中国古代王朝是否真能动员数十万大军？对此可有考古证据佐证？

Richard Wang
You need to know these few things in order to understand them.

你需要知道以下几点，才能理解这些内容。

China's agricultural technology level has achieved a ratio of 1:12 between seed input and grain output since the 7th century BC. By the 10th century AD, this ratio had reached 1:20. This allows China's land to support a much larger population compared to Europe and the Middle East. Until the 17th century, the ratio in Europe was only 1:4.

自公元前7世纪以来，中国的农业技术已达到“种子投入：粮食产出”为1:12的比率。到公元10世纪，这一比率已达到1:20。这使得中国土地能够养活比欧洲和中东多得多的人口。直到17世纪，欧洲的这一比率仅为1:4。

Strong national organizational capabilities and systems. Since the chaos of the Spring and Autumn period in China, various feudal states have been striving to improve their own strength in order to survive, and better national organizational capabilities are themselves a direct way to enhance national strength. Whoever has better organizational skills will have more troops, higher morale, better equipment, and more materials to provide to the troops.

强大的国家组织能力与制度。自中国春秋战国时期的混乱以来，各诸侯国为了生存都在努力增强自身实力，而更强的国家组织能力本身就是增强国力的直接方式。组织能力更强的一方，会拥有更多兵力、更高的士气、更好的装备和更多供给部队的物资。

The earliest theoretical military. The Art of War, the earliest military theory work by Sun Tzu, if described in the simplest way, is to maximize one's own advantage and weaken the enemy's advantage as much as possible. The more our troops are deployed to the front line, the more advantageous it is in itself. And more troops mean more logistics are needed. The reason why Qin became the ultimate victor of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period was because their logistics system was the best.

最早的军事理论。《孙子兵法》作为最早的军事理论著作，其核心可以简单表述为尽可能放大己方优势、削弱敌方优势。我们的部队部署越多，表面上看似越占优势，但更多兵力同时意味着更多后勤需求。秦之所以最终在春秋战国中胜出，关键在于其后勤体系最为完善。

The wartime recruting system and standing professional soldiers. Since the early Warring States period, Wu Qi established the first purely full-time specialized standing military force in human history in the state of Wei. The combat effectiveness of this type of army is clearly higher than other troops temporarily recruited by farmers and ordinary citizens during wartime. In the Wu Qi era, this professional army could already reach 70000 soldiers, and since then, various countries have made efforts to expand such troops, with Wei's professional army having over 200000 soldiers. But the recruitment of ordinary people is also an important component of the national military force, which can effectively defend occupied areas during wartime. These types of soldiers can easily reach hundreds of thousands.

战时征召制度与常备职业军。自战国初期，吴起在魏国建立了人类历史上首支纯职业化的常备军。这类部队的战斗力显然高于战时由农民和平民临时征召的部队。在吴起时代，这支职业军就已达到约7万人，随后各国纷纷扩充此类部队，魏国的职业军曾超过20万人。但大量征召普通人仍然是国家军事力量的重要组成部分，在战时可用于有效防守占领区，这类兵力轻易就能达到数十万规模。

Einfach Scrollen
“1. China's agricultural technology level has achieved a ratio of 1:12 between seed input and grain output since the 7th century BC. By the 10th century AD, this ratio had reached 1:20. This allows China's land to support a much larger population compared to Europe and the Middle East. Until the 17th century, the ratio in Europe was only 1:4.”
Sources on this?

“中国农业技术水平自公元前7世纪起就已达到1:12的种子与粮食产出比率。至公元10世纪，该比例已提升至1:20。这使得中国土地能承载的人口规模远超过欧洲与中东地区。直至17世纪，欧洲的种粮产出比仍仅为1:4。”
相关资料来源？

Richard Wang
In the 1st century AD, Roman writer Columella recorded in his agricultural works that during the Roman period, the ratio was approximately 1:4.5. Columella - Wikipedia

在公元1世纪，罗马作家科卢墨拉（Columella）在其农业著作中记录到，罗马时期的比率约为1:4.5。参见：Columella（维基百科）。

In the 13th century AD, the British writer Walter de Henley recorded in his agricultural works that the ratio of wheat and oats was 1:3 to 5 and 1:2 to 3 in England. We know that there was a period of great regression in Europe after Rome, so the decline in this data is not surprising. And he explained that this ratio is not much worse than that of the European continent. Walter of Henley - Wikipedia

