Tang Dynasty military system

   Defines the battle of attacking more with less, breaking the city and breaking the formation as “going into battle”, with the two sides having the same strength as “middle battle”, and the one with more hits and less is “down battle”. Secondly, according to the kill rate of the enemy, the kill rate of more than 40% is designated as “upper”, 20% is “middle”, and less than 10% is “lower”. In this way, the military merit of “going into battle and winning” is the largest, and the military merit of “going to battle and getting lower” is the smallest. Of course, there are many soldiers participating in a battle. When the “formation” and “acquisition” are the same, according to the specific contributions of the soldiers, the generals’ merits are divided into one, two, and three. For example, the first rank of “playing and winning” can get 5th rank, the second rank is 4th rank, and the third rank is only 3rd rank. The “turn” here is the unit used to measure credit at that time. Others, such as “Gaining in the Battle” and “Gaining in the Battle” are all 4th Rank; The first rank is two rounds for the middle battle, and the second and third ranks of each different “formation gain” are reduced by one turn respectively. So far, the Tang Dynasty has formed a military merit system with a total of 25 levels

Where two out of ten turns into the upper pillar country, it is regarded as the second rank; for every tenth turn into the pillar state, it is regarded as the second rank; for the tenth transformation into the upper guard army, it is regarded as the third rank; The captain of the light chariot is regarded as the fourth rank; the seventh rank is the captain of the light chariot, and the fourth rank is regarded; the sixth rank is the captain of the cavalry, and the fifth rank is regarded; the fifth rank is the captain of the cavalry, and the fifth rank is regarded; For the Xiaoqiwei, it is regarded as the sixth rank; the third is to become a flying cavalry captain, and it is regarded as the sixth rank; the second to the cloud cavalry commander, it is regarded as the seventh rank; the first to the martial cavalry captain, it is regarded as the seventh rank. “The higher the rank of the officer, the more revolutions required.

   Here is a key word to pay attention to: “vision”. The so-called “vision” means comparison and equality, that is to say, the grade of an officer is only compared with the corresponding grade. In the Tang Dynasty, the ranks and positions of officials were separated, and their sequence was divided into three categories: scattered officials, service officials and honorable officials. The sequence of casual officials is equivalent to today’s rank, and determines the salary and treatment level of officials. The sequence of officers is equivalent to today’s positions, which are the specific duties of officials. An official may not have a position, but must have a “random rank”, that is, a rank. The system of honorary officers “was originally to reward soldiers, and then gradually spread to the dynasty”, as an honor awarded to meritorious personnel. Although honored officers have grades, they are not real jobs like casual officials. What is the attraction of the honorary system?

   First, there is no background restriction on the appointment of honorary officers. As long as they have military merit, they can be awarded honors regardless of their background, and if it is a particularly important military merit, they can also be awarded super-specially. For example, in the nineteenth year of Zhenguan (645), Tang Taizong personally conquered Liaodong. In the battle against the city of Andi, the civilian Xue Rengui, dressed in white, cut thieves and generals with his hands. He was invincible and made extraordinary achievements. After the war, he not only won the honor, but was also named a guerrilla general from the fifth rank (scattered rank), and was appointed as the commander of Yunquan Mansion Guoyi (between the fifth rank and the sixth rank). real job). Not only civilians can be awarded honors, but even the “voice people” of Taichang Temple can. The so-called “sound people” is the general term for the official music people in the Tang Dynasty, and their status is lower than that of the commoners. However, the Tang Dynasty stipulated that “people who are too often voiced will be awarded five-rank or above, and they will not get rid of the book unless they are conscripted.” Expelled from China and became a free man.

