Wu Zetian (624-705), born in Guangyuan, Sichuan, was the only female emperor in Chinese history, and one of the most influential, controversial and legendary historical figures in Chinese history. She went from an ordinary woman to a talented person of Tang Taizong, then to the empress of Tang Gaozong, and then to the emperor of the "Great Zhou", and has been active in the political arena for nearly half a century, and her people and deeds have had a major impact on Chinese history and culture and Bashu culture.
▲ Wu Zetian
According to historical records, Wu Zetian was originally named "Jue", Emperor Taizong gave him the name "Mei Niang", self-titled "曌", and "Zetian" is the title of empress since the Tang Dynasty. There are many names for the empress before her death: the titles of talented people, Zhaoyi, empresses, queens of heaven, empress dowagers, etc.; there are also auspicious and mysterious titles that have become empresses: Our Lady Of God Emperor, Holy Spirit Emperor, Golden Wheel Holy God Emperor, Yuegu Golden Wheel Holy God Emperor, CiShi Yue Gu Golden Wheel Holy God Emperor, Heavenly Wheel Golden Wheel Holy Emperor, etc., after abdication, the honorific title is "Zetian Dasheng Emperor", and Tianbao Bazai is added "Zetian Shun Saint Empress" (official title).
Wu Zetian was brilliant from an early age, able to sing and dance, extraordinary courage and versatility. She loved poetry, encouraged literati to create, advocated monarchy singing and harmony, and had good works passed down to the world. The Quan Tang Poems recorded more than 40 of his poems, and "poetry immortal" Li Bai also praised his poems. She loves calligraphy, especially good deeds, won the law in the Jin Dynasty, the penmanship is soft and round, unique personality, "Xuanhe Book" praises her "husbandly temperament", the representative work "Shengxian Prince Monument" is now in Henan Yanshi Zhen Shengxian Temple site. She is quite accomplished in chess and court music and dance.
During the 50 years that she participated in the administration of the dynasty, she made important contributions to the political, economic, and cultural development of the Tang Dynasty by emphasizing peasants, paying taxes thinly, prohibiting lascivious luxury, speaking broadly, setting up examinations, selecting talents, protecting border defense, and making outstanding political achievements. According to the literature, she wrote the "Hanging Arch Collection" in one hundred volumes and the "Golden Wheel Collection" in six volumes, but unfortunately it is not passed down today.
For more than 1,300 years, Wu Zetian's merits and deeds have been commented on by many posterity. The earliest evaluation of Wu Zetian can be traced back to the time of Wu Zetian's lifetime. According to the literature, when Wu Zetian was in charge of the dynasty, King Luo Bin attacked Wu Zetian on behalf of Xu Jingye. After Wu Zetian changed Tang to Zhou, the princes and officials, the chieftains of Siyi, and the people near and far regarded him as the Ming Emperor of Shuntian and praised him.
The Tang Dynasty's evaluation of Wu Zetian was basically positive. After Wu Zetian's death, Cui Rong wrote a lamentation, calling her "HuixinQuansai", "righteous responsibility", "brilliant and far-sighted, Hongye Daxun". Emperor Zhongzong and Emperor Ruizong gave him the titles of "Emperor Zetian" and "Emperor Tianhou Saint". In the history of the Tang Dynasty, Wu Zetian has always been included in this era as an emperor. After the anshi rebellion, there were more and more criticisms of him, and the female calamity misled the country and the theory of "Muji Sichen" was everywhere, but the commentators still praised him for "internal auxiliary current politics and meritorious achievements".
The Song Dynasty flourished, attaching importance to the father and son of the monarch and the resentful of the dictatorship of women. Ouyang Xiu, Song Qi, and others revised the New Book of Tang and severely attacked Wu Zetian, saying, "If it is evil, will it be worse than evil?" The Zizhi Tongjian also records that Wu Zetian has many evils. After the Southern Song Dynasty, the literati and Confucians' evaluation of Wu Zetian deteriorated, reprimanding her for deposing the Tang Dynasty as emperor and scolding her for being a good murderer and being absurd and extravagant. Zhu Xi immediately hated Wu Zetian and denounced her for all kinds of sins in the General Outline. Ming and Qing historians also belittled Wu Zetian, as was the case with Qian Daxin's "Twenty-Two Historical Examinations" and Wang Mingsheng's "Seventeen Historical Discussions". But no matter how much these scholars denigrate the Wu clan, they still praise him when they talk about his specific political achievements and his deeds of knowing people and good deeds.
