Tang Xuanzong was an emperor in the history of the Tang Dynasty who had outstanding merits and demerits. In the early stage of his reign, he worked hard to govern and highly valued wise officials, ushering in an unprecedented prosperous era of Chinese feudal dynasties. But in the later stages of his reign, the impression he left on the world was that he was obsessed with politics, addicted to alcohol and sex, and favored treacherous ministers. As a result, the An Lushan Rebellion quickly dragged the prosperous Tang Dynasty into the abyss, and Emperor Xuanzong of Tang was forced to abdicate, leaving behind the regret of an uncertain future. So the question is, was Tang Xuanzong really so foolish in his later years? How could an extremely intelligent emperor suddenly become confused in the later stages? The history encyclopedia editor brings relevant content to everyone. Interested friends, come and take a look.
The most direct sources for interpreting the late Tang Xuanzong are the famous historical books “Old Book of Tang”, “New Book of Tang”, and “Zizhi Tongjian”. The Old Book of Tang was written in 945, and the content before 756 (the year when Emperor Xuanzong abdicated) mainly reproduced the national history of the Tang Dynasty compiled by Tang historian Liu Fang. The New Book of Tang was written in 1060, mainly supplementing some anecdotes and anecdotes from the Tang Dynasty. The Comprehensive Mirror for Aid in Government was written in 1085, which reorganized and distinguished the history of the Tang Dynasty. However, by this time, nearly two hundred years had passed since the downfall of the Tang Dynasty, and many materials had been lost. Therefore, the content of the Old Book of Tang has become the first-hand material for studying the history of the Tang Dynasty.
In 756, An Lushan led a rebellion to occupy Chang’an, and the “Daily Annals” (dedicated to recording the daily words and deeds of the emperors), “Records of the Grand Historian” and other materials of the first few emperors of the Tang Dynasty were burned. The only surviving major record after this catastrophe is the national history manuscript compiled by historian Wei Shu, which includes a large amount of content from the reign of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang.
After Wei Shu’s death, Tang Suzong (son of Tang Xuanzong) appointed Liu Fang to continue compiling the history of the Tang Dynasty, but this job was unexpectedly difficult for Liu Fang. Firstly, a large amount of materials have been lost, and many contents are difficult to verify; Secondly, there is a large amount of praise for the achievements of Emperor Xuanzong during his reign in the National History manuscript compiled by Wei Shu. However, Emperor Suzong of Tang ascended to the throne through a public usurpation of the throne. He needs to describe his father’s late reign as causing national difficulties due to improper behavior in order to provide a moral justification for his usurpation.
After taking over Wei Shu’s work, Liu Fang continued to compile on the basis of the original national history manuscript. When Liu Fang presented the compiled history of the Tang Dynasty to Emperor Suzong in 760, he was severely criticized and demoted to Qianzhong (now Guizhou region). Night reading of historical books suggests that this is inevitably related to the overly positive evaluation of Tang Xuanzong in national history.
Afterwards, Emperor Suzong of Tang ordered Yu Xiulie and Ling Huqiao to revise the Tang Dynasty history compiled by Liu Fang. Later, the “Old Book of Tang” extensively absorbed this version of Tang Dynasty’s national history, so we can see the distinct “two” Tang Xuanzong from it. Before 741 AD, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang was eager to make progress, and historical records generally praised him; After 741 AD, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang gave people the feeling of suddenly becoming confused, especially in his last few years of rule, almost doing whatever he did wrong, and a prosperous Tang Dynasty was destroyed in his hands.
However, there are many areas of doubt surrounding this conclusion. For example, in his later years, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang favored the treacherous minister Li Linfu, which led to the corruption of the court and laid a hidden danger for the “An Lushan Rebellion”. However, when interpreting the character of Li Linfu in depth, many people will find that he was actually a highly capable minister. Many significant and valuable institutional designs and reforms during the reign of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang were completed during Li Linfu’s tenure as prime minister. If you were Emperor Xuanzong of Tang, would you give up a shrewd and capable prime minister who could solve problems for the empire, and instead favor a prime minister who only knew about benevolence, righteousness, and morality, but could not handle any practical affairs?
For example, in the early stage of the “An Lushan Rebellion”, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang forced Ge Shuhan to lead the main force of the Tang army to a decisive battle against the rebel army of An Lushan, resulting in the complete annihilation of the army, and the “An Lushan Rebellion” developed into an uncontrollable situation. This is another ironclad evidence in historical books about the confusion of Emperor Xuanzong in his later years. However, objectively speaking, at that time, Ge Shuhan had 200000 troops in his hands, more than half of which were elite border defense forces gathered from the fiefdoms of Longyou, Hexi, Shuofang, and other regions. The total number of rebel troops is less than 100000. If one still dares not go to war in this situation, how can the authority of the emperor and the face of the court be preserved? As for the subsequent disastrous defeat, it was largely caused by a major mistake in the command of Ge Shuhan. It was actually quite unjust to blame Tang Xuanzong for all the blame.
Therefore, we can confidently believe that both the Tang Dynasty history compiled by Liu Fang and the later revised versions by Yu Xiulie and Ling Huqiao were influenced to varying degrees by Tang Suzong’s personal will. Tang Suzong had to smear Tang Xuanzong to some extent in order to prove the legitimacy of his usurpation of the throne. We may never know what major historical events occurred before and after the An Lushan Rebellion, but we should recognize that what is reflected in existing Tang Dynasty historical materials may not necessarily be the historical truth.
