In BC11/year, Liang Wudi pacified the southwest and sent Sima Qian to southern Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan. This great trip provided him with a great opportunity to learn about the customs of southwest China, collect old news and inquire about mountains and rivers. Sima Qian returned from this mission and met his dying father.
On his deathbed, his father took him seriously and said, "My ancestor was a teacher of the Zhou Dynasty. After I die, you will definitely become a teacher. Don't forget the work I said! Sima Tan once said: Confucius was born 500 years after the death of Duke Zhou, and Confucius has been dead for 500 years. Someone should inherit Confucius and do some homework. As a historian, Sima Tan is determined to write a general history after Confucius' Spring and Autumn Annals. Now, before his father fell ill, Sima Qian burst into tears and agreed to his father's request, but after his father died, Sima Qian failed to write immediately.
Mainly busy touring sacrifices and meditation, I followed Emperor Wu to Mount Tai and many famous mountains and rivers inside and outside the Great Wall. By 65438 BC+065438 BC+08 BC, he wrote a letter to make full use of books and archives preserved by the court. In BC 104, he officially started the voluminous work of Historical Records. At this point, he has entered middle age. In order to finish this history book as soon as possible, he forgot to write it and almost cut off all his friends.
In 99 BC, when the reasonable Sima Qian was working on Historical Records, a catastrophe fell from the sky, which was the Liling Project. Li Ling, the grandson of General Fei, has boundless strength and is good at riding and shooting. When Li Guangli, the general of the Second Division, sent Rongxing to attack the Xiongnu, Li Ling asked for independence to meet the Xiongnu. He went straight into the army, only to meet the Xiongnu army. Although he and his men fought bravely, they were outnumbered and exhausted reinforcements, and finally defeated the captured and surrendered to the Huns.
When the news reached the court, he praised Li Ling's courtiers on weekdays, and Sima Qian was deeply wronged by taking advantage of the danger of others. Although he has no close relationship with Li Ling, he has always admired Li Ling's personality, so he bravely stood up and stated Li Ling's contribution to fighting alone as an ordinary person this time, thinking that Li Ling should not be accused too much. The role of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was furious, and he felt that Sima Qian praised Li Ling just to send another general, Li Guangli, to the war together. And Li Guangli is Li Furen's younger brother, a favorite of Emperor Wu.
So he put Sima Qian in prison and sentenced him to death. This is the sixth year that Sima Qian officially wrote Historical Records. According to the rules of the Han Dynasty, there are two ways to reduce the death penalty: one way is to make amends with 500,000 yuan. Sima Qian's official position is small, but he can't afford the money anyway. Another way is to "relax the punishment" and be castrated. And castration was the most severe and shameful one in the criminal law at that time. This is not only a serious waste of human body, but also a great insult to quality.
Faced with this practice, Sima Qian was in great pain and wanted to die, so he thought of the creation of Historical Records. Who will end the historical record with such a death? He remembers his father's entrustment before his death, and he will never forget his ambition to write historical records. He will take Confucius' Spring and Autumn Annals as an example and use his own works to distinguish right from wrong, thus benefiting the whole country.
Therefore, he intends to accept the official punishment. After Sima Qian went to prison, his energy was greatly affected. In extreme pain, he once thought of suicide. However, he was inspired by his great ambition to write historical records. In order to end the unfinished historical records, he made up his mind to live bravely. After he was released from prison, he made a secretariat order, which was an official in charge of documents and drafting imperial edicts for the emperor.
He accepted this humble position in order not to leave the books and materials he needed in the Royal Library and continue to finish his great works. In this way, he endured another eight years of humiliation and hard work. By 9 1 BC, when Sima Qian finally finished the prehistoric masterpiece Shadow of Historical Records, he was already in his prime. It took him eighteen years from reading and collecting historical materials to formally writing this book.
If you count from his travels when he was young, the book Historical Records is a masterpiece that almost exhausted his life energy and endured great physical and mental pain. Sima Qian, with his extraordinary talent, amazing perseverance and extensive possession of materials, wrote the first biographical general history of China through understanding, research and integration, thus pushing pre-historiography to an unprecedented new stage and setting up an eternal monument in the history of Chinese historiography. Sima Qian, together with his historical records, will go down in history forever and shine brilliantly in autumn.