The Only Empress of China Was Ruthless D
Empress ruitian entered the Chinese Court as a fifth tier concubine but she ended her life as a country’s only female Emperor once described as hated by Gods and Men alike Zan developed a reputation for ruthless cruelty and betrayal but when one of empress Wan’s ministers advised her that she should live a more respectful Life as a widow rather than an empress her response was so disturbing that it’s impossible to forget wo started breaking the mold early thanks to her father wo shiu who encouraged his daughter to partake in activities generally reserved for men such as reading and writing by the time she was a pretin woo could write poetry create beautiful calligraphy art and quip with the best of them mischievous witty and cunning she was destined for Starcraft from the beginning but before
that happened she had to pay her dues when mu was 13 she received the opportunity of a lifetime China’s Emperor taong invited her to join his herum of over a 100 Royal concubines is this every mother’s dream for her daughter probably not but Woo’s mom was no different when she became upset about losing her daughter to the Palace woo had to confront her she asked how do you know that it is not my fortune to meet the son of Heaven spoiler meeting the the emperor was putting their relationship very lightly woo didn’t just start at the bottom she started at Rock Bottom she began her career in the Palace of a mere fer concubine but it didn’t take long for Wu to catch Tong’s eye after discussing history with the Emperor as she changed his bed sheets woo charms taong with her intelligence as well as her ability to read and write it didn’t take long for
her to rise up through the ranks woo always found ways to stand out as one of Emperor Tong’s concubines one of her most notable strategies was offering to tame one of his horses her tools an iron whip a hammer and a knife as she said first I’ll beat it with an iron whip if it does not yield I’ll hit it with the hammer if it still won’t be tamed I’ll cut its throat with a knife some Chinese historians have theorized that wo first gained favor with Emperor taong because she was willing to go the distance apparently woo was willing to satisfy the emperor’s greatest and most unusual urges woo earned the nickname mayang or beautiful girl from Emperor taong as thought that wasn’t a big enough giveaway who’s actual name meant Celestial but despite her charm and all those personal services to the emperor she was never his favorite being the emperor’s concubine sounded like a
high-profile gig until you remember that it came with some pretty intense tense conditions custom decreed that if Wu didn’t have the emperor’s baby before he died she would have to go live as a Buddhist nun however when the day came Ru refused to give up her power so easily when taesong passed in 649 his ministers forced Ru to get herself to a nunnery she went but soon enough she managed to get out and fight her way back to China’s luxurious courts how did she do it there are two versions of the story and both make it clear that you didn’t want to mess with wuan wuan managed to return to court by attaching herself both politically and romantically to the newly crowned Emperor gawong AKA her own stepson it turns out that Zan had actually started an affair with gaozong not just before she got shipped off to her nunery but even before his dad’s Tong’s demise when
mu returned from the monastery she quickly became emperor GA zong’s highest ranking second tier concubine now this was actually a bit of a demotion from her previous role as the emperor’s official consort but woo took what she could get she knew it wouldn’t be long before she could craft a huge opportunity for a promotion gong’s wife Empress Wang took a liking to and asked her for a favor when Wang saw gawong getting a bit too close to his favorite concubine she asked woo to get between the two love birds and woo was happy to help while woo success F broke up the emperor and his main mistress she did so by becoming the emperor’s number one girl herself the empress was Furious and she made sure she get her revenge on woo in time woo used all her feminine WS to OU the emperor’s old favorite the pure concubine ziao and cement herself as his preferred woman after wuo gave birth to
two of The Emperor’s sons in 652 and 653 the emperor’s wife was understandably ticked soon enough emperor Wang and the emperor’s old favorite mistress Zao started working together to bring woo down while Wang and Zhao were plotting to O wo Zan from the palace woo was getting busy with her new romantic partner the emperor after giving him two sons wo also gave birth to a daughter in 654 it should have been a happy time but instead the little girl led the Imperial Court to tear itself apart sadly the baby quickly perished after her birth leading woo to retire in mourning but woo immediately went mad with grief and blamed the baby’s cruel Fate on her rival Empress Wang according to Woo’s accusations she saw Empress Wang near the baby’s room just before the child died even worse the little girl’s cause of death may have been
strangulation it didn’t take a genius to put two and two together everyone knew that the empress was on edge about her fading power and extremely jealous of woo quickly leading the the emperor to accuse Wang of killing the innocent baby Wang had never been able to give the emperor a baby and now she was accused of destroying one of his hairs the final shot came when woo accused her rival of not just murder but of Witchcraft after all this enough was enough GA zong stripped Wang of her power and promptly replaced her with wuan now woo was the Empress of Imperial China Woo’s daughter’s demise was tragic but it also led to some significant perks and according to some historians that’s not a coincidence some Scholars think that woo use the loss of her own child as an opportunity to drag Empress Wang’s reputation through the mud and clear her own path to Victory but
