In addition to the domestic government affairs of various states and counties in the country and the progress of projects along the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, Zhang Wu's work throughout the eleventh year also had a new task for the country.
That is to renovate the classic books that were damaged in previous turmoils, and to compile history books for the previous Eastern Han Dynasty.
Before Li Shimin in the Tang Dynasty, this work was not uniformly prepared by the imperial court.
Because the Han Dynasty did not have an institution specializing in compiling history books, although there were two officials in charge of history, Tai Shigong and Lantai Lingshi, there were no provisions for compiling histories for previous dynasties.
For example, Sima Qian edited "Historical Records", Ban Gu edited "Hanshu", Chen Shou "Three Kingdoms", Fan Ye "Book of the Later Han", etc. were basically all edited privately.
For example, when Ban Gu served as the Lantai Lingshi, he was ordered by Emperor Ming of the Han Dynasty to record the historical records from Wang Mang's usurpation of the Han Dynasty to the reign of Emperor Ming of the Han Dynasty. He was not asked to revise the history books of the Western Han Dynasty.
However, Ban Gu himself believed that Sima Qian's "Historical Records" was lacking. It only recorded the conflict between Chu and Han, and it was very inappropriate to not record all the subsequent history of the Western Han Dynasty, so he privately revised the "Book of Han".
Chen Shou and Fan Ye also had similar experiences. Both of them had unsuccessful official careers and were repeatedly demoted. During the process of being demoted, they wrote "Three Kingdoms" and "Book of the Later Han Dynasty".
The same is true for Shen Yue, the author of "Song Book" during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and Xiao Zixian, the author of "Nan Qi Book". Neither of them has official endorsement from the imperial court.
And these are only the historical books that are recognized as relatively objective and true, ranking among the Twenty-Four Histories.
There are countless private histories compiled by private individuals.
Even from a practical point of view, "Historical Records", "Hanshu", "Three Kingdoms", "Houhanshu", etc., like most privately compiled histories at that time, were private compilations rather than official official editions.
It is only because its records are relatively detailed, contain few private items, and are quite fair that it is regarded as official history by the world.
But even so, there are many errors and loopholes in these official histories, and there are countless missing parts and parts that are not recorded in detail.
Not to mention that from the Han Dynasty to the Northern and Southern Dynasties, there were countless private histories compiled by private people, which to a certain extent caused the historical records at that time to be very confusing, with many mistakes and loopholes and exaggerations.
The "Book of Wei", also listed as one of the Twenty-Four Histories, records many outrageous things.
For example, there was an official named Yang Gu at that time who was a famous corrupt official. He was later beaten by a tiger. However, in the writings of Wei Shou, the author of "Book of Wei", he became "upright and upright, not afraid of force, a clean official, and no one to spare for his family."
A great upright official with wealth.
The reason is that when Wei Shou was able to become an official and take over the task of writing history, Yang Gu's son put in a lot of effort, so Wei Shou promised at that time that I would write a good biography for your father.
And this is not even the most outrageous thing. The most outrageous thing is that in order to flatter himself, Wei Shou wrote that he was the seventh generation descendant of Wei Wuwu, the Marquis of Gaoliang in the early Han Dynasty.
However, from the beginning of the Han Dynasty to the end of the Northern Qi Dynasty when Wei Shou was located, the time span in between was 779 years, nearly 800 years.
In other words, their family only has seven generations in 779 years, and it takes an average of more than 100 years to reproduce one generation.
At the same time, the "Heyin Massacre" caused by Er Zhurong was written as a loyal minister to bring order to chaos, and Er Zhurong was a lecturer on moral cultivation. Yi Yin of the Shang Dynasty and Huo Guang of the Western Han Dynasty were not as good as him.
Such an outrageous record certainly aroused the indignation of the world, so much so that it was recorded in the "History of the Northern Wei Dynasty" edited by the Tang Dynasty: "It was because of the historical writings that it was a pity for people. At the age of Qi's death, the tombs were collected and his bones were abandoned.
outside".
Because he offended too many people, his graves were dug up after his death.
It can be seen that the history books written by Wei Shou were considered to be complete nonsense even by people at the time.
However, the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties were too chaotic. Not only did the history compilers write nonsense, but the government and the people were also in a mess.
The Book of Wei, which was relegated to the status of an unofficial history during the Sui and Tang Dynasties, eventually became one of the Twenty-Four Histories.
I have to say, this is a very ironic thing.
But it also proves that the historical records at that time were completely unstandardized.
Even such an outrageous "Book of Wei" has become official history, let alone other privately compiled history books.
And this situation lasted until the establishment of the Tang Dynasty.
Li Shimin, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, felt that there were no rules for compiling history at that time, there were countless unofficial histories, and history was too confusing, so he opened a history museum.
