The Southern Song of Zhao Kuo (Ningzong)

Who rules

Name

Zhao Kuo (his temple name Ningzong is given only after his death in 1224)

Title

Emperor (huangdi) of the Great Song, reign era Qingyuan

Since

24 July 1194 (Julian), by the abdication of his father Guangzong that Zhao Ruyu, Han Tuozhou and the Empress Dowager Wu arranged

Born

1168 (Qiandao 4), second son of Guangzong; thirty-one by the Western count on 1 January 1200

Family

Zhao. Empress Han (b. 1165, married 1185, d. 14 December 1200), consorts Yang (b. 1162) and Cao, the adopted boy Zhao Xun (adopted 1197), father Guangzong (b. 30 September 1147), mother-in-law line of the Han family.

Confidence

high

Appointments, deaths and edicts from the Song shi quan wen juan 29 (Qingyuan 1 to 6), checked against the English and Chinese Wikipedia pages on Ningzong, Guangzong, Han Tuozhou and the Qingyuan ban.

Overlord

None. Towards the Jin the Song emperor is the "nephew" of the Jin emperor under the Longxing treaty of 1165 (he is no longer a subject, as he was between 1141 and 1165); the yearly silver and silk (no figures given here) is still paid.

What the realm holds

• Seventeen circuits (lu) since the reform of 1144 (zh.wikipedia on the Song divisions): in our area Liangzhe West and East, Jiangnan East, Huainan East and West; the others belong to the other three researchers of this sheet.
• The capital region round Lin'an, the Grand Canal and the lower Yangtze, with the Huai line against the Jin from the sea to the Dabie hills.
• The ports of Mingzhou (renamed Qingyuan fu in 1195), Wenzhou, Hangzhou, Jiangyin and the Huating coast on this side, with Quanzhou and Guangzhou on the southern side.
• The salt yards of Liangzhe and Huainan, the tea of Jiangnan, the wine monopolies, the mints and the paper-money offices.

How it was acquired

Gaozong (Zhao Gou) refounded the dynasty at Yingtian in 1127 and settled at Hangzhou, renamed Lin'an in 1129, as the 'temporary residence' from 1138. The Huai-and-Dasan line was fixed by the treaties of 1141 and 1165. Ningzong took the throne on 24 July 1194 when Guangzong, ill in mind and refusing to preside at his own father Xiaozong's funeral, was made to give way by a palace party of Zhao Ruyu, Han Tuozhou (who carried the plan to the Empress Dowager through the palace eunuch Zhang Zongyin) and Empress Dowager Wu.

Allies and rivals

The Jin (peace of 1165; embassies at the Song New Year, the Jin birthday and the Song emperor's birthday, each year); the Xia (no contact); Dali (the horse market at Hengshan, in the other three researchers' ground); Dai Viet (the Song recognises its king as king of Annam); Goryeo and Japan (trade through Mingzhou, with an order of the 7th month of 1199 forbidding their merchants to take away copper cash); Champa, Srivijaya, the Arab and Persian merchants at the ports. The Mongols and Chinggis Khan are not yet a factor and are not named in any source we read, except that a Song chronicle entry of the 12th month of 1199 says the Jin, 'invaded by the Meng state', lost land in the north and set up a market at Taozhou (the Chinese is terse and we read it as a horse market).

The realm that morning

COURT. The emperor is amiable and easily led. Han Tuozhou rules: made Junior Preceptor (shaoshi) and Prince of Pingyuan on 22 September 1199, he already held the rank of Kaifu yitong sansi (since the 7th month of 1196), the post of Baoning jun jiedushi (since 1195) and a sinecure at the Wanshou guan; he sits in no ministry and is not chancellor. The sole chancellor is Jing Tang, right chancellor since the 1st month of 1196 (the left seat has been empty since Yu Duanli fell in the 4th month of 1196).

The Privy Council is led by Xie Shenfu, who is also a vice-chancellor (canzhi zhengshi); He Dan is the other vice-chancellor; Xu Jiyi is deputy of the Privy Council. Chen Ziqiang, Han's family tutor, is censor-in-chief. THE BAN. Daoxue is 'false learning' (weixue). A list of persons has been drawn up (59 names in the usual count; zh.wikipedia prints 53 with offices), including Zhu Xi, the dead Zhao Ruyu, the former chancellor Liu Zheng and the scholars of Wenzhou, Mingzhou and Wuzhou.

