A Preliminary Study Of The Bronze Drum Guard

In the Ming Dynasty, Tonggu Wei was located in Guizhou Liping, but owned by Huguang. It had more than 12 thousand people, witch exceeded the standard 5 thousand people. At present there is no one study it, so I use the local records of Guizhou and Hunan in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, and the<Tonggu Wei selected book> in the Ming Dynasty to do some research. The article according to the historical material can be divided into two parts, the statement is as follows:The first part, to the local records of Guizhou and Hunan in the Ming and Qing Dynasties.First of all, why the establishment of Tonggu Wei? Before the Ming Dynasty, Guizhou was divided by neighboring Sichuan, Huguang, Yunnan, Guangxi; for the land far from the center of the 4 provinces each, so it belonged to the fringes of the 4 provinces witch crossed each other and became the management vacuum. Guizhou Liping was a typical example at that time. In order to strengthen the control to the southwest, the central government established a strong military facilities Wukai Wei in Liping, witch had more than 17 thousand people. But it was not enough, so Tonggu Wei was established.Secondly, Tonggu Wei was established in September 1397,2 years later it had been abolished. Then there were 2 records about it been established again, in 1402 and in 1404. Witch one was true, and why? In the<Tonggu Wei selected book>, there were some officers backing in 1402 that can confirm Tonggu Wei was recovered in 1402; and in the local records of Ming Xupu in the first half of twentieth Century,there were many people who belonged to Tonggu Wei and Wukai Wei had been given land in 1404. Thus had laid the foundations of Tonggu Wei and Wukai Wei. Because of it, people thought that Tonggu Wei had been recovered in 1404.Third, then I found that there were much other land had been given Tonggu Wei in Hunan Baoqing, Jingzhou, Chenzhou etc, about 2/3 of the total Tonggu Wei land. It was related with Tonggu Wei belonging to Huguang closely.Fourth, there was a Tonggu Shouyusuo established in 1388 belonging to Wukai Wei, and in the<Ming History> it was changed into Tonggu Wei in 1397. But I found it not true in the process of consulting literature, and I corrected it because of the influence of<Ming History>.Fifth, with the setting of Guizhou buzhengsi, Guizhou became an independent province. Then it needed the management right and ownership right of Tonggu Wei and Wukai Wei, witch conflicted with them belonging to Huguang. This was not conducive to the management of the Empire, so in 1727 Tonggu Wei was changed into Jinping County and Wukai Wei was changed into Kaitai County, and both of them belonged to Guizhou Liping.The second part, to the<Tonggu Wei selected book> mainly.First, we can understand the development of Tonggu Wei through the statistics of the officers in Hongwu Period and in Longqing PeriodSecondly, we can also analyze the sources of officers and the regional structure of their origin, witch can help us answer some questions.Third, we may classify some aspect of Tonggu Wei officers' hereditary.