After leaving Taiyuan Prefecture, we went all the way north, passing through Xinzhou, Daizhou, Yuzhou, Guizhou, and finally arrived at Beiping Prefecture.
Xindai was originally the hinterland of Hedong, so it didn't matter, it was still the same. But Yuzhou, Guizhou and Yunzhou next door were quite different.
In short, the population of the prefectures and counties outside Yanmen Pass has dropped to a very pitiful level due to the tug of war in the past thirty years. The imperial court had to send troops to the four counties of Cao, Song, Bian, and Hua in Guanzhong, Guanbei, and even Henan.
People from small prefectures and small areas immigrated to enrich their local household registration.
After such operations, the local area became much more pleasing to the eye. It no longer looked like a barren place with thousands of villages and thorn trees growing there. It was hard to say how wealthy it was, but it was indeed stable enough and had many resources per capita.
On this day, in a village outside Xingtang County, Yuzhou, Zhao Kuangming and Yao Jie took shelter from the wind and snow. "Is the stick man from Guanxi?" Zhao Kuangming took a bowl of sheep soup and thanked him repeatedly.
"It's from Yanchi County, Lingzhou. There's not much land there, it's only suitable for raising horses." The old man sat down and said with a nostalgic look: "Yanchi County is actually good, but there is not much land. My home is not in Tiezhuquan, otherwise I wouldn't leave.
.”
"But there is a lack of water?" Zhao Kuangming drank a bowl of mutton soup and praised it profusely.
"Short of water." The old man nodded and said: "When the saint governed Lingxia, he built many ponds, but there was still a lack of water. Without water, no matter how much land there is, it can only be left there and cannot be cultivated. It can only be raised.
We’ve ordered livestock, and we can’t even raise enough livestock.”
"Isn't Yuzhou also short of water?" Zhao Kuangming asked.
"It's better than Yanchi County." The old man said: "The snow in winter is heavier than there, and the weather thaws after the weather warms up, which is perfect for spring plowing. Just look at the pasture outside. They are all pastures, but the pastures are different. They are different.
Class three, six or nine."
Zhao Kuangming recalled it. Indeed, the grass in Yuzhou is still quite lush, but it seems that it cannot be compared with Guangchengze in Ruzhou. The climate there is milder, with mountains, forests, lakes, grasslands, and hot springs. No wonder it comes from Han.
Since then, the emperor has been in the Cultivation Palace there to review the cavalry troops, which is really good.
But in places like Henan, where growing grains has higher returns, it is impossible to turn it into pasture. Guangchengze has not been able to expand so far, and is facing the threat of shrinking pastures and opening up cultivated land, which is very different from the Yinshan area.
"This bowl of mutton soup is good, Mr. Zhang. It's cold in winter, so I'll feel comfortable after drinking a bowl of it." After Zhao Kuangming finished drinking the mutton soup, he gestured, and his entourage took out half a coin and put it on the table.
"You don't need so much," the old man declined.
"I have to buy some cooked meat later, take it." Zhao Kuangming said with a smile.
After hearing what he said, the old man accepted it and asked his son, who was killing a sheep in the courtyard, to pick out a few pieces of good meat and steam it. Zhao Kuangming watched their work with interest.
Zhang Weng had three sons. The eldest son was a soldier in the government and was drafted to guard the cowhide pass. The second son was scraping sheep skins and the third son was killing sheep.
Their movements were very skillful. There was a wound on the sheep's neck made by a sharp knife. The iron hook penetrated through the wound, hooked the entire neck, and hung on the wooden beam.
The old man's second son carefully scraped the sheepskin with a sharp knife, making a rustling sound. The meeting was coming to an end, and the sheepskin was completely removed and set aside.
The skinless sheep hung there, swaying gently in the wind. A strong woman came over, took the sheep off the hook, put it on the chopping board aside, and cut it with a knife and ax.
"Bang bang!" The athletic woman's movements were very steady, accurate, and powerful. If she was sent to fight, she could at least stand on the city wall and hit people with an axe.
"Wow!" Another woman under the eaves is much more delicate. She is marinating mutton.
This is a habit brought from northern Guanzhou. Since the rise of the three-crop rotation system, in late autumn, every household will kill part of their livestock and make bacon.
