In the history of China's ancient feudal dynasties, there are countless famous emperors who have passed away in history, and Wu Zetian, as the only woman among them, is enough to leave a page of heavy ink in the history books.
As a woman in the feudal era, it is naturally very difficult to obtain such a high status in society.
After Wu Zetian's death, the wordless stele erected in front of her tomb has also become the object of people's hot discussion, and even Chairman Mao has his own views on this wordless stele, so what is the origin of this wordless stele?
Concubine in the palace
Wu Zetian was born into a clan bureaucratic family, and if she were a boy with such a family background, she would inevitably be able to achieve something in the feudal dynasty system in the future.
But Wu Zetian, as a daughter, was born with all kinds of gender discrimination, and in that era, it was almost impossible for women to become officials.
Wu Zetian entered the palace at the age of 14 and became a concubine, Wu Zetian's mother, who was from an aristocratic background, naturally knew very well about those things in the palace, and she felt that her daughter's future was almost ruined, and she often washed her face with tears.
The young Wu Zetian did not think so, and she felt that serving the wise sage Tang Taizong was not necessarily a bad thing.
Tang Taizong Li Shimin had a number of beautiful people around him, and there were also empresses of the eldest grandson sitting in the harem, as a small concubine who had just entered the palace, Wu Zetian naturally could not attract Li Shimin's attention.
For 12 years, Wu Zetian was like a transparent person in the palace, but what people did not expect was that Li Shimin's son Li Zhi had feelings for Wu Zetian, and at that time, this feeling was against the world.
There is a plot in the history books that often reflects Wu Zetian's fierce means, Tang Taizong got a horse, but he was grumpy by nature and could not be tamed for a long time, so he asked Wu Zetian on the side whether there was a way to subdue this fierce horse.
Wu Zetian said that I only need three things to ensure that this horse is obedient, namely the whip, the iron rod and the long knife, if the whip has no effect, I will use the iron rod to hit hard, if not obedient, I will directly kill with the knife, so as not to hurt the owner later.
In the history books, it is said that Wu Zetian's brutal personality caused Li Shimin to be very angry, so he never promoted Wu Zetian. This kind of plot may only be used by later generations to orchestrate Wu Zetian, but even if such a thing really happened, Li Shimin, who had experienced great winds and waves, should not care too much about Wu Zetian's thoughtful mind.
Empress Wu zhou
After Li Shimin's death, Wu Zetian came to Ganye Temple with many concubines to become a nun, and if it were not for Li Zhi to take her out of Ganye Temple, I am afraid that this future famous empress in Chinese history would have no day to turn around.
After becoming Li Zhi's empress, Wu Zetian soon became pregnant, which further favored her by the emperor, Li Zhi was very trusting of Wu Zetian, often asking Wu Zetian for advice with the minister's notes, and Wu Zetian also showed his mind in political governance, and did his best to help her husband deal with state affairs.
Soon after, Li Zhi and Wu Zetian and his wife discussed state affairs, but this practice caused the dissatisfaction of a considerable number of korean ministers, believing that Wu Zetian's actions were like a chicken Si Chen, but Li Zhili was against all opinions, and the two of them managed a great country in an orderly manner, which was later called "two saints" by the world.
In the later period, Due to physical reasons, Li Zhi often let Wu Zetian preside over government affairs, and Wu Zetian's status in a Tang Empire became higher and higher.
Shortly after Li Zhi's death, Wu Zetian was called emperor, the national name was Wu Zhou, becoming the only female emperor in Chinese history, Wu Zetian abolished the door valve system since the Jin Dynasty, opened the imperial examination, selected talents for the country, so that talented Han disciples could also advise the country, after the Shenlong coup, Wu Zetian returned to the government with Li Tang, and was buried with Tang Gaozong after his death.
To this day, when we visit Qianling, we will find two tall stone stele erected in front of the tombs of Li Zhi and Wu Zetian, the stele on the west side is Tang Gaozong's, which is engraved with neat inscriptions, recording the various deeds that Tang Gaozong did before his death, and the stele on the east side is Wu Zetian's.
The stele is eight meters high, but inexplicably, it is empty and there is not a word on it
。
Why not like Li Zhi's inscription on Wu Zetian's life record? The wordless stele has attracted the research of many historians from ancient times to the present, giving many different insights.
Some people say that it is because Wu Zetian himself feels that the merit is too great, and it is impossible to describe the merits it has made in words, and the other way of saying is diametrically opposed, Wu Zetian is afraid to write it because the sins he committed are too deep.
There is another theory that is more romantic, which was put forward by Chairman Mao, and that is Wu Zetian
He believed that his deeds, regardless of merits and deeds, were left to posterity for comment, so he erected such a stone stele without an inscription.
Wordless monument
So which of these three statements is correct? In fact, neither one of them is correct, because this stele was erected after Wu Zetian's death, and has nothing to do with Wu Zetian's own ideological activities.
Historians have found in recent years that according to the tomb tradition of ancient Chinese emperors before Wu Zetian, there was no monument at all, and the ancient emperors felt that their careers were endless and could not be summarized in just a few lines.
But Wu Zetian has always been a person of novelty, and when her husband Tang Gaozong died, Wu Zetian felt that it was still very necessary to use words to describe her husband's great achievements, so she erected a stone stele for Tang Gaozong and left a text on it, called "Shu Sheng Ji".
However, after Wu Zetian's own death, erecting a monument to the former emperor became a new tradition, and Emperor Zhongzong of Tang also wanted to erect a monument to his mother Wu Zetian, but a very difficult problem was placed in front of Li Xian, how should I record my mother's past? How to evaluate the life of this female emperor?
After Wu Zetian's death, the situation in the Tang Dynasty was in chaos, the emperor changed like a marquee, Li Xian soon abdicated, and all kinds of political forces sang and sang I appeared, and each political force had a different evaluation of Wu Zetian.
In this case, Wu Zetian changed seven or eight titles just by being a courtesan, from the Zetian Dasheng Emperor to the Zetian Dasheng Empress and then to the Wuzhou Tianhou And so on, until 749, when Tang Xuanzong proposed the Zetianshun Sheng Empress, which finally became a stable honorific title.
brief summary:
This year was nearly half a century after the 705th year of Wu Zetian's death, and no one could give Wu Zetian an accurate evaluation for such a long time, so the matter of engraving was postponed again and again, and finally it was not resolved, and only then did we have the wordless stele we see now.