The real Guan Yu: Lu Bu’s beautiful wife whom Guan Yu proposed to marry many times finally belonged to Cao Cao

Introduction: In the biography, Pei Songzhi quoted a passage from the "Book of Shu", which is very interesting: "Cao Gong and Liu Bei surrounded Lu Bu in Xiapi, Guan Yu called the Duke, and sent Qin Yilu to ask for help. (It is known that Bu He must be defeated) begging for his wife (requiring that Lu Bu’s wife be given to him in the future), and the public agreed to marry her. When she failed, she repeatedly proposed to the public. "This Lu Bu’s wife must be very beautiful, but there is no mention of Diao Chan in history (it is said that). It was the name of a female official in the Han Palace), Guan Yu repeatedly requested, Cao Cao took notice, and later captured her and took a look at it for himself. It looked really good, so he simply kept it for himself instead of giving it to Guan Yu.

This article: "Lao Gaixian Lectures on Literary History" is reprinted from Phoenix History

Someone once said that there was a period when saints appeared in China, regardless of Yao, Shun, Yu, and Tang , Wen, Wu, and Zhou Gong were all born before Confucius. This was a period when saints were born. After Confucius, there was only one "sub-sage" Mencius, and never again. China has always valued literature over martial arts, so the saints were the first to publish literature - from Tang Yao to Mencius, and then they came to martial arts. So about six hundred years after Confucius, a martial saint came out. He was Guan Yu of the Shu Han Dynasty during the Three Kingdoms. He wrote "The True Scripture of the Great Emperor of Conquering Demons in the Three Realms". It was more than a thousand years after his death that his soul was in Fuji. He came to the altar in person, held the hands of the two people supporting the altar, and wrote it on the sand table. Therefore, its reliability is better than that of the Analects of Confucius and the four gospels of the New Testament that were recorded by later generations. Don't talk too much, let's get back to the real biography of Guan Yu - Twenty-Five Histories, "Three Kingdoms" written by Chen Shou and annotated by Pei Songzhi of Jin Dynasty. I copied out a few paragraphs and gave a brief explanation:

Guan Yu, whose courtesy name was Yunchang and whose original name was Changsheng, was from Jieren, Hedong (now Jie County, Shanxi). He fled to Zhuo County. The First Master (Liu Bei) gathered his disciples in the countryside, and Yu and Zhang Fei defended them. The first ruler was Pingyuan, and Yu and Fei were the commanders and horses of the other tribes, and they divided and unified the tribes.

Judging from this paragraph, it is wrong for "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" to say that Guan and Zhang were horse archers (horse archers) and infant archers (walking archers) at that time. The Sima of another department in a county is probably a security captain with dozens of soldiers, and perhaps an officer who catches thieves. Originally, if a good friend became a county magistrate, my buddies would have to hold official positions no matter what, so there was no point in becoming archers.

Since the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", all those who have sworn vows in the world have said that they must learn the loyalty of "Taoyuan". But according to historical records, were Liu, Guan, and Zhang sworn sworn brothers? "The former master slept with the two of them in the same bed, and they were like brothers. They sat together (in a place with many people), stood around all day long, and followed the late master." Zhang Fei's biography also said that "Yu Changfei was several years old. Always treat him as a brother."

Let’s see that history only mentions “Enruo brothers” and does not mention sworn worship. In the novel, Liu Bei said, "Zilong (Zhao Yun) is still my younger brother", so he called Zhao Yun "General Zhao Si" in the drama.

Regarding Zhou Cang, in the sixty-sixth chapter of "The Romance", it is said that Lu Su asked Guan Yu to discuss the Jingzhou issue. Zhou Cang shouted sternly at the foot of the stairs: "Only the virtuous people live in the land of the world." ..." Guan Yunchang scolded: "You can't say much about the affairs of this country, but go quickly." This incident really happened in history, but I didn't record the name of the person who stood at the foot of the steps and dared to shout loudly. Who is his name? He is probably a guard captain with a status like Zhou Cang. Just as there is a record of "scraping the arm to cure poison" in the biography, but it is only said to be a doctor without a name, and "The Romance" says it is Hua Tuo. Of course, it is also possible. Probably Luo Guanzhong wrote Zhou Cang based on the scripts of Song and Yuan Dynasties. Such a character.

