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Speaking of the first emperor through the ages, it is naturally Qin Shihuang.

So what was the life of this emperor who played a great role in Chinese history?

Is he as brutal as people say, is he bloodthirsty?
Or is his short life worthy of the title of emperor through the ages?

If you want to talk about Qin Shihuang, you must first talk about Qin Shihuang's origin.

His father was Qin Yiren. Although he was politically minded, his reign was short.

His mother is Zhao Ji, a singer beside Lu Buwei.

As for the relationship between Lu Buwei and Qin Shihuang, there are many theories in history, but it is hard to say which one is correct.

After all, the history of the previous dynasty was written by the people of the later dynasty.

In the short-lived Qin Dynasty, it is also unknown whether the so-called official historians' records were inaccurate.

Qin Shihuang was born in the first month of the 48th year of King Qin Zhao.

The exact place of birth was Kuocheng in Handan at that time.

In 247 BC, King Qin Zhuangxiang died, and the 13-year-old Qin Shihuang was established as King Qin.

Lu Buwei was prime minister, sealed [-] households, named Marquis of Wenxin, and monopolized great power.

When he came to the throne, because he was young, the state affairs were all controlled by Lu Buwei. Under Zhao Ji's suggestion, Ying Zheng respected Lu Buwei as his second father.

In 239 BC, Qin Wang Zhengnian was 21 years old, but at this time there was a fierce political struggle in the Qin court.

At that time, Lu Buwei not only controlled the court, but also had an affair with the Queen Mother.

Seeing that Qin Wangzheng was getting older, he was afraid of being discovered by him and wanted to leave the queen mother, but also feared that the queen mother would resent her, so he pretended to corrupt his servant, plucked out his beard and eyebrows, and dedicated them to the queen mother.

Qin Wangzheng was getting older, so they lied to him that the feng shui of the Empress Dowager's bedroom was not good and she should move out of here.

King Qin thought it was true, so they moved to the Li Palace in Yongxian County. The queen mother gave birth to two illegitimate children, and the fake eunuch Lai Ai also pretended to be the king of Qin's fake father. With the help of the queen mother, he was named Marquis of Changxin. Waiting for the place to accept the party feathers.

Lai Ai has been operating in Yongcheng for many years and has established a huge power. It is a powerful political power in Qin State second only to Lu Buwei.

As a villain, Lao Ai once got drunk and reprimanded a minister: "I am the false father of King Qin, how dare you provoke me."

The minister was very angry after hearing this, and secretly found an opportunity to tell the king of Qin about the relationship between Lao Ai and the queen mother.

In 238 BC, Qin Wangzheng held a coronation ceremony at Qinian Palace in Yongcheng.

Lai Ai used the Royal Seal of the King of Qin and the Seal of the Empress Dowager to launch a rebellion and attack Qinian Palace.

Qin Wangzheng smashed Lao Ai's car and exposed his body to the public.

He also imprisoned his mother, Zhao Ji, in the Qiaoyang Palace in Yongcheng.

The two illegitimate children born to Lao Ai and the Queen Mother were thrown to death.

The next year, Qin Wangzheng removed Lu Buwei from his position as minister and exiled Lu Buwei to Bashu.

Lu Buwei knew that his relationship with King Qin was irretrievable, so he committed suicide by drinking poisoned wine.

After Qin Wangzheng took power, he appointed Wei Liao, Li Si and others to actively implement the unified strategy.

In 236 BC, a war broke out between Zhao and Yan.The state of Zhao sent troops to attack Yan, and the state of Qin sent Wang Jian and other generals to attack the state of Zhao in the name of saving Yan, and captured Zhao successively.river.In Anyang and other towns, the Zhangshui Basin has been occupied by Qin.

In 230 BC, Nei Shi Teng, sent by the Qin Dynasty, attacked Han, captured King An of Han, and established Yingchuan County in Han, and Korea perished.

Qin general Wang Jian led the territorial troops to Jingxing, and Qin general Yang Duanhe led Hanoi soldiers to encircle Handan, the capital of Zhao.

Zhao sent Li Mu and Sima Shang to lead an army to resist.

Guo Kai, the favored minister of King Zhao, received bribes from Qin and spread rumors that Li Mu and Sima Shang were plotting rebellion.Zhao Wang therefore replaced Li Mu and Sima Shang with Zhao Cong and Yan Ju, and killed Li Mu.

In 229 BC, Wang Jian defeated the Zhao army, killed Zhao Cong, and captured King Zhao.

