The History of China - #27 - W. Han 5: Go West, Young Han!

Episode Date: June 22, 2014

The young Emperor Wu of Han struggles to step out of the shadow of his grandmother and seize power in his own right. Meanwhile, he has sent an emissary behind enemy lines to find what mysterious peoples and empires lie far to the West, but it's uncertain what he'll find... or if he'll live to tell the tale. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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authority of the imperial throne and solidified the idea of a unified and prosperous Han China. This week, we begin what will be the first of three episodes covering Emperor Jing's son and heir, Wu of Han. Part one will cover Wu's early reign and the Han Empire's establishing contact and trade with the hitherto unknown kingdoms and empires of Central and Western Asia. Part two will focus on the renewal of hostilities between the Han and Xiongnu Empires brought about as a result of the Han's desire to push west through the Xiongnu-held desert passes of the northwest,

and the terrible war that would throw the two powers into more than 40 years of conflict. And Part 3 will conclude the reign of Emperor Wu and his descent into superstition, paranoia, and tyranny. Prince Liu Che was born in the Han capital Chang'an in 156 BCE as the tenth son of Emperor Jing, and the eldest son of his favorite consort, Lady Wang Zhi. Supposedly, his birth shared the auspicious day of his father's coronation, and while pregnant, Lady Wang Zhi had confided that she had dreamt a son had fallen into her womb, and I should point out that she meant it as S-U-N, the celestial object, not just a guess

as to the child's sex. Emperor Jing had been thrilled about the divine implications such a dream foretold for his unborn son, and Liu Ce was all but outright acknowledged to have been his favorite child from the time of birth. This is further evidenced by, at the age of only three, Liu Ce being proclaimed the Prince of Jiao Dong by his father in 153. It was this same year, you may recall from last episode, that Jing had declared his eldest son, Liu Rong, as the crowned Prince of Han. This had caused something of a fuss in the royal household, as Prince Rong's mother had not been the Empress of Han, who much to her frustration had been completely unable to conceive,

but rather one of Jing's favored concubines, Lady Li. Li's own rude and tactless nature would prove to be her and her son's undoing, however, when she made the fatal mistake of disrespectfully rejecting an offer of betrothal to the emperor's sister's daughter. Lady Wang Zhi had capitalized on Li's misstep by offering her own son's hand to the imperial princess Liu Piao. Though the two children's age difference initially caused Emperor Jing to disapprove of the union, at the time of the betrothal, Prince Liu Che was five, while his cousin-slash-wife-to-be, Princess Chen Jiao, was eleven or twelve. But the emperor

was eventually convinced to approve of the arranged marriage. With Princess Piao and Consort Wang sealed in a marriage alliance, the two worked in consort to unseat their common rival, Lady Li. Princess Piao laid doubts into her brother's mind as to Li's true and potentially nefarious intentions. Charges Li did not do herself any favors in clearing, for instance, boorishly stating that she would not care for any of Jing's other children by his other consorts were the emperor to pass away. Simultaneously, the two women praised the virtues of the young Prince Liu Che,

and that he would make a far better heir than Liu Rong, and critically, that Wang Zhe would make a far less dangerous eventual empress dowager than Li might. In 150, the two had finally convinced Emperor Jing to depose and exile Prince Rong and place Lady Li under house arrest, where she died of frustration and oppression. In disgrace, Prince Rong would eventually commit suicide. With the weight of the throne now clear, Wang Zhi was named Empress only four months later and Liu Che the heir to Han. In 141 BCE, at the age of 15, he ascended to the throne following his father's death. Though again never called as such during his life, his regnal name, Wu, says much about the nature of his reign. It translates as martial or warlike, and it's difficult to think of a more fitting

descriptor of the man. Prior to Wu's ascension, his two predecessors had been largely hands-off about their empire, largely in keeping with the Taoist philosophy of Wu Wei, which is a complex concept most often translated as meaning inaction. Economically and socially, laws had been relaxed. You remember to the point where Jing had to forcibly hem his drifting princes back under control during the rebellion of the Seven States. The Wu-Wei policy had, in its time, been a critical factor in rebuilding the Chinese economy, following the devastation of the civil war between Han and Chu that had established the Han Dynasty some 60 years prior. But it was not without significant drawbacks. The economic deregulation had resulted in vassal states drifting away from imperial control, and had threatened to render the

