Anecdote of the Fifth Queen Mother

Chapter 1 Preface
The title of this book is "Anecdotes of the Five Empress Dowagers". As the name suggests, they are all empress dowagers.These five empress dowagers are: Empress Lu of the Western Han Dynasty, Empress Hu of the Northern Wei Dynasty, Empress Wu of the Tang Dynasty, Empress Xiao of the Liao Kingdom, and Empress Dowager of the Western Qing Dynasty.These five empress dowagers are strong women who appeared successively in the ancient feudal society of our country. They are all actual female emperors. Among them, the empress dowager Wu Zetian of Tang Dynasty is the real female emperor.In feudal society, men were superior to women, so these strong women did things that women were not supposed to do in that era, and they also did things that ordinary women could not do.They proclaim their authority in front of the court, let the majestic men pay homage, shout long live, and shake the prestige of women bossing around, how fun!Wu Zetian has even tasted the taste of sitting on the dragon chair.In feudal society, they can be described as rebellious women.Driven by their desire for power, they became the vanguards who challenged the feudal code of ethics and the "Three Cardinal Guidelines and Five Constant Principles".

According to historical materialism, when evaluating historical figures, one should place the persons being evaluated within a certain historical scope.These five strong women run through the entire ancient Chinese feudal society.Han, Tang, and Qing are three great dynasties, while Northern Wei and Liao are northern regimes established by two northern ethnic groups.Therefore, the five empress dowagers we selected represent various historical periods as well as the Han nationality and ethnic minorities, and they also run through the ancient times and are typical.The purpose of writing this book is to select these five typical empress dowagers, describe the whole process of their intervention in government affairs, and explore some laws of feudal autocracy from one side.Therefore, the purpose of writing this book is not to evaluate specific historical figures, that is, not to evaluate for the sake of evaluation, and the purpose is not to praise or derogate.Whether it is praise or derogation, it is based on the understanding of the author's family and is written without restraint.We don't seek uniformity, we don't seek consistency, and the text is as popular as possible, but it doesn't have to be rigid.One person, one biography, combined to form a whole, not written by one person, gathered together to form one, and then viewed through it, it may reflect more objectively.Whether our purpose is achieved, readers are invited to comment.

The history that repeats itself again and again is the law.The male-centered feudal society adopted various methods to prevent female leaders and eunuchs from arranging power. However, the system of empress dowagers and eunuchs’ arbitrariness were repeated again and again.From the Empress Dowager Lu to the Empress Dowager Xi, it is interesting and instructive to see what the female leaders have in common in politics, and to reflect on it.In the writings of feudal historians, women's participation in politics is basically denied.As early as when King Wu of Zhou defeated Zhou, Zhou’s army swore an oath in Muye and listed the crimes of King Yin Zhou. One of the major crimes was that “only a woman’s words are valid.” At that time, there was a proverb or motto.When the hen crows, the family will be separated.By extension, if women interfere in politics, the dynasty will perish.This is the logic behind Zhou Wu Wang Muye's oath to master.Therefore, the old history is full of records of female evildoing the country, such as Yin Zhou died with Da, and Zhou You used praise to make chaos!It is naturally unfair to shift the responsibility for the decline of a male-centered national regime to women, and it can also be said to reverse history.After the founding of the People's Republic of China, some historians seem to want to reverse the upside-down history again, thinking that men and women are equal, men can be emperors, why can't women!Male emperors can have Sangong and Liuyuan, why can't female emperors have several faces!Contrary to feudal historians, singing the praises of female emperors, such as beautifying Wu Zetian is a vivid example, assigning the continuation of Zhenguan beauty to Wu Zetian's account, and flaunting this is Marxism-Leninism, what kind of materialist view of history!Simply confronting the essence is metaphysics, which has nothing to do with the realistic and truth-seeking Marxist-Leninist historical materialism.

