Wu Zetian

Chinese empress (r. 690-705)

• Born: 625
• Birthplace: Ch'angan (now Xi'an), Shaanxi Province, China
• Died: December 16, 0705
• Place of death: Ch'angan (now Xi'an), Shaanxi Province, China

Wu Hou, known for her ruthlessness, rose from the position of courtier to became the only woman to rule as empress of China in her own name; she was perhaps the most powerful leader in the world during her lifetime. She was a patron of Buddhism and attempted to elevate the position of women in China.

Early Life

The future empress Wu Hou (wew-hoh) of China was born as Wu Zhao into a politically well-connected family in the early years of the Tang Dynasty (T’ang; 618-907). The young woman was selected at an early age to become a minor concubine of the emperor Taizong (T’ai-tsung; r. 627-649). Her father, Wu Shihou (Wu Shih-hou), was a supporter of Gaozu (Kao-tsu, r. 618-626), the first emperor of the Tang, and it was only natural that Wu Shihou’s support would be rewarded by the inclusion of his daughter Wu Zhao in the royal court. Later, Wu Zhao would leverage this privileged position; she would plot and intrigue to eventually usurp the throne and eventually rule in her own name.

During Taizong’s reign, China reached what was probably the height of its success and power. Taizong’s many military reforms led to a consolidation of Chinese power throughout Central Asia and as far north as Korea. Further expansion south into Vietnam and Tibet continued throughout his reign, but periodic uprisings in Yunnan prevented China from achieving full control of the southern region.

The large military expansion was made possible by brilliant financial and economic development, most notably through the issue of new coinage , the {I}Kaiyuan tongbao{/I}, which became an accepted currency from Vietnam to Japan, and virtually everywhere along the Silk Road to Persia. The new trade coinage not only facilitated trade but also greatly eased the burden of tax collection, permitting the imperial coffers to overflow. Under the watchful Chinese military along the main trade routes of the Silk Road, brigandage was curtailed, and merchants could make the trek from Byzantium to China confident of their security.

The beginnings of trouble for Taizong may have been his failure to manage his own success. The pax sinica of the Tang Dynasty greatly stimulated international trade, created a rapidly expanding middle class, and initiated a flowering of cultural arts. This meant that the state had few problems to occupy its time. Therefore, the palace turned inward, and the emperor spent more time engaging in idle pursuits with concubines in the harem than dealing with state affairs. This enabled the courtiers to dominate state politics, a trend that would plague the Tang Dynasty and eventually lead to its downfall.

Life’s Work

Wu Zhao’s rise to the throne began when she became a minor concubine during the latter years of Taizong’s reign. The latter stages of the emperor’s reign were marked by dissipation and degeneracy. It is possible that Taizong knew only tangentially of Wu Zhao, as his late years were preoccupied with the selection of a suitable heir. The emperor had more than fourteen sons and numerous daughters, but his favorite sons were effeminate, homosexual, or otherwise unsuitable for the throne. Perhaps in dejection, Taizong finally placed the young and weak Li Zhi (Li Chih), known as Gaozong (Kao-tsung; r. 650-683), on the throne. The controversial choice would place Wu Zhao into a position to seize power.

Gaozong was a poor choice for leader of the world’s largest empire. Weak and indecisive, he often turned to his court for decisions of policy. He was also preoccupied with creating his own heir. His first wife, the empress Wang, had failed to give birth to a son. Wu Zhao, however, had become a concubine of Gaozong and had given birth to a son. When Wu Zhao gave birth to a daughter who died, she blamed the empress Wang for the infant’s death. The emperor believed Wu Zhao’s accusation. The empress Wang was not immediately deposed, but she and a concubine who had given birth to a son were later accused of plotting against the emperor and were imprisoned and eventually executed. Wu Zhao was elevated to the emperor’s side as empress.

Wu Zhao quickly became the true power behind the throne. Gaozong, untrained by Taizong for the emperorship, was never able to make decisions for himself or to function as emperor. He was further incapacitated by a stroke in 660, which left him inarticulate and partially paralyzed an event that consolidated Wu Zhao’s power. She quickly created her own branch of the imperial secret police, which then began investigating, framing, and murdering her rivals.

The palace plots and intrigues were able to take place because of a continuing rise in living standards and economic power in China. Wu Zhao’s decision to undertake a major military operation in Korea ended with China annexing the peninsula, and major defeats of Sāsānid and Turkish forces consolidated Chinese control over Central Asia. The overall economic prosperity allowed people to concern themselves with arts and religion. Buddhism, which advocated a search for personal enlightenment rather than pursuit of worldly concerns, became increasingly dominant. Wu Zhao was a Buddhist and became an active patron of the religion, while acting to suppress imperial Confucianism, at least in part because of its male supremacist worldview.

After the death of Gaozong at the end of 683, Wu Zhao placed her third son, Li Zhe (Li Che) on the throne in 684, where he would rule as Zhongzong (Chung-tsung; r. 684). However, she realized he would be difficult to control and, within six weeks, replaced him with her fourth son, Li Dang (Li Tang), who became Emperor Ruizong (Jui-tsung, r. 684-690), a puppet emperor. During the year, a failed attempt to assassinate Wu Zhao was the impetus for her to sentence to death nearly half of the imperial family. Virtually all the members of the aristocracy and imperial court as well as high-ranking officials and nobility were replaced by officials loyal to Wu Zhao alone. Under the veil of Ruizong’s rule, Wu Zhao reigned supreme.

