Standalone Northern and Southern Dynasties

Chapter 543 Thunderbolt Cannon

When Su Ze picked up the pen, he had to decide on the teaching materials first.

The Book of Filial Piety alone cannot meet the needs of selecting talents.

Su Ze first gave an order to the Government Affairs Hall, requesting Su Tong (a ritual official who quoted from classics) of the Rites Department to preside over and discuss the main scope of teaching materials together with the officials of the Rites Department.

The popular Confucian classics nowadays are mainly the Five Classics of the Imperial College of the Han Dynasty, namely, Book of Songs, Book of History, Book of Rites, Book of Changes, and Spring and Autumn Annals.

The Han Dynasty established the Five Classics Doctorate, who was responsible for studying the Five Classics.

In addition to the Five Classics, the Tang Dynasty added the Three Rites of Zhou and Yili, as well as the Zuo Zhuan, Gongyang Zhuan, and Guliang Zhuan, making the Nine Classics. In the Kaicheng period, the stone classics were engraved, and the Filial Piety, the Analects, and Erya were added to make the Twelve Classics. The Southern Song Dynasty added Mencius, making the Thirteen Classics.

The Thirteen Classics are too complicated, and the three commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals, namely Zuo Zhuan, Gongyang Zhuan and Guliang Zhuan, have too many words, making them very difficult to learn.

In addition, the Spring and Autumn Annals also contains profound meanings and has been annotated and commented on by many dynasties. Each school and faction has its own interpretation, making it quite controversial.

In the letter Su Ze wrote to Su Tong, he decided to focus on the Four Classics of Poetry, Book of History, Rites and Changes, and add the Book of Filial Piety which was already being tested, making the Five Classics as compulsory subjects.

The remaining classics are optional subjects, not compulsory subjects.

After establishing the scope of the examination, Su Ze next decided to promote the school palace system in prefectures and counties.

At present, Su Ze is only planning to set up a provincial school at the state level, and then establish a county school in the county after the world is pacified.

The benefit of establishing a provincial school is that it can naturally establish a provincial-level pre-selection system among the Chongwen Pavilions. If the students studying in the provincial school are unable or unwilling to continue their studies in the Chongwen Pavilion, they can be granted the positions of provincial clerks or minor officials.

Although Su Ze had a system, as the territory expanded, there were still not enough qualified and reliable officials.

At present, the Government Affairs Hall can only provide three clerks summoned by the system to new officials who are sent to border areas. As officials need to be appointed in the newly annexed states, more local scholars must be employed.

Su Ze naturally handed over the matter of preparing for the provincial school to the Government Affairs Hall.

In the future, if students want to study in Chongwen Pavilion, they must study in the provincial school and pass the imperial examination in the provincial school before they can study in Chongwen Pavilion.

Su Ze had already written down the entire system of the imperial examination and handed it over to the Government Affairs Hall to be formulated into decrees. Nowadays, there were many vacancies for officials throughout the country, and the provincial school held an imperial examination every spring for the scholars of the province.

Scholars who passed the provincial school examination were named Juren, and they could go to Chongwen Pavilion to participate in the next round of imperial examinations.

Those who passed the Chongwen Pavilion examination were called Jiansheng and could enter the Chongwen Pavilion to study.

Scholars who passed the Chongwen Pavilion examination were called Jinshi and could be granted official positions by the Government Affairs Hall.

Su Ze put down his pen. This system was quite different from the imperial examination system that was improved in later generations. It was more like the academy model in the early Ming Dynasty, which gave equal importance to the Imperial College and the imperial examination.

But this is the only way for now, as it is often the case in the early years of a dynasty.

On the one hand, high-level talents quickly emerge in troubled times like gold panning in the sand, and there is no shortage of top talents.

However, there is an extreme shortage of talent at the grassroots level. There is even a situation where dynasties change but the local government remains the same, allowing many "remnants of the previous dynasty" to infiltrate the new dynasty.