emperor as powerless as those of the late Zhou dynasty. Meanwhile, nepotism had stagnated social mobility within the ruling class, and calcified the notion among them that they were effectively above the law. In terms of foreign policy, the shaky peace that existed with the northern Xiongnu empire was based on the Heqin marriage alliance system, which not only deeply embarrassed the national sensibilities of the Chinese, but failed to even adequately guarantee the Han empire against barbarian incursion. Why was the emperor of Han kowtowing and offering tribute to the Chanyu if his horsemen were not even going to respect the treaty and continue attacking them with impunity. Time and again officials to Wen and Jing had advised the two monarchs

that policy reform to a more active aggressive stance against such creeping corruption was not just advisable but absolutely necessary for the survival of the dynasty as a whole. But neither of the two late Han emperors had had the impetus to do much beyond patching up problems as they arose, much less attack the roots of the issue. The ascendant Emperor Wu, however, had no such compunction with violently shaking up the status quo. Less than a year into his reign, he attempted to enact a series of policy initiatives collectively known as the Jingyuan Reforms. I say he attempted to because unfortunately one of the first lessons

that Wu would learn as emperor was that there were forces within the Han empire that were greater than even its monarch, namely the entrenched interests of the nobility and just as much the power of his grandmother, the Grand Empress Dowager Dou, who wielded a level of power in the Han court comparable to, if not exceeding, the newly minted emperor. Zhou, who remember was the driving force behind both her late husband and late son's respective turn to Taoism and the hands-off Wu-Wei philosophy, was having none of the impetuous Wu's pushes toward a more active monarchy, especially given that he was advocating a shift from Taoism to a Confucian-based ideology of government, a shift the Grand Empress Dowager found absolutely repugnant. To curb what she saw as a fundamental undermining of her life's work,

she systematically dismantled the vital core of the young emperor's support within his own court, beginning by stripping the titles and positions of his top two supporters, Dou Ying and Tian Fei, and the emperor's two Confucian mentors, Zhao Wan and Wang Zhan. She had them impeached, arrested, and locked away to eventually commit suicide in prison. By now knowing that her meddlesome grandson was obviously not going to be playing ball by her rules, Grand Empress Dowager Dou began a whisper campaign to, the ultimate hope was, oust him from power altogether.

For his own part, Wu found himself feeling very lonely indeed in his own court. The form these malicious rumors quickly took was of Wu's perceived, at the time, infertility. Wu and his Empress Chun had at that point been married for several years prior to their dual coronation, and had yet to produce any children. All the worse, according to the social conventions of the period, was that the empress had so dominated her husband that she had disallowed him from taking up any other concubines as the rumors swirled no doubt fanned on by the agents of the grand empress dowager the idea that the lively energetic sixteen-year-old emperor wu was unable to propagate the royal bloodline was taken up by his opponents as a reason to depose the teenage monarch. As the push to oust Wu gained momentum, it was rumored that his distant uncle, Liu An, the vassal king of Huainan and renowned figure in Taoist ideology, was the Grand Empress Dowager's favored choice of replacement. One of Wu's only real allies left at this point was his

own mother-in-law, Princess Liu Piao, with whom he pleaded to serve as a mediator with the Grand Empress Dowager on his behalf. But even she turned out to be an awful resource, and abused her position with Wu by exploiting him and making excessive demands of the emperor in exchange for her continued lobbying. Wu, who was already rather frustrated with this side of the family due to his wife's apparent infertility, hey, it's not like he was in a hurry to take blame for their lack of children— was further enraged by his mother-in-law's exploitative and greedy behavior. I mean, come on, Liu Piao, you're jockeying for petty favors while your son-in-law

and therefore daughter are facing an overthrow. Not really cool. Emperor Wu next turned to his own mother, the Empress Dowager Wang Zhi, to reason with the Grand Empress Dowagerager wang tzu however advised patience for the moment there was little to, Wu accepted his mother's advice and endured his overbearing grandmother, all the while doing his level best to impersonate all of the qualities we normally associate with the lowest and most corrupt of Chinese emperors, being docile, uninterested in state affairs, and hedonistic, including frequently sneaking out of Chang'an to conduct hunting and sightseeing safaris disguised as a mere marquee. Unfortunately for one, his grandmother was somewhat more sprightly than Wang Jie had anticipated,

