83 Facts About Wang Mang

Wang Mang was originally an official and consort kin of the Han dynasty and later seized the throne in 9 CE.

Wang Man died early when Wang Mang was still young, before Emperor Cheng took the throne and his mother Empress Wang became empress dowager.

Unlike most of his brothers, Wang Mang did not have the opportunity to become a marquess.

Empress Wang Mang took pity on his family, and after she was widowed, she had Qu moved to the imperial palace to live with her.

Indeed, unlike his relatives who lived expensively and competed with each other on how they could spend more, Wang Mang was praised for his humility, thriftiness, and desire to study.

Wang Mang wore not the clothes of young nobles but those of a young Confucian scholar.

Wang Mang befriended many capable people and served his uncles conscientiously.

Wang Mang was therefore given the post of imperial attendant and later promoted to be one of the subcommanders of the imperial guards.

Wang Mang therefore created Wang Mang the Marquess of Xindu and promoted him to the Chamberlain for Attendants.

Wang Mang did not accumulate wealth, but used the money to support scholars and to give gifts to colleagues which gained him much praise.

Wang Mang had only a single wife, Lady Wang, and no concubines.

Emperor Cheng appointed his uncles, one after another, to be the commander of the armed forces, and speculation grew as to who would succeed Wang Mang's youngest surviving uncle, Wang Gen.

Wang Mang was considered one of the possibilities, while another was his cousin Chunyu Zhang, who had a much closer personal relationship to Emperor Cheng than Wang Mang.

Wang Mang collected evidence that Chunyu, a frivolous man in his words and deeds, had secretly received bribes from the deposed Empress Xu and had promised to help her become "left empress", and that he had promised his associates important posts once he succeeded Wang Gen.

Wang Mang ordered Wang Rong to be arrested, and Wang Li, in his panic, ordered his son to commit suicide.

Wang Mang greatly wanted the title of empress dowager as well.

Grand Empress Dowager Wang ordered Wang Mang to resign and transfer power to the Fu and Ding relatives.

Emperor Ai declined to agree to this request and begged Wang Mang to stay in his administration.

Several months later Wang Mang came into direct confrontation with now Empress Dowager Fu.

When Wang Mang saw this, he rebuked the official and ordered that Empress Dowager Fu's seat be moved to the side, which drew great ire from Empress Dowager Fu, who then refused to attend the banquet.

The prime minister Zhu Bo and vice prime minister Zhao Xuan, at Empress Dowager Fu's behest, submitted a petition to have Wang Mang demoted to commoner status for having previously opposed Grand Empress Fu.

Emperor Ai, who respected Wang Mang, summoned him and his cousin Wang Ren, the son of Wang Gen, back to the capital to assist Grand Empress Dowager Wang.

However, Wang Mang was to have no official post and was to exert little influence on politics.

Wang Mang put him in charge of the armed forces and the government.

Wang Mang, having thus consolidated his power, began to further build up his personality cult, encouraging others to submit false prophecies in which he was mentioned as the second coming of Ji Dan, the Duke of Zhou and the regent for King Cheng of Zhou, or other great mythical personalities.

Wang Mang began a regime of modifying the governmental structure to recall the governments of the Zhou dynasty and the even more ancient Shang dynasty.

In 1 AD, after bribing the distant Yueshang tribes to submit offerings of an albino pheasant, Wang Mang was successful in having his followers persuade Grand Empress Dowager Wang to create him the Duke of Anhan.

In 2 AD, Wang Mang issued a list of regulations to the ally-vassal Xiongnu, which the Xiongnu chanyu Nangzhiyasi obeyed, but Wang Mang's tone of treating Xiongnu as a subordinate state rather than an ally offended Nangzhiyasi, which would foreshadow the eventual breakdown of relationships with the Xiongnu.

Wang Mang then started a petition with the aim of having the Chinese people have his daughter selected as empress.

The petitioners stormed the outside of the palace, and Grand Empress Dowager Wang, overwhelmed by the display of affection for Wang Mang, ordered that Wang Mang's daughter be made empress.

Wang Mang's son, Wang Yu, disagreed with his father's dictatorial regime and program to build up his personality cult, afraid that in the future the Wangs would suffer a popular backlash once Emperor Ping was an adult.

Wang Mang still refused to let her visit the capital.

Wang Mang then arrested Wang Yu, who committed suicide, and his wife Lu Yan who was then executed.

Wang Mang subsequently executed Wu Zhang and the entire Wei clan, except for Consort Wei.

Wang Mang took this opportunity to wipe out other potential enemies.

Wang Mang falsely advised Grand Empress Dowager Wang that they had died of illnesses.

Many other officials who were not willing to follow Wang Mang were victimized in this purge.

In 5 AD, Wang Mang revived an ancient ceremony intended for those who had made great contributions to the state, and had himself given the nine bestowments.

Wang Mang disliked that they were all adults as he wanted a child whom he could control.

Wang Mang gave Ying the epithet Ruzi, the same epithet that King Cheng of Zhou had when he was in his minority and under the regency of the Duke of Zhou.

Early in his reign, Emperor Wang Mang self-confidently sought to implement his ideals of restoring the legendary golden age of the early Zhou dynasty.