according to others that’s not the full story disturbingly some historians believe that woo was so desperate for power that she strangled her child herself and then framed her rival to this day no one knows the truth about the baby’s final days after all the accusations woo and emperor gawong made things official by tying the knot in 655 instead of a romantic honeymoon Woo’s new husband gave her the gift she really wanted against his Chancellor’s wishes he imprisoned wo’s rival ex-empress Wang and concert Zao but even that wasn’t enough for woo She Was Out For Blood and she’d do anything to get it when GAO zong started thinking about freeing Wang and Zao wo stepped in and shut down the idea she prbly had the woman executed according to Legend their ghosts haunted woo for years Woo’s husband Emperor gawong has gone down in
history as a sickly weak ruler who could easily be swayed by people as though his wimpy personality was easy enough for wo to overcome gawong then had a massive stroke in 660 with the emperor left debilitated by his health ISS woo ruled in his place woo looked for some extra help during Emperor’s gaozong Reign by exploring magic and even employing a court sorcerer however gaozong was becoming mistrustful of wo due to the amount of power she wielded her interest in Magic rubbed him the wrong way so much that he sought to depose her but the cunning woo managed to talk to gawong to forget about all of his worries after woo had her concubine Rivals eliminated she started taking care of those pesky chancellors who didn’t support her blood lust woo forced her allies to accuse her haters of treason she had ex-chancellor demoted sent into Exile and executed when one guy that she really disliked died before
she could kill him she made to do by executing his sons instead and that’s not even the worst thing she did when she cleaned house Empress woo had a special plan for her most hated Chancellor Zang son wuji after getting him accused of treason she then manipulated her husband into to sending wuji into Exile still unsatisfied she sent yet another of her lacal to pay wuji a visit and force him to die by Suicide when w was crowned Empress after this long bloody road to power an enormous earthquake hit China leading the course to see it as a terrible Omen one confusion scholar claimed that the earthquake represented the horror of a woman in power he even said that Woo’s masculine rain was making hens turn into roosters following the earthquake a Mountain Rose of from the land instead of seeing it as a bad Omen woo interpreted the mountain as a blessing and a reference to the Buddhist mountain of paradise sumaru wo then dubbed the
mountain Mount Felicity by 664 wo effectively ruled China she’d violently Ed all of her Rivals and competitors leaving only her weakened husband and her loyal Lackey such was her power that when Emperor had important government meetings wuan would de merly listen to his diplomatic updates behind a delicate pearled screen and secretly call the shots gaozong was the emperor name but woo was the emperess in practice woo would do anything to hold on to her power no matter how defenseless her Target was when her husband the emperor impregnated one of his favorite concubines Wu was rumored to have poisoned the woman and made her lose her Baby Woo and gaozong ruled as Divine monarchs under new names ga zong took the name Tian hang emperor of heaven but over time they became known as two Saints in a reference to the way
they shared power to show that she was no Meek wife woo also started flaunting her power by wearing luxurious yellow robes normally only Emperors were allowed to do this so when muan made yellow her signature color it was a sign everyone had better back down and watch the queen conquer people who didn’t respect wutian and in her Inner Circle learned to regret it when Wu’s brother insulted their mother lady Yang Titian showed that she had no patience with disobedience even if they were from her own family she promptly had her own siblings exiled and they literally died before she let them back into China woo status as a female ruler wasn’t lost on her throughout her Reign she worked hard to give women equal treatment and opportunities with men and the new Empress wasn’t shy about her pro- feminist stancy either in 666 woo led a group of women to mount Thai a ceremonial site there the woman took
part in holy rituals that were normally reserved for men before her Reign China had a lot of double standards but under Zan’s rule all that changed she let women get married and divorce as they pleased and changed laws to give both men and women equal rights here’s one example when a man died his family had to mourn him for 3 years but when woman died her family only had to mourn her for one Woo’s legislation leveled a playing field and gave woman just as long as men but for every one of Zan’s Good Deeds there’s another completely horrific story about her going an extra mile to make somebody suffer wo punished her Rivals lady Wang and concert Zao by having their arms and legs cut off despite being the empress wutian wasn’t the most popular lady especially among China’s aristocratic circles and over time she grew tired of their stuffiness and judgment determined to change things
up woo started hiring regular people to work in government she worked to O people who had inherited their jobs and shook things up by hiring whoever was the most qualified and talented no matter if they were men or women higher class or lower class Woo’s children seem to have inherited their mother’s thirst for power and drama her eldest son Lee Hong basically abandoned his claim to the Throne by doing something unforgivable after Lee Hong tried to free some of her enemies from prison he died suddenly likely poisoned by his own mother who’s Second Son Lee Jan could have been Emperor if like Lee Hong had him poked his nose into the wrong places first he came up with the idea that he wasn’t actually wuo son but the secret son of her dead sister then as if that wasn’t enough it’s believed that he got his mom’s favorite sorcerer assassinated and what happened to him him was what happened to everyone else disposed with