In 227 BC, Qin sent Wang Jian and Xin Sheng to attack Yan.

In 226 BC, a rebellion broke out in the capital of South Korea. Qin sent troops to quell the rebellion in Han, and took the opportunity to execute Han Wangan.

In 225 BC, King Qin sent general Wang Ben to attack Wei, King Wei surrendered, and Wei State perished.

Qin established Dang County in the eastern part of Wei.

In the same year, Qin sent Li Xin and Meng Wu to attack Chu with an army of 20.

Later, the king of Qin sent Wang Jian to lead an army of 60 to fight, defeated the Chu army in Qi, and forced Xiang Yan, the general of Chu, to commit suicide.Then the Qin army invaded Shouchun, the capital of Chu, and captured King Chu of Chu.

In 222 BC, Wang Jian pacified the south of Chu, subdued Yue Jun, established Kuaiji County, and Chu State perished.

In 222 BC, King Qin sent Wang Ben to attack Yan's Liaodong, captured Yan Wang Xi, and destroyed Yan.

Then he returned to his division to attack Dai, captured Dai Wang Jia, and established Dai County and Liaodong County.

In 221 BC, Qin general Wang Ben went south from Yan State to attack Qi, captured King Jian of Qi, destroyed Qi State, and established Qi County and Langye County in the old land of Qi.

From 230 BC to the time when Qi was destroyed, Qin State successively annexed six countries in the first and last 10 years, set up prefectures and counties in the occupied areas, and directly belonged to King Qin. The Age of Despotic Empire.

After Qin Wangzheng destroyed the six kingdoms in 26 years, the title of king was not enough to show his career, but he was called emperor, Qin Shihuang.

Implement Shang Yang's legalist policy since the Xiaogong Reform, strengthen the autocratic monarchy, weaken the power of the old aristocracy, and promote the aristocrats who have risen from military merit.

The land ownership system of the Qin Empire basically maintained the "wangyou" land system of the Western Zhou Dynasty, and changed "wangyou" to "state-owned".

Qin Shihuang ordered farmers across the country to report the actual amount of land they own in order to collect taxes.

Although the Qin State implemented the "land grant system" during Shang Yang's reform, the farmers' land was owned by the state and cultivated by private individuals in name, but this move allowed the people of the whole country to actually occupy the land that was originally "owned by the king", and soon it evolved into a farmer. Both officials and officials can freely buy and sell land, so Qin's Shang Yang Reform finally facilitated the development of private land.

Qin Shihuang abolished the enfeoffment system and established a system of prefectures and bureaucracies from the central to the local.

The whole country was divided into 36 counties at the beginning, and later increased to 46 counties with the expansion of land, and Xianyang was designated as the capital.

In Qin Shihuang's team, the highest bureaucrats in the central government are the prime minister, doctor censor and Taiwei, also known as the "Three Dukes".

The chief of the local county is the guard, and the chief of the county is the order.

The system of prefectures and counties initially broke the patriarchal system of blood relationship, and the feudal system and bureaucratic system replaced the hereditary system of nobility.

In order to consolidate the regime, Qin Shihuang also implemented a series of policies, mainly: unifying currency and weights and measures; unifying characters; building the Great Wall, Chidao and Straight Roads;

After the unification of the six countries, various schools and talents who strongly opposed Shang Yang's reform came to serve in Qin State one after another. It is possible that Qin Shihuang adopted the "Shang Yang Reform with Qin State characteristics", which caused various superstitions to prevail in the Qin Empire.

Among them, Huang-Lao Taoists and Yin-Yang Schools synthesized the theories of Confucianism, Law, and Taoism, and put forward the so-called "Five Virtues End and Beginning Theory", which was especially trusted by Shi Huang, who then believed that Qin was the virtue of water, and Zhou was the virtue of fire. , water can overcome fire, so Qin won the world.

Confucian scholars and alchemists from Qiyan also changed the Confucian "enchanting Zen" in a new way. It is rumored that since ancient times, emperors have held the ceremony of enshrining Zen.

At the same time, they also said that there are three islands in the sea, Penglai, Fangzhang, and Yingzhou, where gods live.

Shihuang was very tempted when he heard this, and fantasized about becoming an immortal "immortal".

Xu Fu, a native of Qi, wrote a letter about the fairyland on the sea, and Qin Shihuang sent him to conscript thousands of virgins and boys to the sea to seek immortals.