History cannot be tampered with.Feudal historians who defend the feudal system do not want to touch the essence of history, and only discuss the appearance of history. Their positions and views should be negated.They reversed history, but they reversed their views, not that they recorded reversed history.Since history cannot be tampered with, it cannot be reversed either.A 24 histories records 5000 years of ancient Chinese civilization and thousands of historical figures large and small.These historical figures have written their own history with their own actions.These histories were recorded by old feudal historians and passed down through the test of history. Generally speaking, they cannot be tampered with.Qin Hui is Qin Hui, and Yue Fei is Yue Fei. No matter how fashionable theories are dressed up, they can't change the history written by these two characters.For example, Cao Cao killed people, and he cannot be forgiven for killing people just because he unified the north.No matter how beautifully written, the articles that try to smear history with modern people's ideas are just passing by, and will not damage the historical facts contained in the 24th history!Women's equality is a concept after the May 20th Movement in the [-]th century. Using this concept to praise the ancient heroine and queen will only make history more confusing!We think this is the case with the excessive praise of Wu Zetian in the past few years!

Women account for half of the population, commonly known as "half the sky".Women are as creative as men.What men can do, women can do too!The authority of the five empress dowagers is a vivid proof of this point.A man can be an emperor, and a woman can be an emperor too.Women are no less powerful than men.In this sense, the Fifth Empress Dowager is a hero among women. They have fought for women, and they can also speak out.It is unfair that a male-centered feudal society restrains women with feudal ethics and should be criticized.From the performance of the life of the fifth queen mother, it is enough to deny the hypocrisy of the chastity praised by the following female biographies written by feudal historians!But this is only one side of history.From the other side of history, it is precisely because the autocratic regime is represented by the male family and family name, so it is not something women should do.Women do not pass on to the next generation, so a woman being an emperor would not be very different from the political system of Jiatianxia!Wu Zetian encountered this thorny problem. In the end, she had to go back to Li's ancestral hall to enjoy the blood and incense of Li's descendants.That is to say, it is illegal for women to participate in politics under the feudal autocratic regime.Because of this, a woman has to pay a higher price than a man if she wants to turn illegality into legality, and she is ten times, a hundred times more cunning and cruel than a man in playing tricks!Moreover, women have limited capital to rely on, and they all borrow their natural beauty. Naturally, they have to pay a price of damage to their bodies and morals on the road to success.So in the concept of these strong women who interfere in politics, they don't know what morality and faith are!This is objectively dictated and historically dictated.From the perspective of the practice of political struggle, women's interference in politics means the dictatorship of foreign relatives, or the chaos of politics by male pets, which in essence intensifies the division and struggle within the ruling class, thus causing social unrest.This is true for the change of Zhulu in the Western Han Dynasty, the Battle of Heyin in the late Northern Wei Dynasty, the rebellion of Empress Wei after Wu Zetian, and the coup of [-] when the Queen Mother strangled the reform.The only Emperor Zetian was pushed down by the coup d'état of the five kings, and got the reward of the world, which is more typical.From this point of view, "the morning of the rooster, the only thing that leads to the home" is also a historical experience.Therefore, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty established the prince Liu Fuling and bestowed his mother to death; the queen of the Northern Wei Dynasty gave birth to a prince and was bestowed with death in the end.

After understanding the historical reasons mentioned above, it is not difficult to understand why each queen mother was so cruel from Queen Mother Lu to Queen Mother West.Empress Dowager Lu forced and angered her only son, Emperor Hui to death; Empress Dowager Hu poisoned her only son, Emperor Suzong; The emperor died young, and he killed Emperor Guangxu, the heir to the lineage he had personally cultivated, in an ambiguous manner; the reason why Empress Dowager Xiao did not kill her son Liao Shengzong was because Shengzong kept his own obscurity like an idiot, so he escaped death. Fortunately.It is almost common for women to intervene in politics and have to kill their own flesh and blood in order to secure power. Isn't this thought-provoking?