到了公元13世纪，英国作家沃尔特·德·亨利（Walter de Henley）在其农业著作中记录英格兰的小麦与燕麦比率分别约为1:3到5和1:2到3。我们知道罗马灭亡后欧洲经历了严重衰退，因此这些数据下降并不意外。他还解释说，这一比率与欧洲大陆的情况差别不大。参见：Walter of Henley（维基百科）。

The above is the reason why I wrote Western data as 1:4. The real leap in Europe's data came from 3 major events: the emergence of new crops from the New World, genetics brought by Gregor Mendel, and the use of modern chemical fertilizers. And these mostly happened after the 17th century AD. I heard about the 1:12 ratio in the Spring and Autumn period of China from a blogger in knowledge zone of the Bilibili.com , but I can infer from these later works that it is generally reliable.

上述就是我将西方数据写作1:4的原因。欧洲数据真正跃升源于三大事件：新大陆作物的引入、孟德尔带来的遗传学革命、以及现代化学肥料的使用——这些变化大多发生在17世纪以后。我从B站（知识区）的一位博主那里听说春秋时期中国有1:12的比率，但结合上述后来的著作，我推断这一说法总体上是可靠的。

In the 2nd century BC, the Han Dynasty officer Fan Shengzhi wrote the "Book of Fan Shengzhi", which mentioned that the main grain crops of the Han Dynasty at that time were millet and wheat, with a ratio of 1:20 to 30 and 1:40 to 50, respectively. 氾勝之書 - 维基百科，自由的百科全书

在公元前2世纪，汉代官员范胜之著有《范胜之书》，书中提到当时汉代的主要粮食作物是粟（小米）和麦，其产量比率分别约为1:20至30和1:40至50。参见：范胜之书（维基百科）。

The book above lost a large part in the Song Dynasty about 1000 years later, but about 600 years after its completion, the Northern Wei official Jia Sixie extensively cited the data from that book in his "Qimin Yaoshu". And he also compared the data from the 6th century AD. In the 6th century AD, those two data were already 1:24 to 200 and 1:44 to 200. Qimin Yaoshu - Wikipedia

上书在约千年后的宋代遗失了大部分，但在完成约600年后，北魏官员贾思勰在其《齐民要术》中广泛引用了该书的数据，并比较了6世纪时的数据。到公元6世纪，这两类作物的数据已分别为1:24到200和1:44到200。参见：《齐民要术》（维基百科）。

Hu Shi xiong
I recalled reading somewhere there was a comparison, if you're looking at professional numbers the differences are not that big in actual numbers fielded .
Only the Chinese are organised on a larger scale

我记得在哪看到过一个比较，如果你看的是职业化部队的人数，实际出动人数差别并不那么大。
只是中国的组织规模更大而已。

Jeanpeterson Pierce
an army of a million soldiers helps enemies to be civil and behaved; in the meantime, they cultivate deserts, build roads and canals, and mausoleums to awe all of populace.

一支百万大军会让敌人保持“文明”与克制；同时，这支军队还能开垦荒地、修路挖渠、建造陵墓，以震慑百姓。

Feng Lu
Because you can't comprehend the enormity of China.
A simple population ratio will tell you.
At the height of the Tang Dynasty (750 AD), the population was between 60 and 80 million. Do you think a million-man army would be too many?
During the Song Dynasty (1100 AD), the population reached 126 million. Do you think a million-man army would be too many?

因为你无法理解中国的巨大规模。
一个简单的人口比例就能说明问题。
在唐朝鼎盛时期（约公元750年），人口在6000万到8000万之间。你认为百万大军会太多吗？
在宋朝（约公元1100年），人口达到了1.26亿。你还觉得百万大军会太多吗？
龍书

The site of the Battle of Changping near Gaoping City, Shanxi Province, contains the remains of 400000 soldiers of the State of Zhao. A large number of fragments of weapons from the Warring States period, as well as the remains of Zhao soldiers confirmed by DNA and carbon-14 testing, have been unearthed from the site.

山西高平附近的长平之战遗址出土了约40万赵国士兵的遗骸。在该遗址发现了大量战国时期的武器碎片，并通过DNA和碳-14检测确认了赵国士兵的遗骸。

Chris Jones
Honestly population size isn’t impressive on its own.
If you’re fielding an army, then that means you’re somehow putting it in one place and feeding it.
That. Right there, is the impressive part.