and managed to remain alive and in effective power for several more years before finally giving up the ghost. In secret, however, Wu raged a quiet war for the hearts and minds of his nominal officials, as well as his countrymen. Well before her eventual death, Wu's late grandmother had rather stacked the deck against him, in the form of officials at just about every level of the Han imperial court. Wu knew that he couldn't hope to overcome such opposition directly, as had been shown to be the case time and again, even the emperor had his limits, and so turned to more subtle methodologies. At the heart of their resistance to Wu's proposed reforms

was the central administrative body of the dynastic system since the Qin dynasty of the previous century, the San Gong Jiu Qin, or Three Lords and Nine Ministers. As the name implies, the council was headed by the three highest officials of the imperial government, the chancellor, who I've also at times referred to as the prime minister, the imperial secretary, and the grand commandant. Under them sat the eight ministers of ceremonies, attendance, guards, coachmen, justice, the imperial clan,

agriculture, and treasury, themselves presided over by the grand herald, which makes nine. Though not uniformly against the young Emperor Wu, the administrative council was undeniably dominated by anti-reformist elements to such a degree that Wu decided they had to be worked around rather than through. Privately dubbing the official body the Wai Chao, meaning outsider court, Wu enlisted a circle of young and like-minded supporters, chiefly from ordinary, non-noble backgrounds, and promoted them to mid-level positions in his government so as to infiltrate its executive ranks. As mid-level officials, Wu's secret operatives were able to exert palpable influence over the execution of the

highest-level decrees while remaining hidden enough within the bureaucratic machinery of the imperial system to report directly to the emperor himself. As they stood in direct opposition to the antiquated policies of the outsider court, Wu dubbed his new cabal of officials his Nei Tao, or insider court. In an attempt to bolster his youth movement against the entrenched older elements of his own government, Wu simultaneously engaged in a groundswell appeal to the empire's young scholars and would-be officials to enroll in government services, that they might collectively break the stranglehold the older generation held on the empire's balance of power. But it wasn't until 138 BCE that a critical event tipped the scales in the favor of Emperor Wu's reformist campaign, beginning with a call for help from the far south.

The autonomous state of Minyue, which is modern Fujian province along China's southeast coast, had invaded its northern neighbor, which called for the imperial throne's aid. The state under attack was Dong'ou, which today is the region centered around the city of Wenzhou in southern Zhejiang province. As a side note, I very much hope that I can eventually work in a history of Wenzhou to this podcast. It is the most famous city almost no one outside of China has ever heard of, and they are spoken of within the country as the, quote, Jews of China. I promise I'm just translating. And are best known for their shrewd business sense, propensity to settle abroad, primarily in Spain, Italy, France, and the U.S., and a language so utterly incomprehensible

that they served an analogous function to the Chinese armies in World War II as the American primarily in Spain, Italy, France, and the U.S., and a language so utterly incomprehensible that they served an analogous function to the Chinese armies in World War II as the American Navajo Windtalker units. It was also the only port city in China to remain unoccupied during the Japanese Imperial Army's invasion in the 1930s and 40s, and remains to this day one of the most overlooked and independent-thinking powerhouses in China, to virtually everyone outside, while often being spoken of in hushed whispers by nationals. Back to the Han Dynasty, Dong'o pleaded for Emperor Wu's court to send aid following the battlefield death of its king Zhuo Zhenfu against Mingyue. Though his court vacillated and debated over whether to send reinforcements to the beleaguered Dong'o kingdom, Emperor Wu was resolved to assist his vassal state.