To begin building support for her sole reign, Wu Zhao actively strove to elevate the place of women, founding a branch of the imperial library to write biographies of famous and influential women. Styling herself Wu Zetian, the sage mother blessed by heaven, she ordered Daoist temples to incorporate statues of the sage mother of the philosopher Laozi (Lao-tzu; 604-sixth century b.c.e.) to generate favorable publicity for a female ruler. She had two of her own daughters inducted into the Lingpao canon of the Daoist faith. Although this may have been primarily to keep her daughters cloistered until she arranged a suitable marriage rather than from a true devotion to Daoism, Wu Zetian’s reign was marked by the construction of numerous Daoist temples, and it is clear that she was a patron to Daoists as well as Buddhists.

The Buddhist religion had become increasingly popular in China since the return of the monk Xuanzang (Hsüan-tsang) from India with Buddhist texts in 645. Taizong himself had granted Xuanzang a temple in Chang’an, and the religion spread quickly among both nobles and peasants. Recognizing the potential of using popular Buddhist support, Wu Zetian commissioned a project developing massive Buddhist caves at Longmen (south of Luoyang, Henan Province). The site had been carved out as a Buddhist shrine more than one hundred years earlier, but under Wu Zetian, the shrine would reach eminent status as one of the principal places of Buddhist worship. The main feature of the site is the colossal 57-foot (17-meter) statue of Maitreya, the Buddha of the future, whose facial features were styled after those of Wu Zetian. Construction at the caves began in 673, and the site grew to contain more than 1,300 caves and 100,000 statues. Longmen was named a United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)World Heritage site.

In addition to Longmen, Wu Zetian was a major patron for the temple of Famensi (the open doorway temple) in modern-day Fufang, Shaanxi Province. The discovery of a sarira, or reliquary of the Buddha, at the site during archaeological excavation has led Sinologist Roderick Whitfield to speculate that some of the objects uncovered may have been interred by Wu Zetian herself. Notable among the findings was a small monk’s robe, about doll sized, covered with stylistic white clouds. These clouds may be reflective of the Bai hua jing (white cloud sutra), a Buddhist text that was “discovered” by the monk Xue Huaiyi. The sutra became a critical text supporting the legitimacy of Wu Zetian’s reign; her translator interpreted the text as proclaiming that a female ruler with Wu Zetian’s qualities would appear on the earth and that this ruler would be the reincarnation of Maitreya, the future Buddha. During the time the Maitreya spent on the earth, the texts indicated that there would be bountiful harvests and that people would not suffer illnesses.

To propagate the text, Buddhist temples in honor of Maitreya were established throughout the empire. The main carving of the Longmen Maitreya began after the discovery of this text. The Buddhists “discovered” several auspicious omens in 690. In view of this development, Ruizong abdicated, and Wu Zetian went through the imperial rituals to become empress. Her first action changed the dynastic title from Tang to Zhou, proclaiming a new era of the universal ruler.

Wu Zetian ultimately turned her back on ruling and occupied most of her time with a pair of young lovers, the Zhang brothers, who grew to be bullies in the court and openly corrupt. By 705, Wu Zetian’s hold on power had grown weak, and she could not prevent the assassination of the Zhang brothers. She abdicated in favor of Zhongzong, placing him on the throne for the second time. Bereft of power and with few friends, she died not long after her abdication. After her death, Wu Zetian was interred beside Gaozong in the Qianling Mausoleum, north of modern Xi’an.

Significance

The upward climb of Wu Hou (her posthumous name) bears striking similarity to the rise of Theodora, wife of the Byzantine emperor Justinian (r. 527-565). Theodora had been an exotic dancer, an actress, a Monophysite Christian, and probably a prostitute before becoming the wife of Justinian. Justinian, who in his early years was marked by indecision, was pushed to strength by Theodora’s impassioned speech to him during the Nika revolt of 532. The event strengthened Justinian’s resolve and encouraged him to rule ably. Thus, Wu Hou and Theodora both played a strong role in politics, and their rise was anathema to the upper classes. Although Wu Hou ultimately was able to rule in her own name, Theodora was never recognized as augusta or empress in her own right, as Justinian realized that this would push the nobility too far.

Modern Chinese historians often view the reign of Wu Hou as that of a brutal and depraved usurper, but they agree that she certainly changed the perception of the strength and position of women in Chinese society. After Wu Hou’s reign, no woman in China would ever rule in her own name, although many women would wield real power behind the scenes. The Buddhist caves, temples, and statues created as a result of Wu Hou’s patronage of Buddhism are a lasting legacy, providing examples of the art and architecture of Tang China.

Bibliography

Jiang, Cheng An. Empress of China, Wu Ze Tian. Monterey, Calif.: Victory Press, 1998. A young adult work that presents Wu Hou in a favorable light.

McCune, Evelyn. Empress. New York: Ballantine, 1994. A work of historical fiction, this is nevertheless a well-researched and enjoyable piece that romanticizes some of the details of Wu Hou’s life.

Paludan, Ann. Chronicles of the Chinese Emperors. London: Thames and Hudson, 1993. Paludan’s popular account of the rulers of China contains good biographical and bibliographic material but is more suitable for the layperson rather than the serious academic, who will want to use the standard Chinese imperial biographies.

Paul, Diana. “Empress Wu and the Historians.” In Unspoken Worlds: Women’s Religous Lives in Non-Western Cultures, edited by Nancy Falk and Rita Gross. New York: Harper and Row, 1980. A concise examination of the treatment of Wu Hou by various historians.

Tian, Hengyu. Wu Zetian: The Mighty Woman Sovereign of China. Hong Kong: Asiapac Books, 1997. Not strictly a scholarly work, Tian’s book nevertheless serves as a fine introduction to the debate on whether Wu Hou was a wicked or good ruler.