In the 32nd year, the first emperor asked Lu Sheng from Yan to ask for the traces of immortals such as Xianmen and Gao Yan, and later asked Han Tong, Hou Gong, and Shi Sheng to ask for the medicine of immortality.

Regarding Shihuang's behavior, some Confucian scholars also expressed their dissuasion. Chun Yuyue, a doctor of Qi, suggested that Shihuang still implement the policy of enfeoffing the children of the clan as princes, and Shihuang handed it over to his ministers for discussion.

Li Si's memorial led to Qin Shihuang's order to burn books and ban books, stipulating that all history books not in the Qin Dynasty should be burned; anyone who is not a doctoral officer in the world dares to collect "Poems", "Books", and hundreds of "On" will abide by them , Weiza burn it; those who dare to speak "Poems" and "Books" will abandon the market;

Officials who do not know what they know are guilty of the same.

It was ordered not to burn for [-] days, and tattooed as Chengdan.

The quasi-preservator, the book of medical divination and tree planting.

If you want to learn laws and regulations, you should take officials as your teachers.At this time, Xu Fu went to the sea to seek immortality, and spent tens of thousands of dollars, but finally found no medicine.

The first emperor felt cheated in his heart, so he ordered the censor to question all the students, exposing each other and implicating more than 460 people, and the first emperor ordered them to be buried alive in Xianyang.

Seven years after the reunification, the construction of the well-known Afang Palace began on the south bank of the Weihe River, employing more than 70 migrant workers every year.

At that time, the total population of the country was only 2000 million.

In the 37th year of Qin Shihuang, Qin Shihuang died in the Dune Palace on his fifth east tour.

"Historical Records Qin Shihuang Benji" records: "In July Bingyin, the first emperor collapsed on the sand dune platform."

After Qin Shihuang's death, Zhao Gao persuaded Hu Hai to threaten Li Si. The two conspired in the Dune Palace to fake Qin Shihuang's edict, and Hu Hai succeeded to the throne.

At the same time, in the name of Qin Shihuang, he accused Fusu of being unfilial as a son and Meng Tian as an unfaithful minister, and asked them to commit suicide without disobedience.

After receiving the exact news of Fusu's suicide, Hu Hai, Zhao Gao, and Li Si then ordered the convoy to travel day and night and quickly return to Xianyang.

In order to continue to deceive the subjects, the convoy did not dare to take a shortcut back to Xianyang, but put on a posture of continuing to patrol, and detoured back to Xianyang.

Due to the high temperature in the summer, Qin Shihuang's body was rotten and smelly.

In order to cover people's eyes and ears, Hu Hai and his party ordered people to buy a lot of abalones and put them on the car. The smell of abalones covered up the rotten smell of the corpses and confused everyone.

After returning to Xianyang, Hu Hai succeeded to the throne for Qin II, Zhao Gao was appointed Lang Zhongling, and Li Si was still prime minister, but the power of the court actually fell into Zhao Gao's hands.

After Zhao Gao's conspiracy succeeded, he began to poison the people around him.

He set up traps and gradually drove Li Si to a dead end. When Li Si discovered Zhao Gao's conspiracy, he wrote to report Zhao Gao.

Qin Er Shi Hu Hai not only favored Zhao Gao, but also punished Li Si, and finally cut Li Si in Xianyang.

Zhao Gaosheng was appointed prime minister, and because he could enter and leave the palace, he was specially called "Prime Minister of China".

So how did the name of the emperor of the ages and one emperor come from?

This starts with earlier history.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, princes of various countries were called "jun" or "king".

In the late Warring States period, Qin State and Qi State were once called "Emperor", but this title was not the same at that time.

Qin Wangzheng, who had already ruled the world, thought that these past titles were not enough to show his respect, so he ordered the ministers to discuss the titles.

After some discussions, the prime minister Wang Wan, the imperial historian Feng Jie, Ting Wei Li Si and others believed that the Qin Wangzheng "raised the righteous soldiers, punished the remnant thieves, and pacified the world", and his achievements were "unprecedented since ancient times, and the five emperors can't match it."

They cited traditional honorific titles, saying that "in ancient times there were emperors of heaven, emperors of land, and emperors of Thailand, and emperors of Thailand were the most expensive", and suggested that Qin Wangzheng adopt the title of "emperors of Thailand".

However, Qin Shihuang was not satisfied with this.

He only used the word "Huang" and added the word "Emperor" under it because of the "Three Emperors and Five Emperors", creating a new title of "Emperor" for himself.

Since then, "emperor" has become the title of the supreme ruler of China's feudal society.