To that end, he appointed the newly promoted official, Yan Zhu, to journey to what is modern Suzhou and Jiangsu province, to take command of and mobilize the garrison stationed therein. The major hurdle, however, was that, though he was technically the sovereign of all of China, Wu in fact did not hold the authority to command his own armies. This is because since the time of the Zhou, confirmation of military authority had been vested in what was called the Tiger Talleys. These were emblems, which were first carved from bamboo, then later jade, and by the Qin dynasty forged from bronze, which were identical pairs of tiger figurines, emblazoned with a seal of command that served as a kind of failsafe against misappropriation of imperial military units of each pair produced one was given to a commanding officer within Dowager Dou, and she was in no hurry to assist the far-flung nobodies in Dong'ou against the equally far-flung Minyue. Emperor Wu and his newly appointed General Yan Zhu, however, were not about to

let something as trivial as an 800-year-old system of military confirmation get in the way. When the local army commander in Suzhou, which was then called Kuaiji, refused to obey without seeing the tiger tally, Yan Zhu invoked his status as imperial ambassador and ordered the commander executed. The mayor of Kuaiji, sufficiently intimidated, made no protest when Yan Zhu commissioned the large fleet stationed in Kuaiji to sail to Dong'o's rescue. As it turned out, the show of force itself was sufficient to make min y back down it king was ambitious after all but not so blind as to think his minor kingdom would stand a chance against the might of the han empire without a fight he withdrew his armies from dong but the real victory for emperor wu was not some bloodless victory in a far-away vassal state but instead the political precedent it had set that imperial decrees superseded and could bypass even the long-standing power of the Tiger tallies. With the military now rested away from his overbearing grandmother's grasp, Emperor Wu's political survival was, finally, assured.

This was reinforced the same year when his favorite concubine, with whom he had taken up company in spite of his wife's wishes, Lady Wei Zhifu, became pregnant with his first child, thereby clearing his name and silencing one of the main thrusts of his opponents, that he was infertile. Notably, when news reached the state of Huainan, Wu's uncle and potential successor, Prince Liu An, who had really been banking on that promised promotion, fell into a state of deluded jealousy, denying the reports, and declaring that anyone who brought him news of the quote-unquote truth of Emperor Wu's

continued childlessness would be amply rewarded. At last, in 135 BCE, Grand Empress Dowager Do died at around 70 years of age, removing the final roadblock to Wu taking power in his own right. He would declare an end to Taoist philosophies as the governing principles of state, and declare Confucian teachings the new official ideology. With that taken care of, he renewed a long-standing tradition of the Chinese emperors of old, but one that hadn't been practiced by the imperial seat since the decline of the Zhou dynasty. I mean rampant territorial expansionism, of course. Whereas most leaders in most places at most times would have just picked somewhere to attack,

Emperor Wu decided that that somewhere would be, in fact, everywhere. To the south, west, and north, every direction but the sea itself, Wu launched massive invasions to expand his empire. The first target was the once again troublesome southern kingdom of Minyue, who had been successfully deterred from aggression against Dong'ou in 138, but in 135 had begun another war with Nanyue to its southwest. Nanyue, which you'll remember is modern northern Vietnam and Guangzhou, had just enthroned a new young king, Zhao Mo, and his lack of experience had convinced the Minyue kingdom

that Nanyue was ripe for the taking. Being a vassal of the Han Empire, King Zhao Mo called for aid and Emperor Wu dispatched an amphibious expedition led by Generals Wang Hui and Han Anguo to relieve Nanyue and end the Minyue threat. Though Nanyue's own military was nothing to sniffle at, and many historians think that it was perfectly capable of defending itself against the Mingyue incursion. As a sign of submission to the emperor's authority, it asked for imperial aid instead. Once again, staring down the barrel of the Han Empire's military machine. Seriously, did they not see this coming? The Mingyue nobles rethought their decision just as they had three years prior. In a bid to avoid annihilation, a conspiracy of Mingyue's nobles,

led by none other than its king's younger brother, carried out a coup against King Ying. Ying was killed by his brother with a spear, decapitated, and his head sent to the imperial commander, General Wang, along with Mingyue's notice of capitulation. In the peace terms worked out, the Han emissaries wished to nullify Minyue's ability to wage further aggressive warfare on its neighbors once and for all. As such, they decided to divide the territory in half. The western half, which would still be called Minyue, was given over to a Han proxy ruler

named Zuo Chou, while the eastern half, now called Dongyue, was given to King Ying's brother and executioner Luo Yushan. Business with Mingyue concluded, at least for the time, Emperor Wu's reinvigorated Han Empire had much, much bigger fish to fry. While the Han Empire's relationship with the Xiongnu had always been, well, tense, the early reign of Emperor Wu had increased the heat and pressure along the two powers' extensive borders to the boiling point. In the third year of his reign, 139 BCE, Wu had dispatched his envoy, Zhang Qian, to explore the unknown vastness of Central Asia beyond the Han's western border at the Jade Gate Pass, and establish relations with any peoples he might come across.

