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Story 102: Frozen Suicheng Folktales Story

Frozen Suicheng

Author: Anonymous

During the Song Dynasty, the Khitan sent 200,000 Liao soldiers to invade the border, and the border was tight. Liulang Yang Yanzhao was in Suicheng at that time. Suicheng is the village of Suicheng located twenty miles west of Xushui County. It is adjacent to Puhe River in the north, and across the river is the ancient Great Wall.

Suicheng is small and has insufficient troops. There are only 3,000 defenders. The Liao soldiers came quickly, and suddenly they came to the city, surrounded it, and attacked the city several times for several days, each attack becoming more fierce than the last.

However, the defenders and people in Suicheng seemed to have no worries as usual. Liulang felt strange and asked the people: “Aren’t you afraid of the Liao soldiers attacking the city like this?” The people replied: “With General Yang guarding here, the Liao soldiers cannot attack!”

When Yang Liulang heard that the people had such trust in him, he felt even more responsible. So he gathered all the young men in the city, gave them swords, guns, swords and halberds, and mobilized them to cooperate with the army to defend the city. The army and the people were all gearing up, vowing to coexist and die with Suicheng.

It was October at this time, and the weather suddenly turned cold. Seeing this scene, Liu Lang Yang Yanzhao became anxious and wise, and hurriedly ordered the soldiers and civilians to collect water to flood the city. At night, I poured water on the city wall, and it immediately formed a layer of ice. After pouring water all night, it formed a layer of ice. By the next morning, oh, the tall city wall was shining white and turned into a Great Wall of ice, which was hard, slippery, and impossible to climb.

The Liao soldiers rushed to the bottom of the city and came to climb the city. They kicked and slipped, skidded and slipped. Some of them managed to climb halfway up, and fell down again as soon as they slipped out. The Song army lying on the city took the opportunity to roll wood, thunder and rocks, and fired thousands of arrows, killing and wounding countless Liao soldiers.

The Liao soldiers could not attack the city for several days, so they had to order their troops to retreat. Yang Liulang took the opportunity, opened the city gate wide, and personally led the army to rush out. He only killed the Liao soldiers and fled in panic, throwing away their helmets and armor. In this battle, thousands of Liao soldiers were captured alive, nearly 10,000 horses were captured, and a large number of weapons were obtained.

Because of this battle, Yang Liulang was promoted by Emperor Zhenzong of the Song Dynasty. He was promoted from the inspection envoy of the edge capital of Baozhou (now Baoding, Hebei Province) to the governor of Mozhou (now Mozhou, Renqiu County, Hebei Province).

The Khitan invaded the border and burned, killed and looted along the way, and the people suffered deeply. Liulang Yang Yanzhao led his troops to repel more than 100 attacks by Liao soldiers, bringing peace to the border for a time, and was deeply loved by the people.

Yang Liulang died of illness in Mozhou when he was fifty-seven years old. The emperor sent a special envoy to accompany Liulang’s eldest son Yang Wenguang (the play states that Yang Yanzhao’s son was named Zongbao, and Zongbao’s son was named Wenguang) to escort Lingshu back to his hometown of Taiyuan. The people of Zhengzhou went out to Qingcheng, knelt around the hearse and cried loudly, demanding that Liulang be buried in Mozhou so that his spirit in heaven could guard the border.

Yang Wenguang and the emperor’s envoy felt that the situation was difficult to control, so they asked Ma Tongchi to report to Taijun She for his ruling. She Jun proposed to make another coffin, put Liulang’s clothes and sword inside, and build Liulang’s tomb in the northern city of Minzhou to comfort the local people.

Since then, the Liulang Tomb has been built in Minzhou and has become a memorial place for people to pay homage to national heroes. Civil officials get off their sedan chairs here, military officials get off their horses here, and the people worship during festivals.