SWDnovel Chapter 89 Whose world is this really?
Chapter 89 Whose world is this really?
In the backyard of the Xiapi County government office, Li Sheng followed Li Zili through the corridor to a side hall.
The side hall was filled with bamboo slips and wooden tablets, and the air was filled with the smell of ink and paper.
Paper already existed at this time. In the first year of Emperor He of Han, Cai Lun summarized the experience of his predecessors and improved the papermaking technique. However, at this time, paper had not yet completely replaced bamboo slips and silk.
Zhou Chang was hunched over his desk, holding a calligraphy brush in his hand, writing and calculating on the paper.
"General."
Li Feng first spotted Li Sheng, who had come to inspect the area. Li Sheng nodded to him.
"The general has arrived."
Zhou Chang hurriedly got up, his movements somewhat hesitant.
This old clerk, who had been kept on his toes by Li Sheng these past few days, had sunken eyes and protruding cheekbones, but his spirits were actually much better than before. He seemed to be getting more energetic the longer he stayed up.
"You've worked hard, Registrar Zhou."
Li Sheng walked over and his gaze fell on the silk cloth spread out on the table. The silk cloth was covered with densely packed squares, and numbers and place names were written in the squares.
"This is... a map of the entire field area of Xiapi County?"
"Exactly."
Zhou Chang pushed up his glasses, his tone tinged with smugness.
"I spent more than ten days checking all the land deeds submitted by the four major families, the tax books from previous years, and the fish-scale map archived in the county. I also sent people to conduct on-site surveys in various villages and towns before I was able to draw this map. I dare not say it is 100% accurate, but it is at least 80% or 90% accurate."
Li Sheng bent down to examine it closely.
The map divides the land of Xiapi County into several large areas: the north of the city is dry land, used for growing wheat and beans; the south of the city, near the Si River, is mostly paddy fields, used for growing rice; the east and west sides are hilly, with poor soil and low yields. The land holdings of the four major families are marked in red, scattered in the most fertile areas, especially the paddy fields in the south of the city, which were almost entirely divided up by the Chen, Xu, Zhou, and Wang families.
"How much arable land is there in the entire county?"
Zhou Chang pulled out another booklet and cleared his throat.
"Reporting to the General, Xiapi County has a total of about one million mu of farmland. Among them, about 400,000 mu are of the best paddy fields and cultivated land, concentrated within a radius of 20 to 30 li around the city; the remaining 600,000 mu are distributed in the east, west, south and north villages, mostly hilly and thin land, with a yield of less than 30% of the best fields."
Li Sheng raised an eyebrow.
One million mu, much more than he had expected.
Siyang Township is sparsely populated and its land is vast. A mu of barren land can't produce much grain, and the entire township has only about 70,000 to 80,000 mu. In contrast, Xiapi County has the Sishui River flowing through its south, and it has been a fertile land with thousands of hectares of good fields since ancient times, so it's not surprising that it has such a large number of fields.
"How much did the four major families take?"
Zhou Chang flipped through the calculation booklet.
"The Chen family owns 12,000 mu, the Xu family 9,000 mu, the Zhou family 7,000 mu, and the Wang family 6,000 mu, totaling 34,000 mu. But this is only the land under their names. The land they actually control is far more than that. Through methods such as 'false registration' and 'patronage,' they also control a large amount of land registered under the names of tenants and vagrants. Roughly calculated, the four families actually control at least 100,000 mu of land."
"100,000 mu?"
Li Sheng's voice turned somber.
These four families alone occupied a quarter of the best farmland surrounding the city!
"And that's only four. What about the other smaller, more powerful companies?"
Zhou Chang swallowed.
"Besides these four families in Xiapi County, there are about ten other families that run rampant in the countryside. According to the land deeds, these people own 110,000 mu of land, but the actual amount they control... I estimate is between 400,000 and 500,000 mu."
Li Sheng remained silent.
Four hundred thousand mu. Forty percent of the county's arable land is concentrated in the hands of these powerful local magnates, large and small. And these people make up less than one percent of the county's population.
"What about government-owned land and school land?"
"The government-owned land is about 80,000 mu, and the school land is about 20,000 mu, totaling 100,000 mu. The rent and tax revenue from these lands are used to pay the salaries of officials and the expenses of the county school."
"What about the rest?"
"The remaining approximately 500,000 mu (200,000 acres) belong to self-cultivating farmers."
Zhou Chang paused, then added.
"But among these self-cultivating farmers, three or four out of ten households owe debts to powerful local magnates. If the harvest is bad and they can't repay their debts, their land will be seized by the magnates. Every year, some self-cultivating farmers go bankrupt and become tenant farmers."
Li Sheng nodded, his gaze sweeping over the map.
tenant.
That's the crux of the problem.
"How many tenants are there? Has the count been completed?"
Zhou Chang pulled out another booklet, which was a population register that he had compiled at the same time as the land survey.
"The general ordered me to conduct a population census at the same time, and I dared not neglect it. According to the original household register in the county, there are more than 22,000 registered households in Xiapi County, with a population of about 110,000 men and women. But this number..."
He lowered his voice.
"This figure is missing at least 40%."
"Forty percent?"
Li Sheng's eyes sharpened.
"The hidden residence of a powerful family?"
"Exactly."
Zhou Chang sighed.
"General, you may not know this, but the local powerful families each support dozens to hundreds of retainers and tenants. These people are not registered in the household register, do not pay taxes, and do not perform corvée labor; they are the 'private dependents' of the powerful families. Take the Chen family as an example. The Chen family has only about a hundred registered tenants, but in the past few days, I have sent people to investigate, and they found that there are actually at least three hundred tenants dependent on the Chen family, with a population of over a thousand. The other families are about the same."
He unfolded a newly painted silk scroll, which was covered with densely packed numbers.
"Based on the size of each manor, the amount of grain produced, and the tax records from previous years, I estimated the number of hidden households in each family. The four major families each have between two hundred and four hundred hidden households, totaling about 1,200 households and five to six thousand people. Other small and medium-sized powerful families have between twenty and thirty hidden households and more than a hundred, totaling about 1,500 households and seven to eight thousand people. Adding these together, the total number of hidden households in the county is at least 2,700, with a population of over 13,000."
"In addition to the refugees, runaways, and those 'false registered households' who are actually controlled by powerful families and whose taxes cannot be collected by the government, there are probably as many as five or six thousand households that are actually out of government control."
Li Sheng remained silent for a moment.
With 22,000 registered households, plus 5,000 to 6,000 hidden or absconded households, the actual number of households in the county should be around 30,000, with a population of around 130,000. This figure is more in line with the size of Xiapi County as a large county.
Those powerful and influential people, with less than one percent of the population, controlled 40% of the land and hid nearly 20% of the county's population.
Whose world is this, really?
And if this is the case even for just one county, Xiapi, what about the entire Xiapi Kingdom? What about Xuzhou? And even the whole country?
This is still in those areas where powerful clans are weak. If it were in Yuzhou, where the Yuan family of Runan, the Xun family of Yingchuan, and the Chen family of Yingchuan were located, these top clans of the Eastern Han Dynasty would probably have the entire land and population firmly in the hands of these powerful clans.
The difficulties they would face if they were to invade the Central Plains in the future are unimaginable.