Chastity Layman

Manna Hall.

When the emperor came back from court meeting, his face was very ugly.

"Why is Your Majesty in a bad mood? Could it be that the Zhengshitang rejected His Majesty's plan to expand the Jiucheng Palace and rebuild the Luoyang Palace? In fact, the concubine thought that the Prime Minister of the Zhengshitang was just following the system set by His Majesty. The national system should not be changed overnight and destroyed at will, otherwise the system will become empty, and everything will be messed up by then."

Li Shimin picked up his teacup and took a sip.

"I just didn't expect that both Wuji and your uncle would stand opposite me like this. Even if I did something wrong, they could give advice in private, but they insisted on rejecting it directly. Where is your face?"

"Your Majesty, don't be angry anymore, it's all for state affairs." Empress Changsun persuaded.

Li Shimin put down his teacup and sighed, "Unexpectedly, Chengqian will be thirteen years old in a blink of an eye, and he will be an adult after the coronation ceremony in ten days."

"Yeah, I've grown so tall in a blink of an eye." Empress Changsun couldn't help sighing, Cheng Qian, who was born in the year when Datang was founded, has grown so big with Datang.

"It's time to find a marriage for this kid." Li Shimin said.

He rubbed his chin, "Which one do you think is suitable? Do you know which one has the right daughter?"

In fact, Changsun Wuji's eldest daughter, regardless of her age, status, character, talent, etc., is very suitable for Chengqian, and the two even know each other. It turned out that Li Shimin had also thought about this, and thought it would be good to get closer, but recently, Li Shimin had given up on this idea.

When Qin Lang told him about the history of the Wa Kingdom, the Su Wo family married their daughters to the King of Wa for generations. Reached the point of arbitrarily abolishing and even killing the Japanese king.

This is even more powerful than the later Qi Dou family in the Han Dynasty.

Coupled with the example of Yang Jian in the former Sui Dynasty where his grandfather usurped the imperial power of his daughter's grandson's family in the Northern Zhou Dynasty, now Li Shimin has already given up his mind about marrying the eldest grandson's family.

Empress Changsun was very virtuous, and he was very satisfied. She married him at the age of twelve, gave birth to several children for him, and managed the harem in an orderly manner, but he could not allow another eldest grandson to enter the East Palace and continue to rule the harem in the future.

For the same reason, it turned out that Gao Shilian's family had a few granddaughters, but I don't want to mention it now.

"The concubine thinks that you can find the daughter of everyone from the five surnames in the Kanto, or Jingzhao Weidu, or Peiliu in Hedong, Yang in Hongnong, or Wang in Lanling Xiaolangya."

At this time, the famous families of the gentry, in terms of their status and reputation, of course the five surnames and seven families are the first to be recommended, and then besides the five surnames and seven families in Shandong, of course there are also the Guanlong gentry and the gentry from Daibei, such as Jingzhao Du, Jingzhao Webster, Hedong Liu, Hedong Pei, Hedong Xue and Hongnong Yang.

In addition, there are Henan Lu clan, Henan Yuan clan, Henan Yuwen clan, Henan Fufeng Dou clan, Henan Yu clan, Henan Yuan clan, and Henan Changsun clan.

These families, together with five surnames and seven families, are known as the top 20 great clans of the Tang Dynasty at this time.

Under these twenty major families, there are also the original Southern Dynasties such as the Lanling Xiao family, the Chen Jun Xie family, the Langya Wang family, the Chen Jun Yuan family, the Wu Jun Zhu family, the Wu Jun Lu family, the Wu Jun Zhang family, and the Wu Jun Gu family. The gentry are relatively weaker now.

Even Empress Changsun, when considering her son's marriage, the first thing that comes to mind is these families.

Li Shimin shook his head, "Let's not mention the five surnames and seven families in Shandong."

The five surnames and the seven families are the highest, but these five families were mainly on the east side when the north and the east faced each other in the past. This is not the real family of the Li family and the Li Tang regime that came out of the Guanlong Group in the west. Now the world is unified, and the five surnames and seven families have all joined their ranks, but Li Shimin, like the helmsmen of several dynasties since the Western Wei Dynasty, has always discriminated against them a little bit regionally.

This kind of discrimination is more of a precautionary measure. Back then, the five surnames and seven families were high-ranking clans looked up to by the Guanlong Group, which was headed by Daibei Army. They looked down upon them. Be vigilant against these Shandong aristocrats who are famous, economically strong, and academically mastered.

Especially for Li Shimin, the five surnames in Shandong basically supported the construction, which made him feel more and more upset. Now he is starting to revise the clan chronicles, in order to knock down the famous families that have been passed down from generation to generation in the past, so that those in the new dynasty who will conquer the world with him, and those true confidantes will reset their families with official titles.

After all, in order to strengthen the imperial power, what Li Shimin wants to do is to be the emperor and the courtiers, not the iron-clad aristocratic family of the flowing dynasty. The five surnames in Shandong above did not get their status from Li Shimin or Li Tang. They have been passed down for hundreds of thousands of years. This kind of power is what worries Li Shimin the most.

Although he has been suppressing secretly, but he can't go too far, he has to win over, but Fang Xuanling, Wei Zheng and other upstart prime ministers are all eager to marry each other, which makes him very annoyed.

The merging of the upstarts and the old aristocrats is what he is most worried about, but these people have been vying to do it. Qin Qiong married the daughter of the Cui family of Boling, Cheng Yaojin also married the widow of the Cui family of Qinghe, and Zhang Liang was even more so. Married Li Poxie from Zhao County, Wei Zheng also asked to marry the daughter of the Wang family in Taiyuan, Fang Xuanling married Fan Yang Lu himself, and ordered a daughter from the Jingzhao Du family for his son...