老实说，单看人口规模并不令人惊讶。
要出动一支军队，意味着你得把人集中到某处并供应他们的粮饷。
那一项，才是真正令人印象深刻的地方。

Yu-Hsing Chen
It's difficult to see what archaeological evidence Would be, but one should point out that the nature of Chinese military at various points in it's history were citizen's armies, aka every adult male were eligible for mobilization. These setups generally produce bigger armies such as world war one and two, or say the US civil war. Or to a lesser extent the Republican era Roman armies.
It should also be noted that the really large figures usually show up when they're fighting on the central plains region in China, where it's one of if not the largest continuous heavily populated area throughout history of man kind, thus the logistical challenges of both men and supply was far more favourable to a large army.
The other way we can look at this is simply looking at the size of battle fields, this is relevant since if the fighting is in a small field it’s obvious that there’s a limit to how many troops that could be realistically participated, however if it was a wide scale campaign across a wide area then that obviously means more troops had to be involved.

考古证据难以考察，但应指出，中国历史上多次形成的是民众军制，也就是说所有成年男性可被动员征召。这种体制通常会产生更庞大的兵力，类似于第一次和第二次世界大战，或美国内战。稍微类比的话，也可见于共和国时期的罗马军队。
还应注意，真正的大规模数字通常出现在中国的中原地区作战时，那里可能是历史上最大或最密集的人口居住区之一，因此在人员与供给的后勤方面更有利于维持大军。
我们也可以从战场规模看问题：如果战斗发生在狭小的场地，参战兵力显然有限；但如果是横跨广域的大规模战役，那么显然需要更多部队参战。

Take what’s probably the most notable campaign of this sort, the battle of Changping in 262~260 BC (it really shouldn’t be called a “battle” it lasted almost 2 freaking years and had several phases, it was definitely a campaign.)

以这类最著名的战役为例，长平之战（约公元前262~260年）——它严格来说不应被称为一次“战役”，它几乎持续了将近两年并有多个阶段，确实属于一场长期战役。


The blue side (the eventual losing side Zhao forces) versus the red side ( the Qin forces, ) squared off in this region for well over a year, the Zhao forces took a defensive approach at first and the 5 circle area you see on the map is where they were generally positioned on the mountains of the area, as you can see the Qin forces if they attack any one of the position would be at risk of being hit hard from the back by other garrisons, it was a pretty damn brilliant setup by one of the most well-known general of his era, Lian Po

蓝方（最终战败的赵军）与红方（秦军）在该地区对峙超过一年，赵军起初采取防御策略，地图上你看到的五个圆圈大致就是他们在该地区山地上的防守阵地。正如所见，若秦军攻击其中任何一个据点，都有被其他驻军从背后重创的风险——这是当时名将廉颇非常巧妙的布阵。

You can look up how the battle went generally on the wiki, but the key point here is that it was said this battle the two sides combined for 1 million(!!!!) men mobilzed, let’s look at the size of this map and see how plausible that was.

你可以在维基上查到这场战役的大致经过，但关键在于据称这次战役双方合计动员兵力高达一百万人（！！）。我们来看一下地图范围，评估这一数字的可信性。

First, this map correlates almost perfectly with the modern district of Gaoping City a city of 450,000 + ( basically a town by modern China standards.) So off the bat we can see that it’s not entirely inconceivable that 1 million could fit into this range (as the 450,000 is mainly just in this area.

首先，这幅地图几乎与现代高平市辖区完全对应——该市人口约45万+（以现代中国标准就是个县级市/城镇）。因此一开始我们就可以看到，百万兵力能否在该范围内集结并非完全不可想象（毕竟45万人主要集中在此区域）。


Next I’ll use google map’s rulers to give some idea what the straight line distances between the areas marked on the maps roughly is.

接下来我会用谷歌地图的测距工具来估算地图上各标记区域之间的直线距离。


So you can see that the battle area is approximately 14 x 16 km area, now to give some context, and you can play this game yourself, here is the line drawn between the village of Agincourt and Tramecourt, somewhere in between is where people thought the famed battle of Agincourt was fought.

