Empress Wei Zifu

Empress Wei Zifu (Traditional Chinese: 衛子夫; Simplified Chinese: 卫子夫; pinyin: Weì Zǐfū) (d. 91 BC), formally Wei Sihou (衛思后), was an empress during Han Dynasty. She was Emperor Wu's second wife, and stayed as his empress for 38 years, the second longest in Chinese history. She was also the sister of the famed general Wei Qing, the aunt of Huo Qubing and the stepaunt of Huo Guang.

Family background and early years

Wei Zifu was born from humble means, as an illegitimate child. She therefore took the family name of her mother's husband, who was a servant at the household of Princess Pingyang (平陽公主), Emperor Wu's sister. Her brother Wei Qing was also an illegitimate child, of a different father. When Wei Zifu was still young, she became a singing dancer at the princess' estate.

Emperor Wu initially loved his first wife, Empress Chen Jiao greatly but after Empress Chen was unable to bear him a son after years of marriage, she began to lose favor. Circa 139 BC, Emperor Wu paid a visit to his sister Princess Pingyang, who had prepared a collection of young women to offer for his concubinage (girls from lowly background, such as Wei Zifu, were not included), in order to establish herself political leverage. However, the plan did not work — all the candidates failed to impress the Emperor. Realizing her brother was bored, the Princess called in the dancers for entertainment. This time, the Emperor set his eyes on Wei and had immediately fallen for her beauty. Taking the opportunity of visiting the restroom, the young Emperor took advantage on the young singer, whom the Princess ordered to follow in and serve as a handmaid. Princess Pingyang therefore offered Wei to Emperor Wu to become part of his concubinage.

However, what Wei Zifu would experience later on was far from a lovely cinderella story. Empress Chen, upon hearing the arrival of the new concubine, went on an emotional rampage which forced Emperor Wu to abandon his idea of making Wei his concubine. Wei Zifu then was demoted to an insignificant palace maid and was largely forgotten by the Emperor. More than a year later, feeling hopeless with her life inside the palaces, Wei blended into a queue of palace maids waiting to be expelled from the palace (normally those who were aged or incompetent in palace services) in the hope of getting out. Coincidentally, Emperor Wu happened to be there inspecting the expulsion process, and love soon re-flamed when he saw the tearful young girl pleaing to go home. Wei was made to stay and fell pregnant very shortly later. This was exciting news for Emperor Wu, who was very upset over being partially blamed for Empress Chen's infertility. At the time, Emperor Wu's throne was under threat due to his previous political clash with Grand Empress Dowager Dou in the failed 139 BC reform, after which many royal members supported the idea of deposing him under the excuse that he was incapable of fathering children, and making his uncle Liu An the successor. Wei Zifu's pregnancy cleared Emperor Wu's name, and ensured her becoming greatly favored over Empress Chen.

Empress Chen became exceedingly jealous of Wei Zifu, and Empress Chen's mother, Princess Liu Piao (劉嫖) tried to take vengeance by kidnapping Wei's younger brother Wei Qing, who was then a servant at a marquess' household, and she considered killing him. Wei Qing, however, was rescued from the princess' estate by his friends, led by Gongsun Ao (公孫敖). In response to the incident and as a sign of annoyance towards Empress Chen and Princess Piao, Emperor Wu made Wei Zifu a Consort (a concubine position lower only to the Empress), and resided closely to himself. Wei Qing was appointed the head of the household at Jianzhang Palace, away from where the princess might be able to harm him. While being an imperial concubine, Consort Wei almost monopolized the Emperor's love and bore him three daughters.

In 130 BC, Empress Chen was discovered to have retained witches to use witchcraft in the attempt to restore her husband's love to her and to curse other concubines, Consort Wei in particular. She was deposed for this misconduct against imperial moral standards, but Consort Wei was not made empress at this time, because she too was sonless like the other concubines. In 128 BC, she finally bore Emperor Wu his first son, Liu Ju, and she was created Empress later that year. Her son was created Crown Prince in 122 BC.

As empress

After Wei Zifu became empress, Emperor Wu honored her family greatly. Wei Qing was made a key general in the war effort against Xiongnu, and after he won some major victories, not only he, but also his three young sons, were made marquesses. Similarly promoted and honored was her nephew Huo Qubing, a great general in his own right. Despite the fact that the rise of the Wei family largely owed credit to the military talent of Wei Qing and Huo Qubing, Wei Zifu was often seen as the backbone of the family. A contemporary folk song sang:

cquote|"Nothing to be happy if you bear a son. Nothing to be angry if you bear a daughter. Don't you see Wei Zifu rules the world!"(生男無喜，生女無怒，獨不見衛子夫霸天下！)

Because the great achievements of this Wei family, many later Han emperors considered marrying concubines with the surname "Wei" as a way of attaining good fortune.