This had long been a goal of the Chinese imperial court, but the Xiongnu Empire, militarily controlling the only real passage westward, had prevented it, then called Xiyu, which is literally the Western Regions, and today Xinjiang Autonomous Region, which makes up China's arid northwestern border. As China's only reasonable land route westward, the Han already knew it would be an immensely valuable area to hold, and indeed, it would eventually become a key portion of the Silk Road trade route, but first, it would have to be taken. Emperor Wu had chosen Zhang Qian because of his first-hand knowledge of the Xiongnu and

their customs. He, along with a captured Xiongnu guide named Gan Fu and ninety-eight others, had been sent to both scout out the territory as well as find a way through the Xiongnu-controlled Xiyu region. On the far side, it was believed that a people called the Yuezhi, also known as the Rouzhi, and identified by the Greeks as the Tokaroi, who had been expelled from their ancestral lands during the Xiongnu occupation. Emperor Wu wished to find and treat with the Yuezhi king, and convince him to aid the Han Empire in retaking Xiyu and opening up the western road for travel and trade. Things didn't start out so well for Zhang Qian, though. Virtually right out of the starting gate, he and his party were captured by Xiongnu

patrols as they attempted to cross the world's second largest shifting sand desert in the Turin Basin, the Taklama Khan, whose name either comes from Arabic, meaning the abandoned place, or possibly Turkey, meaning the place of ruin. Zhang Qian's entire party was taken captive and enslaved by the Xiongnu, including, it should be noted, the Xiongnu guide himself, Gan Fu. Welcome home indeed. For a period of ten years, Zhang would work under the lash of his captors, but was able to build a rapport with a local tribal leader, and eventually married a Xiongnu woman who bore him a son. Finally, in 129 BCE, Zhang Qian was able to escape his captors,

along with his wife, young son, and the guide Ganfu. Though the rest of the party had been lost, the four continued westward, around the northern edge of the Turin Basin and the now dried-up salt lake Lopnur, through the Dayuan Kingdom, whose markedly Caucasian-looking citizens were noted by Zhang, and were likely the remnants of Alexander the Great of Greece's conquest and colonization of the area some two centuries prior. It wasn't until 126 BCE that Zhang Tian finally found the long-lost Yuezhi Kingdom, which by this time had settled in Bactria, centered around Samarkand, modern

Uzbekistan, southern Kazakhstan, and northern Afghanistan. Zhang Tian was permitted an audience with the Yuezhi King, but was unable to convince him to return to the east to retake their lost homelands from the Xiongnu. They rather liked it where they were, thank you very much. Plus, those horse people were really scary. Regardless, Zhang Qian was welcomed within the Yuezhi kingdom, where he stayed for more than a year, documenting their culture, lifestyle, and economy, as well as the myriad cultures surrounding the country that were wholly alien to the Chinese up until this point. In late 126, Zhang, his family, and his guide Ganfu departed the Yuezhi Kingdom and began their

return trip to Han China. This time, they skirted the Tarim Basin to the south, and as a side note, both his northern and southern routes would ultimately make up the Silk Road's path around the harsh desert basin. There, they were once again captured by the Xiongnu, who in spite of the hostilities which had been ongoing with the Han Empire for almost a decade at this point, spared his life because they respected his sense of duty and composure in the face of death. The party was once again held in captivity for two years, before once again escaping when infighting broke out following the death of the tribal leader, and finally returned to Chang'an and the waiting Emperor Wu with his report in 126. Zhang Qian's report described in great detail the kingdoms which he had personally visited