  Second, officers enjoy many preferential conditions. First, honorable officials can get a certain amount of private land. The Tang Dynasty stipulated that “every official and honorable person will be awarded Yongye Tian”, and the descendants of hereditary will be exempted from compulsory service and become the official’s private field. Second, an honored officer can formally enter the official career by requesting from the Ministry of Personnel to participate in the ranks of the rank-and-file officials, but he must be degraded when he is rank-and-file. The highest-ranking honorary officer—Shangzhu Kingdom (Second Rank) can only be assigned to the official position on the sixth rank, and the lower ranks decrease in descending order. Thirdly, even if the honored officer cannot enter the ranks of the staff officer, there is still a chance to get the rank. According to the regulations, officers who do not have real positions must take turns to serve as the military guards in the Ministry of War and other states. Those who have served for four years in the ranks below the Zhuguo Kingdom and five years in the ranks of Xiaoqiwei can participate in the selection of the Ministry of War. The corresponding grades can be obtained. The losers can participate in the selection again after the second dormitory cycle expires. Fourth, the children of high-ranking officials have the opportunity to enter the Central Government Academy. In the Tang Dynasty, the central government school was Guozijian, which had six schools including Guozixue, Taixue, Simenxue, Law, Calligraphy and Maths, each with a fixed source of students and posts. Among them, the sons of the second-grade honorary officials, county officials and the fourth-ranking officials with the third-rank honorary seal can enter the National School; the sons of the honorable officials with the seal of the third-rank and above can enter the Taixue; the sons of the honorary officials of the third-rank and above without a seal and the fourth-rank honorary seal can enter the fourth-rank door study. Fifth, the children of honorable officials have the qualifications to enter the official position by relying on the door, although the official rank at the time of entry is only the lowest grade nine. Excess awards can also be passed on to family members. In the Tang Dynasty, it was clearly stipulated that “If the honorable person has a surplus in the upper column, it will be awarded to relatives above the Zhou Dynasty, and no one will give things.”

   Third, the award of honorary officers is very formal. In the early Tang Dynasty, special personnel were usually sent to the army after the war to record military exploits, and then the censors of the censorship station checked the authenticity of the military exploits, and the Si Xun Langzhong of the Ministry of Personnel reviewed whether the awards were consistent with the military exploits. After reviewing the military merits, after being approved by the emperor, the Ministry of War will issue a formal “complaint”. In the “indictment”, starting from the prime minister, the officials who examine and verify at each level and the copyists must sign and seal, and stamp a special “seal of the official department of the Shangshu”, which is particularly solemn and formal.

  Because of this, in the early Tang Dynasty, for civilians, it was an attractive way out for the civilians to be awarded officers through military merit. In a letter unearthed from TLF Astana Tomb No. 24, it is recorded that a person named Zhao Yishen in Luoyang wrote a letter to his grandmother in Xizhou in the 20th year of Emperor Taizong’s Zhenguan (646), and mentioned in the letter The whole family was “unspeakable joy” to learn that Xizhou’s eldest brother was awarded the seventh-rank honorary officer Yunqiwei. However, Lieutenant Cloud Cavalry was only the second-to-last in the entire order of honorary officers, which shows that it was a very respectable honor to be awarded an honorary officer at that time. Not only civilians valued the award of honors, but the literati and officials at that time, and even the children of court officials, regarded military merits and honorary titles as a shortcut to enter the officialdom. Therefore, the Tang Dynasty’s respect for martial arts had a lot to do with the implementation of the honorary official system.

   But since Tang Gaozong and Wu Zetian, “the recipients of the medals have made a lot of money.” After the establishment of the Jiedushi system, Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty asked Jiedushi to organize military merit records by himself. In order to win over the military, the generals often falsely reported their military exploits, and the status of honorary officials was not as good as before. After the An-Shi Rebellion, the treasury was empty, the soldiers and soldiers had merit, and the court could not reward them with money, so they had to use honorable officials to reward their merits. The proliferation of honored officials is not only without a sense of honor, but also the preferential policies are more difficult to fulfill. The honored officials system has completely lost its attractiveness, and the glory of the Tang Dynasty army has also become a thing of the past.