The prosecutors of 1196-98 (Hu Hong, Liu Deshou) were moved out in 1199, but the edicts of 1198 stand. FRONTIER. No fighting; the Jin and Song exchange New Year and birthday missions; the Huai garrisons keep the line from the sea at Chuzhou to the Dabie hills. WEATHER. A wet summer in 1199 (relief ordered for Lin'an in the 5th month) and floods in the last month of 1199 in Yanzhou, Quzhou, Taizhou, Xinzhou, Raozhou, Jiangzhou, Fuzhou (Jiangxi), Jianchang, Xingguo and the Guangdong prefectures.

HOUSEHOLD. Empress Han is alive; Guangzong is alive and ill at Shoukang Palace with his empress Li.

Wealth

Rice of the Yangtze delta and the Taihu polders ('when Su and Hu ripen the empire is fed'), silk of Huzhou, Suzhou, Jiaxing and Wuzhou, tea of Jiangnan and Huainan, salt of the Liangzhe and Huainan coasts (the largest single revenue of the state), wine monopolies (Shaoxing), porcelain (Longquan celadon in this area, Jingdezhen in Jiangxi), paper and books (Lin'an, Huizhou), customs and forced purchase at the ports (Mingzhou, Wenzhou, Hangzhou, Jiangyin; Quanzhou and Guangzhou on the southern sheet), paper money (the Lin'an huizi, the Sichuan jiaozi, iron-cash notes on the Huai) and a steady loss of copper cash abroad. No figures are given here.

Military

There is no single army. The Three Commands (sanya) at Lin'an, the Imperial Armies (yuqian zhu jun) of the river line under commanders-in-chief (du tongzhi) at Zhenjiang, Jiankang, Chizhou, Jiangzhou, Ezhou and Jingnan, the three Sichuan armies held in effect by the Wu family, and the Huai pacification commands at Yangzhou and Luzhou. Paymasters-general (zongling) at Zhenjiang, Jiankang, Ezhou and Chengdu keep the money apart from the generals.

There is a Yangtze fleet and there are coastal naval squadrons (shuijun), at Dinghai among other ports; their commanders are not pinned. The Jiang-Huai commissioner (zhizhi shi) is not in post on 1 January 1200. The Privy Council ordered a check of commanders, arms and ships in 1195, put the choice of commanders under its review in 1197, and set up a military examination for the frontier prefectures in the 8th month of 1199.

Commanders' names for January 1200 are not pinned except where a record says so.

Threats

• Factional purges and the unpopularity of Han Tuozhou
• Copper-cash drain and paper-money strain
• Floods and drought on the Yangtze and the Huai (the Yellow River has run into the Huai bed since 1194)
• Salt-smuggler risings in the south (in 1197 the islanders of Daxi shan, now Lantau, rose after a raid on smugglers and the prefect of Guangzhou had them killed: the annals, Guangdong, the scs sheet's ground)
• A Jin court that has turned its eyes to the northern steppe but remembers the wars of 1161