Most of the meat is sold in the market, and a small part is kept for one's own consumption.
This kind of behavior is widespread, and is practiced in almost the entire county, entire township, and entire village. It has already begun to take shape as a custom. In a few decades or more than a hundred years, it will definitely become a serious custom.
Curing meat also requires costs. In addition to coarse salt, some spices seem to be added, which made Zhao Kuangming look a little strange. There are relatively few livestock in Jiangling Prefecture, and they don’t add much spices when marinating.
, so he felt very fresh.
"The salt here is not as good as the green salt from Hu Luo Yan Pond." Seeing Zhao Kuangming staring at it, the woman did not feel shy and said generously: "I heard it was fished out from the grassland pond in the north. It's not very good. To say the best.
The best salt must be Fengzhou seal salt, which is a tribute. The saint was lucky enough to eat seal salt since he was a child. Even now, the saint eats steamed cakes made of Fengzhou white flour every day and eats them with seal salt.
.”
"How do you know?" Zhao Kuangming asked with a smile.
"If people from all over the country say this, how can it be false?" the woman said matter-of-factly. "Where are they from all over the country?"
"There are people from Lingzhou, Youzhou, and Xiazhou, but Suizhou has the most people." Zhao Kuangming laughed dumbly.
"Is this spice?" he asked.
"Pepper can remove the fishy smell." The woman asked in surprise, "Don't the officials know about this?"
"I know." Zhao Kuangming said with a smile: "In the past, Yuan Zai made a lot of money and was extremely arrogant. Later, he was sentenced to death by Emperor Daizong of the Tang Dynasty. After the house was ransacked, dozens of corals, 500 taels of stalactites, and 800 stones of pepper were found."
"Who is Yuan Zai?" the woman asked, "Why did you collect so much pepper?" "The prime minister of the Tang Dynasty."
"No wonder Tang Dynasty died. This Yuan Zai was too ignorant. Pepper is not expensive, so why not just go to the market to buy it?" the woman sighed.
"Pepper is not expensive?" Zhao Kuangming felt that his knowledge had been subverted: "Hu merchants from the Western Regions brought it all the way, so it is very expensive. Did you know that pepper is produced in Tianzhu?"
"Huh?" The woman opened her mouth wide in surprise.
"Pepper used to be very expensive, but now it's not that expensive." The old man came over and said, "The officials don't know, but these peppers are shipped from Mizhou and Haizhou."
"Zhang Weng is so knowledgeable that he even knows about Haizhou and Mizhou." Zhao Kuangming laughed and asked, "Could it be that the big food merchant Hu Shang came here by sea?"
The old man was a little unsure and said vaguely: "Maybe so. However, I heard from my elder brother's colleagues that the pepper shipped to us is...
At least the number of trinity is produced in Annan."
Zhao Kuangming was severely shocked again.
He was fond of reading and knew that in the pre-Tang Dynasty, most of the pepper was transported overland by the camel caravans of Sogdian and Persian Hu merchants. If the large-scale Hu merchants transported it to Mizhou by sea ship, the quantity would not be comparable to that of the camel caravans.
.
In fact, he once thought that if the price of pepper were lowered, would more people buy it and make more money? He deduced it carefully and found that it was very likely.
Unfortunately, few people do this.
Pepper was still used as a medicinal material in the early Tang Dynasty, and it was expensive. Later, Hu merchants discovered that the Central Plains needed this kind of thing, so they shipped more of it. The price gradually dropped, and it was gradually used as a seasoning. To this day
, the price of pepper has dropped a lot, only a fraction of that in the early Tang Dynasty, but it is still not affordable for ordinary people.
But what he saw in front of him overturned his understanding. A family of soldiers actually used a lot of pepper when marinating meat. Could it be that the price has been reduced recently?
"When did Annan produce pepper?" Zhao Kuangming was a little confused.
"I don't know about this. My elder brother just heard others say so." The old man said: "But who can say for sure? Annan is also under the rule of the imperial court, right? If pepper can be widely grown, it may be a good thing. It didn't happen before.
I think, and now I find, the meat is inedible without pepper."
"Why?"
