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Story 18: The Origin of Disaster

The Origin of Disaster

Author: Guo Yanqing

The origin of the phrase “heng misfortune” began during the Ningzong period of the Southern Song Dynasty.

At that time, the small imperial court of the Southern Song Dynasty was located in the south of the Yangtze River, faced with internal and external troubles, and a financial crisis. It implemented an expropriation tax system of “increasing taxes and increasing consumption”.

That is, on the basis of the original “regular taxes” (land tax, head tax), additional taxes and consumption are added, such as “regular consumption”, “additional consumption”, “profit consumption”, “consumption”, etc.

Such exorbitant taxation was still not enough, so the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty added another military expense, “monthly piles of money”, and ordered all states and counties to pay it monthly.

Since it was an extraordinary military tax, it was all under the banner of “one hundred thousand urgent need”, and the payment was delayed. It is punished according to military law, so it is called a “horrible disaster”.

The local government took advantage of the opportunity to create new names out of thin air, and unreasonably added “horizontal tax” on a monthly basis, such as “Quyinqian”, “jealousy money”, “paper selling money”, “household chief A’s money”, “bao zheng brand silver money” “,

“Fine money for failure to win two lawsuits”, “Happiness money for winning the lawsuit”, “Xiaoxiu cowhide, beef tendon, and ox dimes”, etc., all have different names, but they are all strange, making the people miserable and crying.

From then on, people collectively referred to such man-made and natural disasters as “horrible disasters”, and this term has been popular among the people ever since.