The popular drama "Meng Hua Lu" uses the panoramic description of the picture of the river during the Qingming Festival to intuitively restore some representative features of the commercial civilization of the Northern Song Dynasty. ▲ part of the picture of the river during the Qingming Festival First, adequate urban food and non-staple food supply. The scene of the heroines making fresh cakes in the back kitchen is quite eye-catching. The unique and delicious food is the "magic weapon" for the successful operation of the tea house. As there was no refrigerator, food preservation was a headache for song people. Salting at home is naturally one of the solutions, while Kaifeng has sufficient food and non-staple food supply. Kaifeng became more and more prosperous since the Five Dynasties. By the Northern Song Dynasty, it had developed into a megacity with a population of one million. Most urban residents are not engaged in agricultural production and need to purchase living materials. How to solve the problem of food is the key to reflect the supply capacity of urban materials. For Kaifeng in the Northern Song Dynasty, there were two main channels for the supply of grain and non-staple food: one was the grain from the southeast, which could bring about sixmillion stones of grain to Kaifeng every year, basically meeting the needs of the court, bureaucrats and the garrison. Second, supply from surrounding areas. A large amount of grain and non-staple food depend on the supply of Kaifeng suburbs, counties under its jurisdiction and surrounding counties, which together support the huge dietary consumption of the capital residents. There are many butchers' shops, grain stores and various restaurants and tea shops in Kaifeng, and there are countless peddlers and pawns selling food. Take the supply of fish as an example. In the early morning of each day, fishmongers sell fish from xinzhengmen, xishuimen and Wansheng gate, with thousands of eaves. Even in winter, some traders purchase fish from other places to sell. The most noteworthy is the transformation of Kaifeng suburban agriculture. Due to the sufficient supply of staple food and the high profit of non-staple food, Kaifeng suburban agriculture experienced a change from mainly planting grain to planting economic crops such as vegetables, fruits and flowers in the middle of the Northern Song Dynasty, which obviously complied with the higher consumption demand of urban residents. The profits of non-staple food trade are so high that some suburban farmers call their fields "bronze sea". The supply of grain and non-staple food in regional central cities was also relatively sufficient, so the Song Dynasty became an era of rapid urban development. Second, rich street trade and "nightlife". In the Kaifeng street scene presented in the play, all kinds of shops and street vendors can be seen everywhere, and the business hours are even extended late into the night. With the development of Commerce in the Song Dynasty, Kaifeng and other political and military central cities grew rapidly into economic centers and trade nodes, and their economic significance was no less than political and military significance. The rise of economic significance has an important impact on the changes of urban morphology. Taking the capital city as an example, Chang'an in the Tang Dynasty was a classical city officially planned and built, and commercial wholesale activities could only be carried out in a special "city". Residential area "square" is not only separated from commercial area "city", but also separated by square wall. The gate of the square is open in the daytime and closed at night. There are only some "snack bars" in the square. In the Song Dynasty, Kaifeng broke the distinction between the square and the city. Commercial shops and residential buildings were mixed, and residential buildings with one floor of business and two floors of residents were also very common. As for the business items of the store, it can be said to be all inclusive. Documents of the Song Dynasty, such as the records of Tokyo dreamtime and the picture of the river during the Qingming Festival, intuitively show the business conditions of all walks of life in Kaifeng. ▲ this is the night view of Kaifeng Yuhe river. Photographed by Xinhua News Agency reporter ang Li Stimulated by business activities, more and more merchants extended their stores to the street, and the wide streets became narrower and narrower, which was a famous "street invasion" phenomenon in the Song Dynasty. Songting had demolished these "illegal buildings" and set up signs in some important areas, but it was gradually "occupied" by businessmen, and finally had to compromise in the form of taxing street shops. Therefore, the streets in the play are probably too spacious. The time limit of urban commercial operation in Song Dynasty was also broken. A prosperous night market economy has emerged in Kaifeng. Shops of all sizes often do not close until the third watch and open again at the fifth watch. The prosperous "night economy" has prolonged people's activity time and stimulated residents' consumption desire. Third, prosperous overseas trade. The first major case involved in the play is that Qiantang county magistrate and other officials use smuggling trade to make profits, and the annual amount of stolen money can reach 200000 yuan. The Song Dynasty was an era of highly developed marine civilization and overseas trade. A major feature of overseas trade in the Song Dynasty was that the vast majority of trade activities were carried out by the people. The government encouraged the people to engage in trade activities. It only handled administrative affairs such as goods tax, entry-exit management, inspection of contraband through municipal shipping agencies, and did not organize large-scale official foreign trade activities. Under such an open policy, many people in Zhejiang, Fujian, Guangdong and other coastal areas live on sea trade, and international ports such as Mingzhou (now Ningbo), Quanzhou and Guangzhou have gradually formed. ▲ this is the street view of Quanzhou City (UAV photo) taken in April, 2021. Issued by Xinhua News Agency (photographed by Zhou Yi) Merchants and sailors in the Song Dynasty traveled all over East Asia and Southeast Asia, and had a full trade exchange with merchants from Arabia and Europe in the Nanyang region. These trade activities enriched the economic ties between China and foreign countries, promoted the flow of materials and people in the world market, and also made the Song Dynasty and the Qian Dynasty obtain a high circulation status in East and Southeast Asia. The "Nanhai I" large Song Dynasty merchant ship, which sank in the sea near Guangdong Province, has as many as 180000 cultural relics, including a large number of exquisite export porcelain, lacquered wood, lead and tin ware, which fully demonstrates the volume and diversity of export goods in the Song Dynasty. The booming overseas trade, on the one hand, has brought a large amount of extra tax to the national finance. According to the statistics of scholars, the national finance in the early Southern Song Dynasty earned about 2million yuan from overseas trade every year, which is particularly important to improve the financial situation of coastal areas. On the other hand, the overseas commodity trade network from coastal to inland has been established. Fragrant drugs, ornaments and other commodities from overseas are not only used for court luxury consumption, but also widely seen in private markets, and some have even become popular and popular "online red products". Overseas commodities are no longer high above the world, but "fly into the homes of ordinary people". (author: Wang Shen assistant researcher, Institute of ancient history, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) (outlook new era)