-195 BC- Emperor Gāozǔ was dead, so he was replaced by Crown
Prince Liú Yíng as the next emperor (who would be enthroned as Emperor Hùi
of Hàn).
-However, it was obvious to everyone that it wasn't
Emperor Hùi who was calling the shots at this point, but his mother, the cruel
Empress Lǚ, who was really running the show (especially considering that Emperor
Hùi was only like 15 when he was enthroned, so his mother had actually been
officially granted the title “empress dowager” meaning that she could rule as
regent until Emperor Hùi came of age to rule on his own).
-To make things
more complicated, Emperor Gāozǔ
had actually wanted Prince Liǘ Rúyì (his son with his favorite concubine, Consort
Qī, to be his heir), but this didn’t actually work out and eventually the
emperor took it back. It’s unclear as to
why really he wanted Liǘ Rúyì to be heir, but officially the reason was because
Liú Yíng was seen as being too “kind”, “tolerant”, and “weak-willed” (aww).
-Emperor Gāozǔ knew that naming
his son with Consort Qī would be met with fierce hostility from the empress, so
he had actually gone to great lengths to give Liǘ Rúyì power so that after he (Emperor Gāozǔ)
died then at least Liǘ Rúyì would have some ability to protect himself should
he not be enthroned.
-Emperor Gāozǔ did this by having Liǘ Rúyì enthroned as the vassal
king (or prince) of Dài in 200 BC, and having his trusted official Zhōu Chāng (who was actually a close friend of
the empress’) watch over him to try and keep him out of harm’s way. He was then named vassal king/prince of Zhào
in 198 BC (I’m not sure if this was in addition to being prince of Dài or he
was just being moved around). This
allowed for Liǘ Rúyì to effectively remain out of the capital and away from the
empress.
-Anyway,
because of all of the drama with Consort Qī and her son potentially becoming
heir to the throne instead of her own son, Empress Lǚ immediately set out seek
retribution against Consort Qī for this (whether Consort Qī intended to rock
the boat or not!).
-With the death of Emperor Gāozǔ, Empress
Dowager Lǚ immediately had Consort Qī arrested and imprisoned on fake charges (of
course), forcing her to perform hard labor.
-With Consort Qī dealt with, Empress Dowager
Lǚ then set her sights on eliminating the “threat” posed by Prince Liǘ Rúyì.
-The empress repeatedly sent for Liǘ Rúyì
to come to Cháng'ān, but of course Zhōu Chāng,
speaking for Liǘ Rúyì, politely refused these summons.
-Knowing that summoning the prince
himself to the capital wouldn’t work, so Empress Dowager Lǚ decided to switch
tactics and sent for Zhōu Chāng himself instead. Thinking that he was safe since he was such
good friends with the empress, Zhōu Chāng
acquiesced, but was promptly arrested when he finally arrived at the capital.
-Liǘ Rúyì knew that Zhōu Chāng’s life was in danger if he didn’t
come to the capital himself, so unfortunately the prince finally made the
decision to obey his stepmother’s summons and come to the capital.
-Although Emperor Hùi did his best to
protect his half-brother, of course this wasn’t enough since he just didn’t
have enough power at this time, and eventually Liǘ Rúyì was poisoned and died.
-After Liǘ Rúyì’s murder, the empress
then had Consort Qī’s arms and legs cut off, her eyes gouged out, her tongue
cut out, and then had her imprisoned in either a pig sty or lavatory (depending
on which version of the story I guess) and fed livestock slop.
-When Emperor Hùi finally
found out what was going on and saw the tortured and mutilated Consort Qī with
his own eyes he had a mental breakdown (understandably) for about a year, during
which all of his power was relinquished to Empress Dowager Lǚ.
-The emperor then spent most of his time
just living a debauched life, most likely trying to numb the insanity caused by
his mother’s brutality.
- Consort Qī finally
died in 194 BC after being tortured to death.