After that, the country formally regulated the work of compiling history. Li Shimin placed the history museum in the province, and the prime minister supervised the compilation of national history to compile history for the previous dynasty. This became a major national project.
However, standardizing the work of compiling history was a matter for the Tang Dynasty, and the Han Dynasty had not yet perfected the system in this regard.
Naturally, Chen Mu would not allow historical records to continue to be confused like this, so he opened the Hongwen History Museum in Lantai, recruited scholars, and Taichang took charge of the entire history revision project.
So this is why the imperial court is preparing to revise history with great fanfare this year.
However, Cai Yong was old and the work was too heavy to continue, so he carefully selected his student Ruan Yu, his admired descendants Xu Qian, Wang Can and others to serve as the Minister of History to help him complete the repair work.
In addition to compiling history, Chen Mu also presided over the repair, integration, and compilation of the entire country's classics.
Just like Zhu Dixiu's "Yongle Dadian", he wanted to include all the classics in the world into the National Library of the Han Dynasty.
It's just that Zhu Di's "Yongle Dadian" has more symbolic meaning than practical significance. It has no definite role and is just gathering dust in the warehouse.
Chen Mu did this because Dong Zhuo's Rebellion caused a devastating blow to the Hongdu Hall, Lantai, Piyong Hall, Dongguan, Shishi, Xuanming, Taixue and other book collection sites in the Eastern Han Dynasty, and they needed to be restored.
And with the booming development of the papermaking industry, paper was widely spread. In the past, almost all books in the collection were bamboo slips. Now they must be transcribed on pages, compiled into volumes, and printed into books.
In the future, these books will be selected and some will become textbooks, some will become classics for scholars to study, and some will become part of a rich national library.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! From this point of view, the actual significance of Chen Mu's re-repair and inventory of all the remaining classics of the Han Dynasty is definitely greater than that of Zhu Di.
It is very difficult to provide open knowledge in a feudal society like the Han Dynasty.
But the good news is that these things may be out of his control.
Because the repair and inventory work has only just begun this year, it is only a brief estimate that the preliminary inventory, classification, excerpting, transcribing, Bible study and other work may last for several years.
Then there will be a lot of calibration, inspection, selection, printing, etc. in the future, just like "Yongle Dadian" and "Sikuquanshu" both took several years to more than ten years.
Work like this will take a long time, and by that time, Chen Mu may not even know whether he is here or not. I can only say that he is doing this work now and will leave a valuable asset to future generations in the future.
At present, the development of folk science is still relatively active, and physics, mathematics, and chemistry are all advancing rapidly. At the same time, at the beginning of this year, the Han Dynasty officially launched the AD calendar.
In the past few years, the ministers of the DPRK and Central Government have written suggestions on the issue of Liu Bei's reign, asking Liu Bei whether he wanted to change it.
Since Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was established, it is common for emperors to frequently change their reign names.
So after Liu Bei got the letter, he asked Chen Mu if he wanted to change the Yuan Dynasty?
This incident reminded Chen Mu that regulations must be implemented.
First, it is necessary to determine the system of one emperor's one-year title, so as to facilitate the common people and officials to record events.
The second is to determine the AD chronology to make history clearer.
The former is easy to say.
After Liu Bei heard that it was best to establish a system of one emperor and one reign, so as to facilitate the common people in the world, he agreed to Chen Mu's request.
In this way, Liu Bei was also called Emperor Zhangwu in later history.
The latter is more troublesome.
Because determining the AD year is not as easy as imagined.
Chen Mu studied the calendar many times with the fortune-telling sage Liu Hong and his student Xu Yue, and re-improved and perfected the "Qianxiang Calendar" in an attempt to find the most suitable year.
But it is a pity that Liu Hong was old and died of illness last spring, so this matter has been delayed.
It was finally perfected at the beginning of this year, and a new calendar was finally promulgated in the middle of the year, defining a year of 365 days, as well as new concepts such as twenty-four hours and leap years.
Of course, the calendar is still the lunar calendar. After all, this is the crystallization of the wisdom of China’s civilization for thousands of years. The twenty-four solar terms are a typical example.
But how to determine the AD year is a headache for several astronomers and mathematicians.
This has nothing to do with algorithms and everything to do with history.
In later generations, the AD calendar in the West actually took the birth year of Jesus as the origin of time.
During World War I and World War II, because the West mastered the technological advantages of the Industrial Revolution, quickly accumulated raw capital, and became the world's hegemon, people all over the world had to hold their noses and admit their AD chronology.
but now.
The world overlord is the Han Dynasty.
Jesus was nothing in Chen Mu's eyes, let alone using his birthday as a year.
Therefore, it is necessary to re-divide the AD era.
