding the elderly, women, and children, the number of adult soldiers capable of fighting is about 30,000 to 40,000. The other approximately 70,000 to 80,000 are captured by the Helian company.
The youngest son Qianman takes control.
Coupled with some large and small tribes that are neutral between them, the Xianbei Royal Court now has only a dozen large and small towns under its control, with a total population of less than 300,000, and its strength has declined severely.
If you stand on Danhan Mountain and look down, you will see countless densely packed tents standing at the foot of the mountain, smoke rising from cooking stoves, and herdsmen cooking food in pottery.
After the meal time passed, hundreds of cavalry suddenly ran out from the direction of the royal court and galloped towards the grassland.
"Boohoo!"
Bone whistle.
One of mankind's oldest musical instruments.
At this time, it became an important tool to gather herdsmen.
Only tribes with more than 5,000 households can have adults. At present, the total population near Shan Yuting is less than 50,000 households. Excluding Bu Dugen and Fu Luohan, there are also two other adults, Ke Zui and Que Ju.
Kuitou, Budu Genbu, Fuluohan, Qianman, Kezui, Queju, plus some scattered small tribes in Linlin, formed the entire central Xianbei.
The Kezui tribe and the Queju tribe belong to the old people of the Tanshihuai period, and they are also one of the two veteran tribes left today.
Qianman can continue to grow and not be annexed by the leader, just because of their existence.
The strength of these two tribes is not strong, with a total population of only forty or fifty thousand, and only about ten thousand soldiers that can be dispatched, but they are an intermediate force that cannot be underestimated.
In the long course of history, their final destination was to wait until Qianman grew up and had a war with Kuitou, and perished in their war.
But now at least it still exists and has not fallen into the tribal conflict between Qianman and Kuitou.
At this moment, the loud sound of the horn was heard on the grassland. Located in the grassland to the west of Danhan Mountain, in the tent of Ke Zuibu, the two Xianbei adults looked at each other, and a strange flicker flashed in their old eyes.
bright.
"This is the summoning order from the Pai Department."
Ke said calmly and authentically.
The Xianbei tribe is usually named after its leader.
According to Yeluyu's epitaph, Tanshihuai tribe first came from the Tang tribe, and later unified Xianbei and became the leader of Xianbei. The name of the tribe should be Tanshihuai tribe.
However, after the alliance split, many Xianbei tribes no longer recognized the status of leader, so they once again called Shan Yuting Tong.
Que Ju said calmly: "It seems that what the Han people said is true. Kuitou is indeed thinking of going south."
"Shall we go?"
Ke Zui asked.
"Is there any choice?"
"Yes, if we don't go, I'm afraid it will give the leader an excuse to get rid of us."
"Qian Man will not sit idly by. He has grown up. The tribe his father left for him will give him the courage to regain his position as leader."
Que Ju sighed: "It's just that our tribe's life was already very difficult, and now we have to fight again."
"Maybe the Han man is right, we have to choose between them."
Ke Zui said.
Que Ju shook his head: "We are already old, our claws have been worn away, and we no longer have the ability to compete with these little wolves."
In fact, they are not old yet, they are in their forties and almost fifty.
However, the average life span of the grassland people is shorter than that of farming civilization. The cruel and harsh living environment results in their average life span being much shorter than that of the Han Dynasty people. They often reach more than 40 years old, which is no different from the 60 years old of the Han people.
.
Ke Zui was silent for a moment. He also felt that his health was getting worse and worse recently. His strong body in the past was like a deflated skin. If he rode a horse and ran a little farther, his body would fall apart, and his whole body ached.
"Okay, let's go."
Que Ju stood up from the sheepskin coat carpet, opened the tent curtain, and left only one sentence: "Whether we want to choose one of them in the future, at least not now, we will see after some time."
The sharp bone whistle was still ringing, and every time the royal envoys who were responsible for summoning the leaders of the herdsmen's tribes passed by, they would shout a few words and let the herdsmen convey it themselves.
The general idea is that the weather is even colder this year, and countless cattle and sheep have frozen to death. If you want to survive, you can only follow the leader south to rob the Han people.
In just a few days, this order spread throughout all the tribes near Danhan Mountain.
The Xianbei people became excited. Some were willing to follow the leader, while others were naturally unwilling. But this time the leader was very smart and accepted the advice of his brother Bu Dugen. The three brothers knew very well that they could only control half of the total number of tribes.