-Although
Empress Dowager Lǚ had killed Consort Qī and Liǘ Rúyì, she still wasn’t quite
finished in terms of her paranoid purge in order to consolidate absolute power
for herself.
-Liú Féi
(AKA Prince Dàohuì of Qí), Emperor Gāozǔ’s
eldest son (with another one of his concubines) was invited to the capital by
the empress for a glorious feast.
-Of course, Emperor Hùi was a nice guy
and allowed for his older half-brother to be seated ahead of him at the dinner
table, which was a breach of etiquette (although it made sense because the
emperor was just being polite), but this caused Empress Dowager Lǚ to seemingly
fly into a rage. She then went into the
kitchen and ordered the servants to poison Liú Féi’s
wine.
-Of course, when it was time to drink Emperor
Hùi knew (somehow) that the empress had poisoned Liú Féi’s wine, so he took his half-brother’s cup and made a
toast as if he was going to drink out of the cup himself, which naturally
caused his mother to leap up and stop her son from drinking the poisoned
wine. She then was REALLY pissed off,
and after apologizing to his mother (!) he then allowed for Liú Féi to leave the feast and travel safely back to his home.
-Apparently, after this Liú Féi was safe from the evil empress’ machinations, and I guess
lived happily ever after?
-Perhaps
she was frustrated from her inability to have Liú Féi
murdered, so Empress Dowager Lǚ then decided that her next target was yet
another one of Emperor Gāozǔ’s sons, Liú Yǒu
(the prince of Zhào).
-Although Liú Yǒu
had married the empress’ niece, he had
recently been busted for having an affair.
-Seeking revenge for her husband’s
infidelity, Liú Yǒu’s wife went to her
aunt and told her that Liú Yǒu was planning a
rebellion against the throne.
-Upon hearing the news, Empress Dowager
Lǚ summoned Liú Yǒu to the capital (which
actually worked!). When he arrived, of
course, he was arrested and imprisoned, where he eventually starved to death.
-192
BC- Mòdú Chányú (emperor of the fledgling Xiōngnú Empire) sent word to the Hàn dynasty
that he was terribly lonely and, seeing as how the empress was single, wanted
to see if the empress was interested in marrying him (haha).
-Of course, this really pissed off Empress Dowager
Lǚ due to its insolence (a barbarian king asking for an EMPRESS’ hand in
marriage?), and so the court began to plan for an invasion of the Xiōngnú
Empire as a response. However, the
courtier Jì Bù pointed out that the Xiōngnú were much more powerful than
whatever invasion force the Hàn dynasty could raise and that attacking them
would obviously be insane.
-Although this was followed by an awkward
silence, everyone knew that he Jì Bù was right, and so instead the Hàn court
sent back a humble letter turning down Mòdú Chányú and instead they just continued
the héqīn tributary system (marriages
between Hàn princesses and Xiōngnú lords along with gifts of wine, silk, and
liquor from the Hàn dynasty) with the Xiōngnú.
-191
BC- at this point, Emperor Hùi was 19 years old, so Empress Dowager Lǚ decided
that it was finally time for him to get married.
-Bizarrely, the empress chose for her son Zhāng Yān, her own granddaughter and the emperor’s niece!
-I guess he had no real say in the matter,
and upon being wed Zhāng Yān officially became Empress
Xiàohuì of Hàn.
-Although Emperor Hùi and Empress Xiàohuì
never produced any children of their own, Empress Dowager Lǚ apparently tried
to convince Empress Xiàohuì to officially adopt the sons born from Emperor Hùi’s
other concubines as her own sons and then have those concubines subsequently executed
afterwards (!!), and although it looks like the empress actually went through
with the mass adoptions it’s unclear as to if these sons were actually the
offspring of these concubines and the emperor himself (the fate of Emperor Hùi’s
concubines is also kind of unclear as well, although it seems as if they were
indeed killed).
-During
this time also Empress Dowager Lǚ began to elevate members of her own family (the
Lǚ clan, as opposed to the imperial Liú clan) to positions of power.