After the general direction of the imperial examination is determined, the rest of the matters can be left to the Council of Government to plan.

Su Ze walked out of the barracks and looked at the snowflakes falling from the sky. This year's winter in Bingzhou was colder than in previous years.

Su Ze knew that, in general, the end of the Northern and Southern Dynasties was the end of the Little Ice Age, and the overall trend was getting warmer. But it was also a period of extreme climate change. Last year, the grassland suffered a snowstorm that was rare in a decade, and this year, the snow in Bingzhou was earlier than in previous years.

With heavy snow, life in Jinyang City was even more difficult.

Because Su Ze had burned down the trees near Jinyang, heating was scarce in Jinyang City.

If it is colder this year, I am afraid Erzhu Rong will not live until next spring.

However, the more it is at this time, the more we cannot take it lightly. A trapped beast will still fight, and Erzhu Rong is also a master at finding opportunities.

Su Ze sent a message to Yu Jin and Dugu Xin, asking them to defend the city this winter and not leave, so as to trap Erzhu Rong to death!

At the same time, the new weapons secretly researched by Gong Cao were also transported from Guanzhong to Hedong via the pontoon bridge of Pujindu and delivered to Yu Jin's army stationed in Linfen.

"General, this is a Thunderbolt Cannon that was improved from the Thunderbolt."

Yu Jin looked at Su Yuanwailang, the official in charge of the Ministry of Works in front of him. It was said that he would be promoted to the rank of craftsman by Duke Su Jun just because he invented the thunder cannon.

The so-called thunder cannon is actually an upgraded version of the thunder bomb used by Yang Jia in Yizhou.

A thunder bomb is made by filling a clay pot with gunpowder, detonating the gunpowder, and then using the fragments of the pot to kill the enemy.

The lethality of black gunpowder is actually limited. Its main function is to scare people, to scare the superstitious Liao people living in the mountains.

In comparison, the Thunderbolt Cannon does have some practical value.

The pottery jar was still filled with gunpowder, but this time iron nails were mixed inside and a delayed fuse was also set. When it was thrown onto the city wall through a catapult and exploded, it could effectively kill the soldiers defending the city.

Doctor Su from the Engineering Department said that the Engineering Department was also developing another kind of artillery that could fire iron shells with greater power than the catapult.

However, the development of this type of artillery encountered many difficulties. Both the ratio of gunpowder and the strength of the gun body encountered many hardships. I am afraid that it will be useless when fighting Erzhu Rong.

But this kind of thunder cannon is enough.

Yu Jin ordered the use of thunder cannons and launched an attack on several military strongholds of Erzhu Rong near Linfen.

When the thunder cannon exploded on the city wall, it caused great psychological pressure on the defending troops. Some defenders even believed that Su Ze had magical powers and was the man destined to succeed, so they took the initiative to open the city gates and surrender.

Relying on the thunder cannon, Yu Jin quickly occupied the Linfen Basin and took this rich area of ​​Bingzhou into his possession.

At this point, Yu Jin had already joined forces with Su Ze near Jinyang. The resources from Guanzhong no longer needed to bypass the grassland, but could be directly transported from the floating bridge at Pubanjin across the Yellow River to Hedong, and then transported to the front-line troops via the roads in Hedong.

Su Ze's logistical supply pressure was greatly reduced, and his determination to fight Erzhu Rong became more determined.

No matter who Erzhu Rong sent out to fight, Su Ze would hang up a sign of no fighting. Every day, he would ask the cooks to set up a big pot in front of the military camp and cook various foods, which made the soldiers in Erzhu Rong's camp opposite starve.

Faced with such a shameless way of fighting, Erzhu Rong could only curse. He even came to the front of the battle and cursed, but Su Ze was too lazy to send anyone to curse back.

The war in Bingzhou was like a quagmire in the rain, but it also attracted the attention of the world.

However, Yuan Ziyou, who occupied Luoyang, has become increasingly unhappy recently.

(End of this chapter)