Wang Mang continued the regime of modifying geographical names to fit with ancient names.

In 9 AD, Wang Mang made his wife, Lady Wang, empress.

Wang Mang selected many Confucian scholars to serve as advisors for Crown Prince Lin.

In 9 AD, Wang Mang instituted a revolutionary land redistribution system, ordering that all land in the empire become legally the property of the empire, to be known as wangtian, in a system similar to the Zhou well-field system.

In 10 AD, Wang Mang set up a state economic adjustment agency, seeking to control fluctuations in the prices of food and textiles by purchasing excess goods and then selling them when the price went up.

In 17 AD, in an attempt to refill the depleted imperial coffers, Wang Mang instituted six monopolies on liquor, salt, iron, coinage, forestry, and fishing.

Also, in the same year Wang Mang abolished slavery to limit the power of the landowning families, but following Wang Mang's assassination in 23 AD, slavery was reinstituted.

Wang Mang sent his ambassadors to Xiongnu to inform Chanyu Zhi that he had become emperor and that Xin had replaced Han, and requested that the great seal of the chanyu, which Han had issued, be exchanged for a new seal issued by Xin.

Wang Mang built defensive bulwarks some distance from the Xin outpost of Shuofang.

Wang Mang began to accept Xiyu kingdoms' pledges of allegiance, an action that had been banned by Wang.

However, Wang Mang did not follow his generals' recommendations to start the campaign as soon as a critical mass of men were gathered, but wanted to attack with overwhelming force.

When Wang Mang first became emperor, his ambassadors visited the southwestern tribes, whose chieftains Han had largely granted the titles of princes.

Wang Mang instructed the local commandery governor, Zhou Xin, to arrange for the killing of Han.

However, Wang Mang continued to refuse to reinstitute the Han system of using awards to buy the submission of southwestern tribes.

When Wang Mang started his campaign against Xiongnu, he requisitioned the forces of Goguryeo within Xin borders.

The Xin army that Wang Mang sent against them was defeated by them.

The general Wang Mang sent, Yan You, used humble words to trick their leader, Zou, who was a marquess of Goguryeo, into a meeting with him where he treacherously killed Zou.

Wang Mang then changed Gaogouli to the derogatory term "Xiagouli", and reduced their king's rank to marquess, which further enraged Goguryeo, causing them to attack the Xin northeastern regions with great ferocity.

In 16 AD, Wang Mang made another attempt to intimidate the Xiyu kingdoms back into submission, but the Xin armies were divided and cut off from each other.

Han had a well-defined system of official salaries, but when Wang Mang became emperor, he ordered that the salary system be overhauled and recalibrated.

In 16 AD, Wang Mang finally issued the new salary system, which was dependent on how prosperous the state was in determining what the salaries were.

The ensuing famine led to prophecies that Wang Mang had lost the Mandate of Heaven and that the Han dynasty would be restored.

Wang Mang sent messengers issuing pardons with the aim of encouraging these rebels to disband.

Some, in order to flatter Wang Mang, told him that these were simply evil troublemakers who needed to be killed, or that this was a temporary phenomenon.

Wang Mang listened to those who flattered him and generally relieved from their posts those who told the truth.

Further, Wang Mang made no further attempts to pacify the rebels, but instead decided to suppress them by force.

Around this time, Wang Mang made another strategic mistake involving Xiongnu.

Wang Mang wanted to consider peace with Xin, and he sent one of his key officials and a nephew of his to serve as ambassadors to Chang'an.

Wang Mang created Xuyu chanyu and envisioned placing him on the Xiongnu throne by force.

In 20 AD, Wang Mang made a sudden change to his presumed heir.

Wang Mang deposed Crown Prince Lin based on the rationale that trouble would come from the fact that Crown Prince Lin was younger than his brother Lord An, and thus Lin should not have been crown prince in the first place.

Wang Mang then created Lord An the Prince of Xinqian and Wang Lin the Prince of Tongyiyang.

Wang Mang ordered Wang Lin to commit suicide by poison, but Wang Lin refused, and killed himself using a sword.

Wang Mang then announced that he had in fact two sons by female servants, whom he then created dukes.

In 22 AD, Wang Mang finally realised that the agrarian rebellions were posing a much greater threat to his rule than the Xiongnu.

Wang Mang commissioned two of his key officials, Wang Kuang and Lian Dan to launch attacks against the agrarian rebellions, with the Chimei being their first target.

Wang Mang's brother Liu Xiu, by contrast, was a careful and deliberate man, who was content to be a farmer.

Wang Mang agreed and joined forces with the branch of the Lulin forces which were in the same area.

Wang Mang sent his cousin Wang Yi and his prime minister, Wang Xun, with what he considered to be overwhelming force, some 430,000 men, intending to crush the newly reconstituted Han regime.

Wang Mang Yi had to withdraw with only several thousand men back to Luoyang.

Wang Mang died in the battle at the palace, as did his daughter Princess Huanghuang.

Wang Mang's body was cut into pieces, and his head was delivered to the provisional Han capital Wancheng, to be hung on the city wall.