and exiled by his own mother in 683 wuan got one step closer to absolute power when Emperor gaozong passed away on the one hand his demise wasn’t too shocking gawong had suffered from ill health for ages but then again the circumstances around his passing were strange at best according to tradition Chinese Emperors were supposed to be surrounded by their families when they died but gawong passed alone apparently because zien had poisoned him and needed to hide her sin it seemed that her thirst for power was even stronger than her jealousy when her husband was alive she had merely exiled her son leean now that gawong was dead she didn’t have to hold back after a lifetime of turning her personal life into Political gains wo could finally have a little fun without her husband when it came time for the empress to select a new romantic partner she had
her pick of the litter she selected haui a good-looking Buddhist monk and rewarded him for his service with a series of promotions and honors you might be shocked to know that Woo’s relationship with Hai ended poorly when woo started spending time with other gentlemen Hai got so jealous that he burned down two of her buildings in Revenge she burned down ha’s whole life he was executed in 695 after gawong was out of the picture picture it was also time for a new emperor to rise enter wo’s third son Emperor Jang xong unlike his dad Jong zong didn’t roll over and let Wu control the country instead the new emperor struck his own path refusing his mother’s advice and making important decisions without her input bad idea after Xiao zong’s ticked off his mother one too many times woo lashed out she stripped him of his title and then
exiled her son again to to the outskirts of China his successor Wu’s fourth son Lee Dan learned from his brother and followed his mother’s orders he became emperor Ru zong that is until 690 when wo stripped him of his title and took power for herself as the empress to ring in the New Era where she was Empress in her own right woo announced the end of the Tang Dynasty and named her Reign zuu Dynasty the name was in reference to her father but also an earlier Dynasty from which Wu often claimed a lineage no matter how you look at it woo was claiming her era she was no longer concubine or wife she was now China’s official ruler Emperors were known for having numerous concubines some of whom who performed intimate duties however Empress woo not to be outdone by the boys also had her own concubines the handsome Zang brothers were Woo’s favorites and they were known to spend a lot of time with the empress in her
Close Quarters well into old age by the end of Woo’s rule a series of illnesses forced the octogenarian to rule by proxy with time on her hands Woo’s thoughts turned to her past as she pondered her afterlife woo decided to make amends she couldn’t bring back all the people she’ killed but she could confess her sins she did so on a golden tablet and according to custom threw it off a mountain where it lay hidden for, 1300 years over a century after woo begged for forgiveness for a lifetime of wickedness a farmer happened to stumble upon her golden confession with it a major historical riddle came one step closer to being solved was woo as bad as Confucian said or did they maliciously discredit her according to woo herself they weren’t fully wrong the tablet admits her sinful nature after a lifetime of scheming woo was ultimately
undone by a coup in 705 well inter her 80s woo wasn’t much of a threat so she was left alive but forced to step down and let Emperor zong zong her son take the throne sadly in the bloody takeover Wu’s favored lovers the Zang brothers were executed after being taken down in her 80s woo lost her sense of purpose she only lived for a few more months after she lost her crown and she breathed her last breath in 705 in a recent documentary of Tian historians claimed that her blank Stone wasn’t the sign of failure but Victory woo herself demanded to leave her tomb without any inscriptions she either wanted to leave her Legacy up to history or to the end she refused to explain herself to anyone woo made history when she appointed a woman in the role now referred as prime minister unfortunately this groundbreaking gesture didn’t have quite
the impacts the Tian wanted the prime minister’s official tomb was completely destroyed by woo successors for a terrible reason Scholars believed that it was a malicious and intentional attempt to erase both woo and a female prime minister from history archaeologists studying Woo’s Reign were stunned when they made an enormous Discovery The Granary proved that Zan was also a highly competent ruler under her rule she increased China’s agricultural output almost doubled the number of farming households and most importantly kept her people fed despite all the murder woo had good qualities all in all Woo’s official reign as empress lasted 22 years all the way from 683 to 705 however when you consider that she was all but in charge long before she actually ascended to China’s Royal seat her rule was functionally over 50 years
long she may not have been the nicest person but no one can deny that Wan could hold on to a crown like no one else when one of Vin’s ministers suggested she should act more properly as a widow her response was so disturbing that it’s impossible to forget Wan was not a woman to be messed with she promptly sentenced her upstart minister to Exile in the swampy disease ridden Southland where one can imagine that the minister didn’t have a happy ending what do you guys think of Wan’s Reign was it successful or downright cruel let us know in the comments below and we can have a discussion but remember to like comment and subscribe and we’ll see you in the next video thanks for watching