"If you don't use pepper, it tastes too fishy and smelly, and you can't even sell it at a high price. Even if you eat it by yourself, you still feel sick," the old man said. "What did you do when there was no pepper?"
"Some grass roots are spicier, so we can barely use them." "How do they compare to pepper?"
"It's hard to compare, it's hard to compare." The old man smiled and said, "Our family can afford pepper anyway, so why bother looking for horseradish?"
"Ya Nei." Yao Jie walked over and whispered: "Annan does produce pepper. It only happened a few years ago. Last year in Luoyang, I met Jing Haijun, a person from Zou Yuan, and he said that the people there grow pepper.
There are more and more, and it seems that it was ordered by the imperial court. But Annan pepper was also transferred here by Hu merchants who were big eaters. They had many ships, were familiar with the sea conditions, and had great navigation skills.
It was high and the ship was good, so after seeing that the demand for pepper in the North was increasing year by year, they purchased large quantities of Annan pepper and transported it to Haizhou, Mizhou, Dengzhou and other places for sale, and made a lot of profits.
"
"What if-" Zhao Kuangming turned around, looked at Yao Ji, and said: "If every household in the Northland buys pepper, how big of a business will it be? Money is exciting, what kind of business is the most profitable? Not coral, pearls, jade, etc.
"It's a rare product, but a common product that everyone needs." "It's indeed a good deal!" Yao Jie also sighed: "If you manage it properly, being rich and rivaling the country will not be a problem."
He could see that households in the north that implemented the three-crop rotation system had a large number of old and weak livestock that needed to be slaughtered every year. Even when the market was good, strong livestock could not be killed.
One household may not have much, just one or two cows and more than 20 sheep, but what about a thousand households, ten thousand households or even one hundred thousand households? What is the concept? If pepper is used to marinate meat to remove odor, then
How big of a market must it be? I can’t imagine it.
"Is there so much pepper?" Zhao Kuangming murmured to himself: "Should we plant all the land in Annan with pepper? Is it possible?"
Zhao Kuangming and Yao Jie did not know that in the Portuguese countryside in the 15th century, every household began to slaughter livestock and marinate meat in late autumn. Because of the strong smell, spices were needed to suppress it. As the three major spices (pepper)
, nutmeg bark, cloves), the demand for pepper is increasing year by year, and Venetian and Genoese merchants make a lot of money from it - they get goods from the Turks, and the Turks obtain goods from the Arabian maritime traders.
Purchasing in India.
But one day when the Turks implemented a trade embargo, the spices and silk were all cut off, forcing the Portuguese to go to sea to find spices. As it developed later, Portugal naturally became the first colonial empire.
Today's agricultural production model in northern Daxia is very peculiar.
Wool has promoted the prosperity of the woolen textile industry, and woolen cloth has now begun to become popular in the Yangtze River Basin. Although people are in the south, the winter is really cold, and the demand for woolen cloth is no less than that of northerners.
The dairy industry has also experienced great development. Milk powder has become one of the standard dry rations in the military. Officers say it is a good idea because it greatly reduces the logistical pressure.
Then there is meat. Under the three-crop rotation system, taking 60 acres of land as an example, you can raise at least 20 cows. If you don’t raise cows, you can raise more than 300 sheep. Cows and sheep have a life span.
People die of old age, illness or accidents every year, and the amount of slaughter is huge. Large-scale slaughter usually starts in late autumn. Due to the level of processing, the smell of meat is very strong, so it is best to cover it with spices. Isn’t this just creating something out of thin air?
A huge market?
Of course, the premise is to bring down the price of spices. This requires large-scale planting and a relatively developed shipping industry, because pepper cannot be grown in cold places.
"I suspect that the saints foresaw this day more than 20 years ago." Zhao Kuangming sighed: "In that poor place in Annan, even if the people plow the land and plow out sparks, can they grow so much pepper? Are they willing?"
"In front of the axe, there is nothing that you are unwilling to do." Yao Jie also sighed repeatedly: "As long as the people need this kind of thing, make money, and make a lot of money, then there is no way to stop it. The Annan states may have to give it to the North for the rest of their lives.
People have planted pepper, but it’s not enough if they don’t plant it.”