Moreover, in order to prevent their tribe from being annexed, they could not bring all their troops south. If they only sent troops, the maximum of ten thousand horses would be the limit.
The enemy on the grassland is not just bad weather, the Huns, Wuhuan people, and even the Xianbei people are all cruel competitors.
During the Tanshihuai period, the Xianbei family was dominant and drove the Huns to the Western Regions, suppressing the Wuhuan people in the north of Youzhou and attaching themselves to the Han Dynasty. However, after Tanshihuai's death, the Xianbei people began to divide themselves.
Come on, Kuitou and Qianman won't go into detail. Xianbei in the east, which currently has the best relationship with Gongsun Zan, is also experiencing constant internal strife.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click the next page to continue reading the exciting content! Mika, Suli, Huaitou, Queji and other tribes attacked each other, and finally annexed each other. After Kirby, they disappeared in the long river of history.
In the end, the Duan tribe, the Yuwen tribe, the Murong tribe, etc. were split. It can be said that these eastern Xianbei were one of the ancestors of the later Five Hus who disrupted China.
Therefore, in order to prevent the old, weak, women and children left behind from being annexed by other tribes after their own tribe sends troops south, they must find a way to coerce other tribes to go with them, at least to make them send troops that cannot threaten their own tribe.
If it were in the Tanshihuai period, or even in the early Helian period, this would not be a big deal. With one order, all the Xianbei tribes would have to obey the order and send troops to attack the Han Dynasty.
However, the Xianbei royal court had long since lost power, so naturally other methods had to be used.
Among the three brothers, Bu Dugen was the smartest. He simply took advantage of the herdsmen's current difficulties in life and coerced all tribal leaders to accept the proposal of this southern expedition.
In fact, during the late Han Dynasty, many nomadic peoples began to migrate inland on a large scale and continued to move south.
It is introduced in the seventh-grade history textbook of the People's Education Press.
It's just that the history textbooks don't give the reason for the southward migration, but according to current calculations, the Little Ice Age was the biggest factor for their inward migration, and it was also the most important objective condition for the Five Husties to disrupt China.
When survival becomes increasingly difficult, war naturally becomes the only resort.
Soon, in less than half a month, as the weather became colder and colder, the herdsmen's cattle and sheep once again suffered from large-scale freezing and disease deaths. Food was visibly reduced, and the call to go south became more and more common among various tribes.
Coming higher and higher.
Although the tribal leaders such as Qianman Quejuke and others knew that this was the leader's way of coercing them, the commotion below was too intense, and Qianman was not yet an adult this year, so the power of the tribe was still in the hands of some veterans who had stayed in Helian.
The tribesmen also wanted to go south, forming an unstoppable force.
In desperation, they finally chose to succumb to Shan Yuting. By the beginning of November, except for Qian Man because he was young and Que Juke because he was old, countless tribal leaders and nobles, large and small, gathered at Shan Yu Ting.
Court, obey the leader's call.
Although the three people did not come, the leader also knew that his goal had been achieved. These people were just envoys for Qian Man and others. Since they could come, it means that the strategy was at least half successful.
The remaining half depends on how many troops each family sends.
Finally, after discussion, the Qianman tribe sent 8,000 troops, the Queju Kezui each sent 3,000 troops, and other small tribes gathered together the number of scattered troops, about 3,000 to 4,000 troops.
It may seem like a small amount, but the current Xianbei in central China only has this strength.
The total population is less than 50,000 households. Calculated with four to six people per household, the entire central Xianbei has only more than 200,000 people, and the elderly, women and children account for about two-thirds of the population. Even if all the troops and horses are mobilized, the central Xianbei
They can only produce 60,000 to 70,000 cavalry.
What's more, it's impossible to mobilize all these soldiers and horses, and using half of them is already the limit. Otherwise, there will be no adult men in the tribe at all, and only the old, weak, women and children will be left, which will be very dangerous in the grassland.
The leader is the strongest, so he sends 15,000 troops. In total, the number of troops that can be mobilized can reach more than 30,000, which is almost the limit of the troops that can be mobilized.
After deciding to send troops, each tribe quickly began mobilizing for war.
Countless herdsmen dismounted their horses to graze, mounted their horses, carried knives, and prepared their own weapons and dry food. Amid shouts of shouts, they mounted their most majestic horses. Under the urging of the tribal leaders, they gathered in the direction of Shan Yuting.
go.
