Mar Iazed-buzid, the Great Donor: Part 2B
Emperor Hsuan-tsung (685-762) fleeing to Sechuan during the An Shi Rebellion. China, Tang dynasty, 8th century.
We have the winter scene of Hsuan-tsung’s final days as emperor on the good authority of Tu Fu, the poet of whom the Chinese say “to read his poems is to read Chinese history.” In the central hall of the palace, the poet tells us, the smoke of incense lilted from jade-white bodies of dancing goddesses, and grieving flutes harmonized with clear pure strings. While guests in warm sable coats savored camel’s hoof soup, fragrant whipped kumquats, and frosted coolie oranges, in the kitchen, blue-blooded families divvied up the imperial gold tableware. With music swelling, regal ministers stayed up late taking their pleasure, bathed by their choice women, whom they pampered with silks that came slowly from the hands of shivering farm wives, whose husbands were horsewhipped by tax collectors demanding tribute for the palace and whose farms were beyond hope. The people’s wise monarch, wishing them well, sent them baskets and bushels full of sincere gifts. Outside the imperial-red gates lay the frozen dead and the twisted paths along which noble men were driven. Simple-hearted people, frantic, ran themselves ragged. The one hundred grasses were in tatters, and banners trailed out into the stars. War-bound men, each wearing quiver and bow, were herded about like chickens and dogs to the borderlands, where meals, like day and night, passed indistinct, and blood swelled up like seawater. Lament seized every district. The elusive engines of grief loomed like a mountain, ready to heave and swing loose. . . . Tu Fu was a palimpsest, and his work a reflection, of those times. It is inevitable that I-ssu, perhaps at the time already an attendant at the palace, received similar impressions.
In the last month of the final year of Hsuan-tsung’s reign (AD 755), the pretender to the throne, General An Lu-shan, lifted his childlike mask. With his armies coiled in the northeast, he raised the standard of rebellion. At first An intended to wait until the death of the emperor, but now, fearing that insinuations made by the new chief minister could lead to his destruction, he struck, and paralyzed, the eastern capital of Loyang. In that city An found himself in an imperial dream: at the head of 150,000 men, proclaiming himself emperor, and proposing the new dynasty of Yen. The bravest generals of the day, Kuo Tzu-i and Li Kwang-pi, were dispatched at once into Honan against him. The counterfeit general took the road south, announcing his desire to kill the emperor’s new chief minister, Yang Kuo-chung. Several battles were fought. On the seventh day of the sixth moon in 756, at a place called Ling-pau, Ko Shu-han, one of Kuo Tzu-i’s generals, was defeated and captured. (See Supplement 5) On that day, Ko Shu-han unwittingly made a place for I-ssu to become his military successor. By the ninth day, fugitives from the battle arrived continually at the capital and filled the minds of everyone with fear when they told the story of the terrible combat and the treason of Ko Shu-han. (It was said, “Ko Shu-han’s eyes turned on a new emperor.” Whether Ko Shu-han actually joined An Lu-shan or was secretly put to death by him is uncertain.)
The bright emperor Hsuan-tsung watched anxiously from the top of the Flower and Calyx Belvedere for the “fires of peace.” Lighted each night on little watchtowers built a few li apart, this shining chain of torches signaled security between Chang-an and the Pass. But on the twelfth night of the sixth moon, there was no chain of light. In the icy dawn of the thirteenth day, a small and pale retinue accompanied the Son of Heaven through the western gates of the city with a quota of armed men. As day broke, Hsuan-tsung passed through the Gate of Lingering Autumn in his chariot. Golden whips were broken in haste. In a downpour of rain, the emperor fled among the shadows that towered over the imperial highway, leaving members of his own clan to fend for themselves. For I-ssu, circumstances now left only two possible courses of action. We do not know which he took: Either (A) he now joined with the hordes of populace who were passing before and behind the imperial retinue, polishing smooth the way southward to Szechuan where the emperor’s soldiers and adherents were numerous, or (B) he remained in the city multitude and witnessed the arrival of the barbarians and their acts of slaughter.
SUPPLEMENTS
Supplement 5:
The Capture of Ko Shu-han
General An Lu-shan
After Loyang sunk under waves of invasion, the horses of 300,000 hu barbarians dashed against Lofty Barrier Pass, the single crossing between Honan and Shensi. The pass was held by Ko Shu-han and 200,000 men. The new chief minister, Yang Kuo-chung, impatient and consumed with anxiety for his own life, persisted in urging the emperor to order Ko Shu-han to leave his safe position and advance through the pass until the imperial army prevailed. Ultimately, orders from the palace, inspired by Yang Kuo-chung, forced the fiery Khitan general, a seasoned military governor of the northwest since AD 747, to abandon his safe position, to meet and be engulfed by the oncoming waves of An Lu-shan’s barbarians.
Ko Shu-han led his men through the towering walls. At Dividing River, several hundred groups of hu barbarians suddenly appeared on horseback. The general urged his horse, and the imperial army moved onto the heights. By sunset, the fume of his marching men pervaded the forest on the winding mountain summits. Like clouds and mists, the imperial troops and their horses massed themselves, clinging to cold rocks on precipitous paths. At one moment, the glint from the surface of the mountain waters was pierced by shining arrowheads; at the next, the imperial forces were defeated and Ko Shu-han captured.