But by the time of the Han Dynasty, many ancient books from the Pre-Qin period had been lost.
A large number of records, including those from the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties, are also incomplete.
It’s not that you can’t date the AD because of historical inaccuracies, but it’s that you can’t be sure which year the things recorded in the book are from.
For example, you set the year when Confucius was born as the first year of the Christian era, but they can't determine the date of Confucius' birth.
The times recorded in "Zuo Zhuan", "Chun Qiu", "Historical Records", "Lu Shi Chun Qiu" and even "Chun Qiu Gu Liang Zhuan" and "Chun Qiu Gong Yang Zhuan" are different.
Some ancient books say it was the 20th year of Lu Xianggong, some say it was the 21st year of Lu Xianggong, and some say it was the 22nd year of Lu Xianggong. And this kind of thing not only happened to Confucius, there are many other examples.
And if you want to determine the AD year, you must first determine the specific time of this year and what exactly happened in this year.
However, the time records during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods are relatively confusing. If the AD is placed in the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods or even the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties, it is possible that the historical records of a certain year AD will be vague, incomplete or confusing.
For example, if you reluctantly set the birth date of Confucius as the year AD in the 21st year of Lu Xianggong, there are also a lot of time differences in this year. For example, some classics record who was born at this time and what happened between countries.
War, disaster, etc.
However, the records in other ancient books are inconsistent with this, and the time and place of the occurrence are also deviated.
So what should you do at this time?
Should we adopt the statement of this classic or that of that classic?
At that time, the Han people had a tradition of governing classics, such as the Yang family of Hongnong, who passed down Ouyang's "Book of Changes". The Yuan family of Runan, who passed down Meng's "Book of Changes". The Heng family of Peiguo, who passed down "Shang Shu". The Zhen family of Beihai, who passed down "Gongshu".
"Yang Chunqiu". Sima Jia of Hanoi, "Han Shu".
Including Guan Yu's reading of "Spring and Autumn", which actually means studying a book specifically.
Each school and each school has its own research on the classics handed down from ancient times. If you adopt the records of one school, the other school will be dissatisfied, and there will probably be endless debates in academic research.
Even if you set the birthday of Confucius as the 21st year of Duke Xiang of Lu, other Confucian schools are probably dissatisfied.
Therefore, it is not easy to determine the AD year.
Finally, after Chen Mu discussed with many historians and astronomers, he finally decided to put the AD date in the first year of the founding of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, which was 140 BC in the Western calendar.
Before the first year of Jianyuan, it was collectively called BC, and after the first year of Jianyuan, it was officially called 1 AD.
There are two reasons why the first year of Emperor Wu's founding of the Han Dynasty is called AD 1.
First, although the history of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods is relatively vague, the historical records from the late Warring States period to the Western Han Dynasty are very clear due to the "Historical Records" and "Hanshu".
What happened in that year, the country's policies in that year, and what disasters happened in that year are all basically recorded in detail, and there are traces to follow.
Therefore, it is best to place AD in the late Warring States period and the Western Han Dynasty to avoid historical chaos.
The records of events in BC can be vague and left to the judgment of historians and scholars themselves, which will make events in AD less controversial.
Second, the first year of Jianyuan is the first year in history, and it is also the year when Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty Liu Che ascended the throne.
Before Liu Che created the era name, there was no era name.
In the past, the year was often recorded based on the emperor.
For example, before Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Emperor Jing of the Han Dynasty reigned for 16 years. The year names of each year were in the order from the first year of Emperor Han Jing to the sixteenth year of Emperor Han Jing, which was similar to the 21st year of Duke Xiang mentioned before.
Since Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the existence of era names has made it easier for historians to record historical materials, and at the same time, it also allows the people to know what year this year is.
Therefore, the creation of the era name is of great significance. In addition, the historical records from Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty to the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty are detailed and will not obscure the historical data.
Therefore, based on various considerations, the AD chronology was finally determined.
And if the first year of Jianyuan is set as one year and one century AD, then the eleventh year of Zhangwu today, the sixteenth year of Jian'an in history, and 211 AD in the Western calendar, would be 351 AD when converted to Han Dynasty AD.
Since then, China has had clear dates. As for the records of BC, we have to continue to look for answers from ancient books, trace history, and find the historical truth of the Xia, Shang, Zhou, and Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods.
This process may take a long time, but it is what the court must do. Even if the truth is not found, a set of explanations must be made up to give the Chinese people a sense of belonging.
But in any case, the confusing historical data and ancient documents are being repaired.
The confusing year records and era name system have been improved.
So in the eleventh year of Zhangwu, Liu Bei officially announced that this year was 351 AD in the Han Dynasty. Since then, the calendar, time, and historical recording methods have undergone earth-shaking changes!