or traversed. I'll read excerpts from Zhang's report as relayed through Sima Qian's Shi Ji, which was itself translated by the esteemed Dr. Burton Watson. The first was the Dayuan Kingdom, or Ionian Kingdom, whom Zhang described as, quote, southwest of the territory of the Xiongnu, some 10,000 li, which is about 5,000 kilometers, directly west of China. The people are settled on the land, plowing the fields and growing rice and wheat. They also make wine out of grapes grapes the people live in houses in fortified cities there being some 2,000 or 3,000 li west of the Dayuan, north of the Gui, or Oxus, river. They are bordered to the south by Daxia,

on the west by Anxi, and on the north by Kangju. They are a nation of nomads, moving from place to place with their herds, and their customs are like those of the Xiongnu. They have some 100,000 or 200,000 archer warriors. End quote. Next, he described Daxia, or Bactria,

as, quote, situated over 2,000 li southwest of Dayuan, south of the Gui, again, Oxus, river. Its people cultivate the land and have cities and houses. Their customs are like those of the Dayuan. It has no great ruler, but only a number of petty chiefs ruling the various cities. The people are poor in their use of arms and afraid of battle,

but they are clever at commerce. After the great Yuezhi moved west and attacked and conquered Daxia, the entire country came under their sway. The population of the country is large, numbering some one million or more persons. The capital is Lan Shi, where all sorts of goods are bought and sold. Zhang also visited a kingdom to the north of Yuezhi, which he called Kangju, which may have been either Turkic, Iranian, or Tokarian origin. Kangju he described as, quote, situated some 2,000 li northwest of Dayuan.

Its people are nomads and resemble the Yuezhi in their customs. They have 80,000 or 90,000 skilled archer fighters. The country is small and borders Dayuan. It acknowledges sovereignty to the Yuezhi people in the south and the Xiongnu in the east, end quote. Zhang Tian also made mention of many other peoples and kingdoms he had heard of, or discussed, or possibly even seen while abroad, including Anxi, which was the Parthian Empire, which is kind of a successor state to the ancient Persian Empire. He described it as, quote,

Anxi is situated several thousand li west of the region of the Great Yuezhi. The people are settled on the land, cultivating the field and growing rice and wheat. They also make wine out of grapes. They have walled cities like the people of Dayuan. The region contains several hundred cities of various sizes. The coins of the country are made of silver and bear the face of the king. When the king dies, the currency is immediately changed and new coins issued with the face of the king. When the king dies, the currency is immediately changed and new coins issued with the face of his successor. The people keep records by writing on horizontal strips of leather. To the west lies Tiaozhi. Now Tiaozhi remains rather ill-defined, but it's often thought to

have meant Mesopotamia. He described it as, quote, situated several thousand li west of an shi and borders the western sea which is probably either the persian gulf or the mediterranean it is hot and damp and the people live by cultivating the fields and planting rice chiefs. The ruler of Anqi gives orders to these chiefs and regards them as vassals, end quote. Zhang had also heard tell of a country he called Shendu, which existed in northern India and Pakistan, saying, quote, Shendu, they told me, lies several thousand li southeast of Daxia. The people cultivate the land and live much like the people of Daxia. The region is said to be hot and damp. The inhabitants ride elephants when they go into battle. The kingdom is situated on a great river, which is thought to be the Indus. Zhang Qian was rewarded lavishly by Emperor Wu, and honored with a position as palace counselor.

He would conduct a second and final journey to the west in his lifetime, from 119 to 115 BCE, as part of a trade mission to the Wusun people, and would result in a long-term link between Han China and the Parthinian-Persian Empire. Upon his triumphant return, Zhang was appointed the imperial grand messenger, making him one of the nine most powerful ministers in government. He would die, however, little more than a year later, in the year 113 BCE, but had laid virtually all of the groundwork for the highly lucrative Silk Road trade network, both in terms of finding the literal western road out of China and establishing connections with its distant neighbors. All the while, though, the long-contentious relationship between the Xiongnu and the Han had finally boiled over, and no marriage alliance would suffice to settle things back down again. Next time, the titanic 40 years war between the two heavyweights of the 2nd century BCE

Eastern Asia. The Sino-Xiongnu War. Thank you for listening. along with a free 30-day trial of the service. With over 100,000 titles to choose from, for your iPhone, Android, Kindle, or MP3 player, Audible is the nation's leading seller and producer of spoken audio content.