The feudal society's feminist leadership is like the eunuch's power, no matter how to prevent it, it will repeat itself again and again. This is a question worth pondering.Let us dissect Wu Zetian.Because Wu Zetian proclaimed himself emperor, it is more typical.The reason why she was able to claim the title of emperor was that Tang Gaozong had been ill for a long time and had a weak personality. Wu Zetian used the imperial power to pre-government for a long time and cultivated his buddies.The long-term fall of Tang Gaozong's power was an accidental factor, and it seems that Wu Zetian's success was only accidental.In fact, this accident is contained in the necessity of despotism.The emperor is just like ordinary people, and most of the successful kings, because they live in the deep palace and the environment is limited, not only do not know the difficulties of farming, but also their mental development is not perfect, and the average can not reach the level of middle intelligence, human nature is often distorted, eccentric and stubborn , and the feudal system makes such a fool concentrate power in one body, and he has to spend a lot of time enjoying himself, so the power must fall on the women and villains around him.This is the reason why feudal society women rule the country and eunuchs are always unavoidable.Fundamentally speaking, whether it is a woman, a man, an eunuch, or a foreign relative, they all use imperial power to ravage.Since the imperial power is the private property of each family, and it is sacred and absolute, it is natural that the women and villains around the emperor will be able to do their tricks.The feudal historians of the old era did not search for the source of the chaos from the root, but only blamed the faint king and the women's misfortune on the appearance of history, which can be said to have drawn a blurred curtain on history.Historical materialism should lift the veil and reveal the true face of history, instead of only confronting the appearance of history.The simple confrontation just puts another layer of metaphysical curtain on the blurred curtain of feudal historians, making the truth of history more hidden behind the scenes, which cannot be ignored.Whether it is a dictator of men or a dictator of women, it is meaningless to praise or blame for the sake of praise or blame.The Biography of the Five Empress Dowagers in this book seems to derogate more than praise, as if returning to the position of a feudal historian.The wise see wisdom, the benevolent see benevolence, and readers' comments are also a kind of re-creation.The purpose of our writing the biography of the five empress dowagers is to observe the end of the original, comment on the cause and effect of their appearance on the stage of history, and provide people with reflection.The authors of this book are all young and middle-aged, with the most unframed minds. They all write by intuition, with their own emotional color of praise and criticism, but they all try to narrate in the light of historical facts. Although the form is popular, there are both opinions. According to the book, readers can remove the author's praise and criticism to think independently.

The feudal system in China has long been overthrown, and women have risen from the bottom of society. Now that men and women are equal, women's outstanding talents have been liberated, and they do not need to pay special prices for their political career.From a global perspective, it is not surprising that women are heads of state.But in feudal society it was a different matter.The cruelty of the fifth queen mother is the means they must use in politics, and this means should be regarded as their tragedy!We should not wash away this tragedy, but should reflect this tragedy as it is, so that people can understand the essence of feudal autocratic society through this cruel tragedy reflected by refraction.Speaking of the personal talents of the Fifth Empress Dowager, they are all remarkable figures.They conquered the whole male-centered society without thousands of troops. Isn't that simple!How they get close to the imperial power and play with the imperial power is an art.They are also double figures in history, making outstanding contributions to history and committing crimes against history at the same time.Empress Dowager Lu assisted Liu Bangtu, a hero, and made great contributions to the consolidation of the Western Han Dynasty; Empress Dowager Xiao rode out on horseback and galloped on the battlefield;Empress Dowager Hu, who led the Northern Wei Dynasty to its demise, also had many achievements.As for the Queen Mother, she maintained the precarious Qing Empire for nearly half a century, which is not easy.Whether it is praise or derogation, they are all prominent historical figures!In any case, they are worthy of a big book.So the book "Anecdotes of the Five Empress Dowagers" is worth reading.

There are six authors in this book, covering Shaanxi, Gansu, and Qinghai provinces. Some of them are my students and my friends. In 1988, I was the editor-in-chief of the "Commentary Biography Series of Chinese Historical Figures", and there was a title "Biography of the Five Empress Dowagers", which was the predecessor of this book.History has entered the 21st century, and revisiting historical stories is still full of new ideas.Never forgetting the past is the guide for the future. Historical heritage is the precious wealth of the nation.The Five Empress Dowagers had a profound influence on Chinese history, and there are still many lessons to be learned. Therefore, in consultation with Gansu People's Publishing House, on the basis of "The Biography of the Five Empress Dowagers", it was revised and renamed "Anecdotes of the Five Empress Dowagers" for readers.

Finally, I would like to thank Comrades Hu Fusheng and Liu Mingyi of Gansu Provincial People's Publishing House for their great efforts in publishing this book.

Zhang Dake

May 2002 in Beijing
(End of this chapter)