This situation annoyed Li Shimin, and he became more and more vigilant against these elites.

Now that his prince is looking for a wife, Li Shimin immediately ruled out the five surnames and seven families in his heart. Li Shimin was worried that his powerful relatives, especially the top aristocrats like the five surnames and seven families, would become the princes of the Han Dynasty in the future. The Dou family is as authoritarian, if it is the same as the Su'er family of the Japanese country in the future, wouldn't it be too big to lose, and it will be a disaster for the country?

He had always thought of ways to suppress the five surnames, but if instead he let the prince marry the five surnames, wouldn't it give more money to the five surnames? At that time, they will gain more and more power.

"I think that to marry Da Lang, you should choose one of the nobles in Guanlong, preferably a noble family."

Li Shimin stated one of his own standards, not looking for the five surnames and seven families, nor the gentry in the south of the Yangtze River, but looking for the Guanlong noble family, and looking for the gentry among them.

After all, the Guanlong aristocrats were the fundamental core of the ruling class of the Li and Tang Dynasties, and looking for the gentry instead of the generals was because they were worried that the story of Sui Yangjian usurping the Northern Zhou Yuwen family would repeat itself.

Originally, the Changsun family or the Gao family were both good choices. The Changsun family was also a famous family since the Northern Wei Dynasty. It itself came from the Northern Wei clan. Of course the princess is more suitable, she is naturally close.

The Gao family, as the queen's uncle's family, is also from the Gao family of the Northern Qi Dynasty, and their status is also very noble. The Bohai Gao family has a great reputation.

But Li Shimin was also worried that this kind of pro-in-law would lead to the dictatorship of foreign relatives.

As for the top aristocratic clans like the five surnames and seven families in Shandong, he was afraid that accepting the concubine would boost the reputation of these families, making them more difficult to get rid of and unable to control.

The generals of the Guanlong nobles were also worried about military power.

The gentry in the south of the Yangtze River were also worried that they would not be able to provide any help to the prince, and the Daibei clan were all military leaders and barbarians.

So this won't work and that won't work. After setting up a bunch of screening conditions, there are not many suitable ones.

Hongnong Yang, Jingzhao Weidu, or Xue Liupei from Hedong, these six families are the top gentry.

Li Shimin thinks about it, and thinks that the name is too big and the strength is too strong. These six families are all families that have been prime ministers after the establishment of the Tang Dynasty. For example, the Pei family has Pei Ji and Pei Ju, and the Hongnong Yang family has Yang Gongren and Yang Shidao brothers. Webster has Wei Ting, and Du has Du Ruhui and Du Yan.

"The female prime minister is not suitable!" Li Shimin added another screening condition.

Immediately, the upstart prime ministers such as Li Jing, Fang Xuanling, Wei Zheng, etc. were also excluded.

Li Shimin also found it difficult to choose. Thinking about the generation of their brothers, his father chose Jiancheng as the prefect in Xingyang. He chose Guanyin's maidservant from Changsun's family in Henan, and his younger brother Yuanji chose Hongnong Yang's family, all of whom were famous.

The wives that Yang Jian chose for his sons in the previous dynasty were all famous families. For example, the prince Yang Yong married the daughter of Yuan Xiaoju, the great-great-grandson of Emperor Jingmu of the Northern Wei Dynasty, and his concubine Gao Liangdi was also the daughter of the prime minister Gao Jiong. The second son, Yang Guang, married the daughter of Emperor Ming of Xiliang.

The third son, Qin Jun, married the daughter of the Cui family of Boling, who was also the daughter of the great general of the dynasty, and his concubine was also Princess Nanchen.

The fourth son, Yang Xiu, married the daughter of the Changsun family in Henan, and the fifth son, Yang Liang, married the daughter of the famous Doulu family in Daibei.

In the Sui and Tang dynasties, Yang Jian and Li Yuan gave their sons the characteristics of marrying wives, all of whom were married to famous families in the world. But now Li Shimin wants to avoid this, avoid that, there are not many choices left.

The Guanzhong gentry is headed by the six families of Yang Wei, Du, Xue, Pei and Liu. These six families are the first level. Below them are the five major families of Fufeng Dou, Wugong Su, Xiliang Duan, Longxi Xin and Longxi Yan. The family is worse than Weidu and other six families.

Similarly, under the seven families of the five east and five surnames, there are also the Liu family of Pengcheng, the Wang family of Langya, the Han family of Changli, the Sun family of Le'an, the Guo family of Taiyuan, the Zhang family of Fanyang, the Song family of Guangping, the Wen family of Taiyuan, and the Nanyang family Shandong gentry such as the Zhang family, the Gaoping Xu family, the Bohai Gao family, and the Julu Wei family.

But Li Shimin still wanted to choose among the Guanzhong gentry.

"Guanyin servant, look at the Wugong Su family, the Xiliang Duan family, the Longxi Xin family, and the Longxi Yan family. Are there any suitable women?" Li Shimin also removed the Fufeng Dou family first, because the Fufeng Dou family was exactly his family. My uncle's family, the Fufeng Dou family was also quite remarkable during the Sui and Tang Dynasties, especially in the Wude Dynasty, they also served as prime ministers.

Li Shimin simply excluded the Dou family first, like the Changsun family in Henan and the Gao family in Bohai.

"Concubine, please inquire carefully about these points!" Empress Changsun replied, "Your Majesty does not consider other noble families, especially the five surnames and seven families. The five surnames and seven families have always been the first choice for marriage."

"It's precisely because of this that I didn't choose the five surnames and seven families. Let's choose from the four families of Guanzhong, Su, Duan, Xinyan. If not, I will choose from the Henan gentry, and I will not choose from the Shandong gentry and Jiangnan gentry. , I don't believe that there is no suitable princess!"