-This was ironic because it was actually Empress
Dowager Lǚ’s idea originally that only those of imperial blood could become princes
of the various regions of the Hàn Empire, but at this point she was using her autocratic
grip on power to ensure that members of her side of the family were elevated to
become princes and other offices otherwise reserved for those of imperial
blood.
-188
BC- Emperor Hùi dies of a mysterious illness at the age of 22 (!). He was replaced by his eldest (adopted) son, Liú Gōng, who was enthroned as Emperor Qiánshǎo of Hàn (and must
have been about 10 years old around the time of his enthronement).
-Unfortunately, we know so little about about
Emperor Qiánshǎo that he’s not even included in a lot of the histories of the Hàn
emperors.
-The only real thing we know about him (that
was recorded, at least) was that at one point (either in or before 184 BC) when
he found out that he was adopted by Empress Xiàohuì he claimed that he would kill
whoever was responsible for his biological mother’s death. Of course, when Empress Dowager Lǚ found out
about this she had the young emperor secretly imprisoned with the excuse that
he was “ill” and then had him executed.
-184
BC- So, Empress Xiàohuì was dead, so Empress Dowager Lǚ had him replaced by his
(adopted, like him) six-year-old little brother, Liú Yì (AKA Liú Hóng), who was enthroned as
Emperor Hòushǎo of Hàn (although of course Empress Dowager Lǚ would still be calling
all the shots, of course).
-180
BC- Empress Dowager Lǚ finally dies and is buried in Emperor Gāozǔ’s tomb.
-Her reign of terror had lasted for about 15
years.
-Did this mean that Emperor Hòushǎo was able
to take control of the throne for himself?
-This was because during her rule Empress
Dowager Lǚ had re-stocked the government with members from her own clan, so
they weren’t about to give up their power just so authority could be rightly
restored to the emperor (who was still a boy, of course).
-Empress Dowager Lǚ had even gone so
far as to write in her will that Emperor Hòushǎo was to marry her grandniece as
well as installing other various family members into important government
offices and positions.
-However, even though it was a “rumor”
it was obvious that the Lǚ clan was trying to take power from the imperial Liú
clan, so in a last ditch attempt to save the government these usurpers a bunch
of officials led by the imperial chancellors Chén Píng,
Zhōu Bó, and others formed an alliance.
-The plan was for Liú Xiāng (AKA King Āī of
Qí and grandson of Emperor Gāozǔ)to raise an army and invade the capital, while the imperial guard commanders
Liú Zhāng (AKA Prince Jǐng of Chéngyáng) and
his younger brother Liú Xīngjū would try and get the imperial guard to rebel
against the Lǚ officials. After invading
the city Emperor Hòushǎo would be dethroned and Liú Xiāng would crown himself the new emperor.
-When Liú Xiāng
raised his army and started marching he soon was met with the Hàn imperial army,
led by Chancellor Guàn Yīng (AKA Marquess Yì of
Yǐngyīn). However, Guàn Yīng actually sympathized with the rebel army, and even ended
up joining them in their rebellion!
-Meanwhile, back in the capital, the Liú clan
tried to persuade the Lǚ clan to give up power in order to avoid unnecessary bloodshed. This didn’t really work, though, so the Liú clan
instead used military officers sympathetic to Liú Xiāng’s
rebellion to order their troops to hunt down any Lǚ family members they could
in order to completely exterminate them.
-Once the massacre was complete, the Liú clan
held a meeting in which they officially decided that NONE of Emperor Hùi’s sons
from his various concubines were legitimate (even if they had been officially adopted,
since that was all the doing of Empress Dowager Lǚ) were legitimate and instead decided on Emperor
Gāozǔ’s last surviving son, Prince Liú Héng of Dài, who, after some convincing,
finally accepted to be enthroned as Emperor Wén of Hàn.
-Emperor
Hòushǎo was stripped of his titles and evicted from the palace, and not too much
longer after that was executed along with his wife, Empress Lǚ (unclear as to
why, unfortunately).