It was as if the small streams had gathered into a big river. Looking down from a high altitude, one could see groups of nomadic cavalry forming countless black spots in early November, running towards Danhan Mountain.
Some of them only have a few dozen people, which are the teams gathered by small tribes with hundreds of families, and some have more than a thousand people, which are the troops of large tribes.
After only two or three days, the troops and horses were almost gathered.
There was no war mobilization or any warning. As the troops of the leader Fuluohan Budugen set off first, all the tribal leaders spontaneously followed them with their own troops and began to head towards Yunzhong County in the south.
Cruel and harsh living conditions are the best mobilization.
At this time, Yunzhong County, Jiuyuan County, Dingxiang County and other places had long been occupied by the Xianbei people. Tribes including Fulohan, Budugen, Qianman and others were already migrating south.
If Shan Yuting hadn't been the royal court established by Tan Shihuai, Kuitou's grandfather, he would have long wanted to take his tribe to live in Dingxiang and other places in Yunzhong.
Along the way, troops continued to join.
When they set out from Shan Yuting, the three Kuitou brothers only brought more than 10,000 people with their own troops, plus thousands of people from scattered tribes in the surrounding areas. When they arrived at Yunzhong County, the army had already gathered more than 30,000 people, like a black cloud.
Same, heading towards Yanmen County.
Now more than half of Yanmen County is not in the hands of the Han people. Currently, in the entire Bingzhou, only Taiyuan and Shangdang are controlled by the imperial court, and this control is still very weak, with troops and generals very scarce.
The imperial court had previously appointed Guo Yao, who was born in the Guo family of Taiyuan, as the governor of Yanmen. However, Xianbei looted the area and Guo Yao could only occupy the south of Yanmen County and defend Yanmen Pass.
The Han army's cavalry outside the pass had already discovered the movement of the cavalry and immediately came back to report to Guo Yao.
Guo Yao served as the prefect of Yanmen in the last years of Emperor Ling's reign, and his son was the famous Guo Huai. Due to the turmoil in the Central Plains, no one took care of the matter of merging states, so the Guo family had deep roots in Yanmen, Taiyuan and other places, which was at the same time as the
On behalf of the prefect of the county, the Wang Ze, Wangrou and Wang Yun families who later succeeded the prefect of Yanmen controlled Yanmen Taiyuan and other places.
Last year, Zhang Yang, the governor of the Party, led his army southward. As one of the only remaining big families in Bingzhou, the Taiyuan Guo family and the Taiyuan Wang family have almost controlled the entire Bingzhou. The court also pinned its hopes on them to resist the invasion of Xianbei from the north, so it
The two major families offered rewards.
But no matter what, the current Bingzhou is too dilapidated. Guo Jian has less than 10,000 troops and horses, and there are many old, weak, sick and disabled. There are only a few thousand available troops and horses, and the strength is very weak.
Hearing that Xianbei was marching south again, Guo Yao was shocked and immediately organized his troops and prepared to defend Yanmen Pass.
From the former Han Dynasty to today, Yanmen Pass has been the last line of defense in the north of Bingzhou. Even those as powerful as Tan Shihuai have been defeated at Yanmen Pass many times. Including the last northern expedition of the Han Dynasty in the sixth year of Xiping, although tens of thousands of cavalry were defeated by Tan Shihuai.
Shi Huai was beaten to pieces, but after finally returning to Yanmen Pass, Tan Shihuai could not make any further progress.
Yanmen Pass seemed to be faced with a formidable enemy. At the same time, Guo Jian sent people to Taiyuan to ask for help from the two Wang families in Taiyuan. The two Wang families were the Wang Ze family and the Wang Yun family. Among their descendants were Cao Wei Sikong Wang Chang and Taiwei Wang Ling.
.
The three major families are closely related and intermarry with each other. For example, Guo Huai married Wang Ling's sister, and Guo Linzong once recommended Wang Ze, thus supporting each other.
Soon, a few days later, the Xianbei people entered Yanmen Pass.
At the same time, the three major families immediately sent troops to support. The number of Han troops at Yanmen Pass was about 10,000, and they were barely able to resist.
Stop the winter breeze.
The ancient city wall is full of mottled spots, with countless dark red stains on it, witnessing the blood that has been smeared on it over the years.
The leader stood at the far end of Yanmen Pass. He looked away from the soldiers guarding the gate who were waiting solemnly. He glanced at Qianman's tribe in the distance, grinned, and waved his hand: "Attack the city!"