Zhuge Liang asked Guan Yu to conquer Sun Quan in the east and reject Cao Cao in the north, but he refused to listen. Sun Quan sent an envoy to ask for a marriage, but he cursed: My tiger girl will marry your dog son! He almost killed the matchmaker. Such unlucky matchmakers are probably rare in ancient and modern times. As a result, he still fought on both sides and was defeated and died. If he married his daughter to Sun Quan's son, he might be able to achieve Donghe Sun Quan's strategy. But An didn't know that Sun Quan would use Miss Guan as a hostage to blackmail him, and he would let his daughter suffer in vain. There were too many such things in history.

Regarding Guan Yu's defeat, Pei Songzhi quoted "Shu Shu" and "Wu Shu" as annotations in the biography of Guan Yu, with slight discrepancies.

On the other hand, "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is well written, much better than Yue Fei's "Jing Zhong Zhuan". He synthesized folklore and official history into novels, which generally penetrated into the folk and replaced the official history. Therefore, everyone admired Guan Yu and promoted it, so Guan Yu was promoted from a king to an emperor - "the great emperor who conquers demons in the three realms". ". This was granted by the emperor and was not a folk fabrication. Fortunately, there are many emperor-level gods in the sky. As far as I know, there are the Jade Emperor (surnamed Zhang), Emperor Fuyou (a Jinshi of the Tang Dynasty, Lu Yan, named Dongbin, who lived in Muzha Xianggong Temple in Taiwan), Emperor Zhenwu of the North Pole (It is said to be an allusion to Emperor Hui, the eldest grandson of Ming Taizu), Emperor Wenchang (surnamed Zhang, Zhang Xianzhong recognized his family name), so it doesn't hurt to add a new one. They all see through fame and fortune, so they don't argue.

Except for the Communists, everyone in Peiping’s merchants worships Guan Gong. They don’t want to imitate his majestic and arrogant attitude towards the scholar-bureaucrats. Who would dare to come and buy things after imitating this? But learn from him his faith. To be genuine is to be trustworthy, and to never go back on your words is righteousness. Mr. Zhongshan said that Chinese businessmen do not need to sign a contract and are much more creditworthy than Japanese businessmen. Only when businessmen have faith and righteousness can they have the basic conditions to stand in society, and then they can make money and get rich. This is very meaningful, but it does not apply to some modern businessmen. It should be explained in another way, and we must learn from Guan Gong to use the big sword. Just kill a guest and tell him to leave with all his money.

When Guan Yu is mentioned, people can't help but think of red face, long beard, Qinglong Yanyue Sword, red rabbit horse, etc. I put the textual research on Chi Mian at the end of this article. According to the order of Guan Yu's biography, I will first talk about what weapons the old man used. Let me find another paragraph from the biography of Guan Yu:

In the fifth year of Jian'an, Cao Gong went to the east, the former lord rushed to Yuan Shao, and Cao Gong captured Yu and returned (maybe similar to the soldiers trapped in Tushan and Zhang Liao in "The Romance") It is different to persuade him to surrender), he paid homage to the partial general (probably similar to today's major general), and the courtesy was very generous. Shao sent General Yan Liang to attack Liu Yan, the prefect of Dongjun, in Baima. Duke Cao sent Zhang Liao and Yu as the vanguard to attack. When Yu saw Liang Huigai (a general's ear, with a big flag or umbrella behind him), he spurred Liang into the crowd and beheaded him in return.

Although "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is a novel, it is not too far from official history, and it is not like other historical chapter novels that are full of random chapters. Most of what he describes are facts. However, sometimes a few people are added, and sometimes the actual real people are omitted. For example, the general Xiang Chong mentioned in "Departure List" is not mentioned at all. The part about Guan Yu is also seen in except Chi Tu Ma and Zhou Cang. Official history.

Cao Cao knew that Guan Yu could not stay for a long time, so he let him go.