As the years went by, the sexual attraction to Empress Wei by Emperor Wu would decrease tremendously. He favored several other concubines, including Consort Li (the sister of Li Guangli and Li Yannian) and Consort Zhao. However, he continued to respect Empress Wei's judgment in governing the palace, and he entrusted her with palace affairs while he would be out of the capital, while entrusting the governmental affairs to her son, Crown Prince Ju.

The Crown Prince Ju revolt and death

In his advanced age, Emperor Wu became fairly paranoid about the use of witchcraft against him. In 96 BC, a series of witchcraft persecutions would begin. Large numbers of people, many of whom were high officials and their families, were accused of witchcraft and executed, usually with their clans. The first trial began with General Gongsun Ao and his wife, leading to the execution of their clan. Soon, these witchcraft persecutions would become intertwined in the succession struggles and erupt into a major catastrophe.

In 94 BC, Emperor Wu's youngest son Liu Fuling was born to Consort Zhao. Emperor Wu was ecstatic in having a child at his advanced age (62), and because Consort Zhao purportedly had a pregnancy that lasted 14 months long -- the same length as the mythical Emperor Yao -- he named Consort Zhao's palace gate "Gate of Yao's Mother." This led to speculations that he, due to his favor for Consort Zhao and Prince Fuling, wanted to make Prince Fuling crown prince instead. While there was no evidence that he actually intended to do anything of the such, over the next few years, there began to be conspirators against Crown Prince Ju and Empress Wei.

One of the conspirators against Prince Ju would be Jiang Chong (江充), the head of the secret intelligence, who once had a run-in with Prince Ju after arresting one of Prince Ju's assistants for improper use of an imperial right of way. It appears likely that Jiang was behind many of the witchcraft accusations against important persons -- including Prince Ju's sisters Princesses Zhuyi and Yangshi and cousin Wei Kang (衛伉) (Wei Qing's son), who were executed in 91 BC after being accused of witchcraft. One other conspirator was Emperor Wu's guard Su Wen (蘇文), who had falsely accused Prince Ju of committing adultery with Emperor Wu's junior concubines.

Jiang and Su decided on using witchcraft as the excuse to move against Prince Ju. Jiang, with approval from Emperor Wu, who was then at his summer palace in Ganquan (甘泉, in modern Xianyang, Shaanxi), searched through various palaces, ostensibly for witchcraft items, eventually reaching Prince Ju's palace. He planted dolls and a piece of cloth with mysterious writing in Prince Ju's palace, and then announced that he found them there. Prince Ju was shocked. He considered his options, and his teacher Shi De (石德), invoking the story of Ying Fusu and raising the possibility that Emperor Wu might already be deceased, suggested that Prince Ju start an uprising. Prince Ju initially hesitated and wanted to speedily proceed to Ganquan to try to see his father to explain himself, but he found out that Jiang's messengers were already on their way. He decided to accept Shi's suggestion.

Prince Ju then sent an individual to impersonate a messenger from Emperor Wu to arrest Jiang and his coconspirators — except for Su, who escaped. After they were arrested, Prince Ju personally killed Jiang. He then led the guards of his and Empress Wei's palaces and prepared to defend himself. Su fled to Ganquan Palace and told Emperor Wu that Prince Ju was committing treason. Emperor Wu, not believing it to be true and correctly (at this point) believing that Prince Ju had merely been angry at Jiang, send a messenger back to Chang'an to summon Prince Ju. The messenger did not dare to proceed to Chang'an, but instead returned and falsely reported to Emperor Wu that Prince Ju was going to kill him. By now enraged, Emperor Wu ordered his nephew, Prime Minister Liu Qumao (劉屈犛), to put down the rebellion. The forces battled for five days, but Liu Qumao's forces prevailed after it became clear that Prince Ju did not have his father's authorization. Prince Ju fled the capital and eventually committed suicide.

Shortly after Prince Ju's escape, Emperor Wu sent two officials to Empress Wei's palace to seize her seal (i.e. to depose her). In response, she committed suicide, and was buried with a small coffin in south of the city. Most of her clan members were killed in the turmoil.

After her great-grandson Liu Bingyi (through Prince Ju) became emperor in 74 BC as Emperor Xuan, he had her reburied in a larger but relatively modest tomb, not with her husband Emperor Wu, and gave her the posthumous title Wei Si Hou (衛思后, literally meaning "Empress Wei, the Deep Thinker"). Her new tomb, due to its remote location and relatively humbleness, escape the looting by tomb raiders later.

References

* "Book of Han", vols. 6, 63, 97, Part 1.
* "Zizhi Tongjian", vols. 17, 18, 22.