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. 18 January 1200 (Julian), the 1st day of the 1st month of Qingyuan 6New Year. 1 January 1200 is day 14 of the 12th month of Qingyuan 5. The Jin New Year mission is due at Lin'an; the Song's own was sent in the 9th month.Depends on: The calendar: we take the astronomical new moon of 18 January; the Song calendar can differ by a day.
2. 20 March 1200 (leap 2nd month, gengyin)Jing Tang becomes left chancellor, Xie Shenfu right chancellor, He Dan head of the Privy Council and vice-chancellor.Depends on: Han Tuozhou's will and Jing Tang's health. Stopped by: Jing Tang's death earlier or Han's choice of other men.
3. 4 April 1200 (leap 2nd month, yisi)Liu Zheng is restored as Junior Protector and Grand Academician and retires: the first softening towards the proscribed.Depends on: Han's wish to show some mercy now that the prosecutors are gone. Stopped by: A renewed purge.
4. 23 April 1200 (3rd month, jiazi)Zhu Xi dies at his home at Kaoting near Jianyang, aged 69 by the Western count (71 by the Chinese count of the day) (the chronicle adds that a gale uprooted trees that day).Depends on: His illness; this date is firm. Stopped by: Nothing in play except the player's own act.
5. 16 July 1200 (6th month, wuzi)The retired emperor's wife, Empress Li (Shouren taishang huanghou, posthumous name Ciyi), dies.Depends on: Her illness.
6. 17 September 1200 (8th month, xinmao)Guangzong dies at Shoukang Palace; his temple name is fixed on 21 December 1200 and he is laid in a temporary tomb at Yongchong, Shaoxing, on 15 January 1201.Depends on: His illness; he is mentally broken. Stopped by: A play that moves him.
7. 23 September 1200 (8th month, dingyou)Chancellor Jing Tang dies in office; Xie Shenfu, already right chancellor, is the senior minister.Depends on: Jing Tang's age and health.
8. 28 September 1200 (8th month, renyin)Ningzong's son Zhao Tan, Prince of Bin, dies, leaving no living son of the empress; the adopted Zhao Xun is the only boy of the house.Depends on: His illness.
9. 20 October 1200 (9th month, jiazi)Lü Zutai, brother of Lü Zuqian the philosopher, is sent into confinement for a memorial calling Han Tuozhou to be put to death and asking for Zhao Ruyu and Zhu Xi to be cleared; he is beaten and held at Lianzhou (so the chronicle; zh.wikipedia has Qinzhou).Depends on: The ban still in force.
10. 11 November 1200 (10th month, bingxu)Han Tuozhou is made Grand Tutor (taifu).Depends on: His standing.
11. 14 December 1200 (11th month, jiwei)Empress Han dies (posthumous name Gongshu). Han Tuozhou favours the pliant Consort Cao, the emperor the clever Consort Yang (guifei since 14 March 1200), who is made empress on 3 January 1202 (12th month of Jiatai 1).Depends on: Her health; the contest for the empress's seat. Stopped by: Han succeeds in placing Cao.
12. 8 December 1200 to 5 January 1201 (11th month)Zhu Xi is buried at Huangkeng in Jianyang; later accounts say some thousand mourners came despite the ban (the chronicle records only a reburial footnote; the figure is not checked).Depends on: The ban's enforcement.
13. Summer 1200Drought in Changzhou, Zhenjiang, Yangzhou, Chuzhou, Tongzhou, Taizhou, Hezhou and Jiangyin, and floods in Huizhou, Yanzhou, Quzhou and Wuzhou; relief ordered (the chronicle, year-end entry).Depends on: The weather.

Later, on the likely course

1. 5 February 1201 (Jiatai 1)The era name changes from Qingyuan to Jiatai (announced in the 12th month of 1200).Depends on: The decree has been issued.
2. 2 to 5 May 1201A great fire at Lin'an (3rd month of Jiatai 1); another in March 1202 reaches the ancestral temple.Depends on: Wooden city, dry spring; fires recur.
3. March 1202 (2nd month of Jiatai 2)The ban is lifted; Zhao Ruyu is restored on 4 March 1202. The chronicle gives the restoration of Zhu Xi's rank under the 10th month of Jiatai 1 in one reading and Jiatai 2 in another.Depends on: Han's calculation that the ban has done its work. Stopped by: A fresh need for a scapegoat.
4. July 1205 to November 1207Han Tuozhou becomes Grand Preceptor and Chancellor for military and state affairs (7th month of Kaixi 1), launches the northern war in the 5th month of 1206, and is killed at the Yujin garden on 24 November 1207 (11th month, yihai) on a secret decree obtained by Shi Miyuan, with Xia Zhen as the killer; the Wu family's Wu Xi, now in Sichuan, declares himself king of Shu in the 12th month of 1206 and is killed in the 2nd month of 1207.Depends on: Everything that follows from the court's choices before then. Stopped by: A different court policy.

Places of note

• Lin'an, the temporary capital: Palace, Privy Council, Secretariat, Three Commands, the Imperial Clan Office, the Taixue
• Shaoxing, the old temporary capital and the tombs in exile: The imperial tombs (Yongsi for Gaozong); Guangzong is laid here after he dies in September 1200 (likely course)
• Jiankang, the reserve capital (liudu): Travelling palace and the Jiangdong command

Where the sources disagree

• The OMNIA board's power note calls Han Tuozhou 'the chancellor'. On 1 January 1200 he is not: Jing Tang is the sole chancellor and Han holds court honours (shaoshi, Prince of Pingyuan) and military rank but no ministry. He reaches the chancellor's equivalent only in 1205.
• The campaign board's calendar says thousands buried Zhu Xi in 'November'. The 11th lunar month of Qingyuan 6 runs from 8 December 1200 to 5 January 1201 (Julian). The chronicle we read gives only a reburial footnote.
• The campaign board names the port 'Mingzhou (Ningbo)'. Since the 10th month of Qingyuan 1 (about November 1195) the prefecture is Qingyuan fu; the 1200 form is Qingyuan fu (Mingzhou).
• The brief says the new year of Qingyuan 6 is around late January or February 1200. On our reckoning it is about 18 January 1200 (Julian); in the Gregorian calendar the same day is about 25 January.
• The brief calls Wu Xi 'Wu Jie's son'. The histories make Wu Xi (1162-1207) the grandson of Wu Lin and son of Wu Ting; he is at Lin'an as deputy commander of the Palace Command on 1 January 1200 (Scc covers the Wu family in Sichuan).