因此你可以看到战场范围约为14×16公里。为给出对比（你也可以自己试算），这里画出阿金库尔村（Agincourt）与特拉姆库尔（Tramecourt）之间的线，著名的阿金库尔战役大致发生在两者之间某处。


(roughly 1.6 KM between the two villages.)

（两村之间约1.6公里。）


( so the actual battle lines might have stretched less than 1km. )

（所以阿金库尔实际的交战前线可能不足1公里。）

So we know that Agincourt was fought between around 20,000 to 40,000 combined. it’s pretty clear that the area I’m drawing above here is way more than 10 times that size, and this discount that to maintain such positioning for over a year, it was clear that both sides had thrown in huge manpower in logistics simply keeping everyone alive there. probably at least as much as the actual men stationed on the various forts and camps set up at the front.

阿金库尔的参战兵力约为2万到4万。很明显，我上面画出的区域比阿金库尔大十倍以上。考虑到在该范围内维持阵地长达一年之久，显然双方在后勤与维持人员生存方面投入了巨量人力，后勤人员的数量可能至少与前线各据点和营地的驻军规模相当。

( it should also be noted that the peak number happened fairly briefly. for most of the campaign the actual numbers there wasn’t up to the final maximum, the Qin also appeared to have hidden a lot of their men off the map until the final showdown.

（还应注意，兵力高峰只持续了一段相对较短的时间。在大多数时间里，实际驻扎人数并未达到最终峰值，且秦军似乎在决战前曾将大量兵力隐藏于地图之外）。

So just looking at the battlefield and the duration of the campaign, it is pretty clear that at least a factor of 10x greater number of manpower being involved in this was more than plausible,

仅从战场规模与战役持续时间来看，参与人数达到数十万（甚至十倍于表面前线人数）是非常可能的。

The most noted aspect of this campaign wasn’t just that it was incredibly long and with insane number of men mobilized, it was also that it was said that towards the end because of the setup of this campaign, most of the Zhao forces didn’t die in battle but simply surrendered after they were clearly checkmated by the Qin, after which the Qin general killed most of them, it was said to be something close to 400,000(!!!!!), this was long thought to be simply impossible (like even just within a hundred years after the event people thought that couldn’t have happened.) and widely dismissed, however since 1995 they DID find a huge massacre site in the area. now they haven’t found 400,000 dead exactly, but there’s been numerous pits that’s at least 100+ dead each, and the odds of bodies just randomly buried surviving 2000+ years is actually pretty bad even if it’s just bones so that one can even find that seem to suggest that something of that magnitude was not entirely out of the

这场战役最为人所注目的，不仅在于其漫长与动员人数之巨，而且据说在战役末期，由于战役布置，赵军大多数并未战死，而是在被秦军困死棋局后选择投降，随后秦将处决了大部分俘虏，据称数量接近40万（！！）。这一说法长期被认为不可能（甚至在事件发生后百年内，人们都认为那不可能发生），并被广泛质疑。然而自1995年以来，考古学家确实在该地区发现了大规模的屠杀现场。虽然未发现确切的40万遗骸，但发现了许多坑葬，每坑100余具遗骸不等；而在两千多年后还能发现残存尸骨的概率本就很低，所以这些发现似乎表明发生过规模巨大的事件并非完全不可能。

So the conclusion is that hundreds of thousands? almost certainly a yes, the question is how many hundreds of thousands? just consider the simple fact that we’re not talking about two armies marching on to a field on a sunday and slugging it out for 2 hours here… we’re talking about entire campaigns that lasted months or even years over a very wide area.

因此结论是：数十万乃至数十万以上？几乎可以肯定是的，问题只在于到底是几十万。请考虑一个简单事实：这里不是两支军队某个星期日走上田地拼打两小时的情形——我们谈论的是跨越数月乃至数年的大规模战役，战线广阔。

Magnus The Red
bai qi da goat

白起大神（bai qi da goat）。

Wei Shi
“most of the Zhao forces didn’t die in battle but simply surrendered”, they run out food for near 50 days (other than horse meat & corpse.), after 200,000 stronger ones died in battle with commanding officers, how do you continue fighting?

“‘大部分赵军没有在战斗中阵亡而是选择投降’，因为他们近50天断粮（除了马肉和尸体）。在约20万精壮士兵连同指挥官在战斗中战死之后，你们怎么继续作战？”