Wubei Zhi (Vol. 49)

Treatise on Armament Technology, Volume 114

Military Supplies and Logistics: Defense

Therefore, it has been said: standardize the land to levy funds, use those funds to complete the fort, and use the fort to allocate residences original: "慮" (lù), here used interchangeably with "廬," referring to a basic housing unit or cottage within the fort walls..

It is stated that:

• Those with thirty mu (a traditional unit of land area, approximately 666 square meters) of land are allocated one residence.
• Those with double the land receive double the residences.
• Those with four times the land receive four times the residences.

The poor who have no land shall contribute their physical labor Providing manual labor for construction in lieu of the monetary tax.; they, too, shall receive one residence, or they may be ordered to rent a residence from the wealthy. If an existing residence exceeds the quota established by the land regulations, an additional monetary levy shall be charged.

If space [inside the fort] is insufficient, then use the levied funds to purchase the threshing grounds, orchards, and vegetable gardens of the wealthy to create room. If it is still insufficient, then break open the fort walls and expand the perimeter. Thus, there will be no person in the fort who does not have a residence, and no local laborer original: "土著之丁" (tǔ zhù zhī dīng), referring to able-bodied men legally registered to the local soil. who is not firmly settled.

4. Setting a Deadline

To "set a deadline" means to establish a fixed date so that the people of the abandoned forts will completely relocate to the consolidated fort. It is difficult to involve the common people in the initial stages of planning A reference to the Analects or similar statecraft philosophy, suggesting that the public can be made to follow a path but cannot always be made to understand the complex reasons behind it initially.; furthermore, their financial resources are unequal and the farming season offers very few breaks. I fear that they cannot all relocate at a single command.

Therefore, a timeframe must be established for them: one month after the fort is completed, every family must have a house. Once the house is finished, then provisions can be stored original: "囊積" (náng jī), implying the bagging and accumulation of grain and supplies for a potential siege....