Evidence: The court and the ban are well documented by the Song shi quan wen (the chronicle of Ningzong's reign), which we read for 1195-1207; prefects and local commanders are seldom named for a given winter. The sheet's circuits and prefectures are written from knowledge of the Dili zhi and not re-read line by line.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: A rough outline of the east. The Song's whole ground on this sheet is carried by the provinces and lords of all four researchers; this part only gives the realm a base colour in the east.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Continuation of the Comprehensive Mirror for Aid in Government, Bi Yuan (畢沅), completed by Feng Jiwu after his death (late eighteenth century, finished after 1801, from Song and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's continuous month-by-month chronicle of the Song and Yuan centuries, compiled from the Song shi, the Liao, Jin and Yuan histories, Li Tao, Li Xinchuan and other Song sources. Read online
• Outline and Details of Two Reigns (thirteenth century, after 1224). A Song outline-and-detail chronicle of exactly the two reigns around 1200, drawn from the court's daily records. Read online
• Annals of the Western Xia, Wu Guangcheng (吳廣成) (1825 to 1827, compiled from Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's year-by-year reconstruction of Tangut history from the Chinese histories, since the Xia left no surviving annals of their own in Chinese. Read online
• History of the Song, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1345, from the Song veritable records, state histories and the Huiyao). The official history of the Southern Song, which ruled from Lin'an (Hangzhou) in 1200. Read online
• History of Song, chapters 488 and 489: Jiaozhi, Dali, Champa, Zhenla, Pagan, Srivijaya, Java, Brunei, Chola and Tambralinga, Toqto'a (Tuotuo) and the Yuan history office, from the Song court records (1343 to 1345, from Song veritable records and court diaries). The Chinese court's record of its southern neighbours, compiled from Song archives. Read online
• History of the Jin, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office, with Ouyang Xuan among the chief compilers (1343 to 1344, from the Jin veritable records and the Jin national history). The official history of the Jurchen empire that ruled north China and Manchuria in 1200. Read online
• History of the Song, the chapters on Xia and on foreign states, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1345). The Song court's accounts of its neighbours, each arranged as an annal of embassies and wars. Read online
• Record of the Great Jin State, Attributed to Yuwen Maozhao (宇文懋昭); the attribution is doubtful (preface dated 1234; probably assembled in the Southern Song from Song and Jin material, with later accretions). A Song-side history of the Jin, with annals for each emperor and chapters on institutions, customs, the capitals and the Jurchen way of life. Read online
• The Unofficial History of Nanzhao, Yang Shen; revised by Hu Wei (16th century, revised 1775, from Dali and Yunnan traditions and lost local histories). The kingdom of Dali has no surviving text of 1200: its own records were destroyed in the Mongol conquest and after, and the Song shi's Dali entry ends in 1175. Read online
• Draft Compilation of the Collected Statutes of the Song, Various; the Song huiyao were compiled by the Song state, the surviving draft reassembled by Xu Song from the Yongle dadian in the nineteenth century (the original Song compilations date from the eleventh to the thirteenth century; the surviving extracts were recovered in 1809 to 1820 and printed in 1936). Dated extracts from the Song government's own statute collections, arranged by office. Read online
• Miscellaneous Notes on Court and Country since the Jianyan Era, Li Xinchuan (李心傳) (first series 1202, second series 1216). A contemporary handbook of the Southern Song state, written in Sichuan by the historian Li Xinchuan and finished in its first part in 1202, two years after the start of 1200. Read online
• Classified Statutes and Regulations of the Qingyuan Era, Xie Shenfu (謝深甫) and the Song law commission (compiled 1198 to 1202 and promulgated in 1202). The Song law code as it stood in 1200, compiled on the orders of Ningzong's court between 1198 and 1202 and classed by subject: officials and their discipline, the examinations, the army and the frontier garrisons, taxation and corvee, the salt, tea and liquor monopolies, maritime trade and the treatment of foreign merchants, the post roads, criminal procedure and prisons. Read online

8 more in the sources library for South China.