After the May Fourth Movement in 1919, progressive intellectuals gave a positive evaluation of Wu Zetian in order to fight for women's rights and respond to innovation. "Women's Magazine" has published more than ten articles, such as "Mainland Feminist Activists - Wu Xi", "The Great Revolutionary Politician Wu Zetian", "Wu Zetian New Theory", and so on. At that time, historians, literary circles, and art circles all showed concern for Wu Zetian, and scholars Chen Yinke, Fan Wenlan, Lü Zhenyu and others tended to affirm Wu Zetian, but some scholars still held a completely negative attitude towards him.
After the founding of New China, there was a boom in the study of Wu Zetian, and scholars initially used the materialist view of history to re-study and evaluate Wu Zetian, and achieved fruitful results, and Wu Zetian was basically affirmed. In particular, Guo Moruo, who is also a Sichuan native, wrote a script "Wu Zetian", which is full of praise, but during the ten years of turmoil, it was used by the "Gang of Four" to become a tool for political struggle.
Since the 1980s, the study of Wu Zetian in the academic circles has achieved unprecedented development. In 1985, the first national Wu Zetian Academic Symposium was held in Xianyang, Shaanxi, and the "Wu Zetian Research Association" was established. The Institute has held 12 academic seminars so far. Since then, the research on Wu Zetian has shifted from the previous evaluation research to the study of many specific problems, and the angle, method and concept of research have also changed, and the research of Wu Zetian has gradually gained a truly independent status, and many reviews have been published, and it has basically been characterized as an outstanding female politician. Literary and film works with Wu Zetian as the theme also became popular, and a large number of scholars in the West also began to study Wu Zetian. At present, Wu Zetian is still a hot figure in the study of Tang history.
▲Huangze Temple
"Zheng Qi Kaiyuan, Zhi Hong Zhen Guan; Fang Liu Sword Pavilion, Guang Yu Li Zhou." This is a link of Guo Moruo's handwritten inscription in the 1960s in the main hall of Huangze Temple in Guangyuan, Sichuan. As she said, Empress Wu Zetian is an important figure in Chinese history and a cultural celebrity who has a profound influence on Bashu culture. His birthplace, Guangyuan, Sichuan, has many legends and ruins about Wu Zetian: near Zetianba, there have been a large number of wu surnamed families living for generations, who regard themselves as descendants of the Wu clan and worship the holy throne of Wu hou. Every year, the 23rd day of the first month (said to be the birthday of Wu Zetian) is celebrated as the "Daughter's Day" of Guangyuan.
Huangze Temple outside Guangyuan City is the only surviving temple of Wu Zetian in the country. The temple was originally the "main temple of Chuan", which is said to have been built in honor of Li Bing and Erlang. Wu Zetian called her empress, and in order to commemorate her birthplace, the locals took the meaning of "Renjie Di Ling, Emperor En Puze" in Lizhou and changed the main temple of Sichuan to Huangze Temple. In the twenty-second year of the Later Shu Guangzheng (959), the official government remodeled and expanded the temple into the "New Temple of Empress Wu of Tang Zetian", and the Inspector Li Fengqian published the "Guangzheng Monument" to commemorate it. The Northern Song Dynasty's Taiping Imperial Records and the Southern Song Dynasty's "Youdi Jisheng" both write the legend of Wu Zetian's mother Yang Shi's dragon and Wu Zetian's birth into the chronicles. Huangze Temple was well preserved in the Yuan Dynasty, and it was also often seen in the poetry travels of the literati during the Ming and Qing dynasties.
▲Guangzheng Monument
Since modern times, Shuoxue Hongru and social sages have come to visit Huangze Temple. Guo Moruo visited Huangze Temple in the early 1960s and not only created the historical drama "Wu Zetian", but also wrote a couplet for Huangze Temple. The late honorary president of the state, Song Qingling, who is quite loved by the people, once wrote an inscription in 1963 at the Guangyuan Emperor Ze Temple: "Wu Zetian is the only female emperor in Chinese history, an outstanding female politician in the feudal era." "It can be said that it is the most fair evaluation of Wu Zetian!"
Nowadays, people pay attention to Wu Zetian, and have shifted from the evaluation of merits and deeds in history to multi-faceted academic research, and her deeds and related relics have long become cultural heritage and become an important part of Bashu culture. Her birthplace, Guangyuan, is more famous for its "empress hometown".
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Edit: South Beauvan
Proofreader: Wang Yang Li Shengli
Producer: Mao Shengwen
Review: Tang Yuanbo
Source: Bashu Literature