Author: Qi Yunke
Among the twenty-one emperors of the Tang Dynasty, Tang Dezong Li Shi was a very peculiar emperor.
Almost all of Li Shi's life is in the midst of entanglement and contradiction. He was determined to revive the Tang Dynasty, but after encountering many obstacles, he despaired and broke the jar, resulting in the futile revival.
Compared with his merits and demerits for the king, what is more popular with posterity is that he actually recognized his grandson as his son, which is extremely rare in the imperial family, which pays more attention to traditional morality and etiquette.
So, what made this Tang emperor dare to break through the constraints of traditional human morality and do such a jaw-dropping and strange thing?
Emperor Dezong of Tang, Li Shi, was the tenth emperor of the Tang Dynasty, and his father was Li Yu, emperor of the Tang Dynasty. When he was fourteen years old, the Anshi Rebellion, which led to the decline of the Tang Dynasty, broke out, and he was forced to flee like many of the royal sons.
He had eleven sons in his lifetime. In fact, he had only nine sons. The other two sons, one is his nephew Li Yi and the other is his grandson Li Chen.
What's going on?
Li Shi's father, Emperor Li Yu of the Tang Dynasty, had a concubine, Li Mi (李邈), who was said to be the perfect candidate to inherit the throne; unfortunately, Li Mi eventually died young. Emperor Tang posthumously made Li Mi the Crown Prince of Zhaojing.
After Li Mi died, he left behind a son, Li Yi. Tang Dezong understood that if his brother Li Mi was still alive, the possibility of him being able to have a son was very small, after all, he Li Mi was the concubine. Therefore, Tang Dezong adopted Li Yi as his son, and ranked first, that is, the eldest son. Li Yi's transformation from a fatherless child to the emperor's eldest son is also a kind of luck in a way.
Li Yi indeed did not disappoint Tang Dezong, and when he was the envoy of Jingyuan Jiedushi and the governor of Yangzhou, he once pacified the rebel army. During the Jingyuan Mutiny, Tang Dezong fled to Fengtian and the rebels besieged the city, and Li Yi, as the eldest of the princes, personally led an army to hold the city and eventually defeated the rebels. Later, Tang Dezong died, and Li Yiyi died without victory, which can also be regarded as a filial piety.
Li Xian (李謜) was the son of Emperor Shunzong of Tang. Tang Dezong loved this grandson very much, so he adopted him as a son, ranking sixth in line. In this way, Li Xuan and his biological father Li Xuan changed from a father-son relationship to a brotherly relationship.
Li Xian was born in the third year of Jianzhong (782 AD). Tang Dezong, who had just passed the age of confusion, often came to see him and took him to play.
Although Li Xian was not very old, due to the unusual favor of Emperor Dezong of Tang, in the fourth year of Zhenyuan (788), he was named the Prince of Yong and awarded the title of Kaifu Yi Tongsan Division. A six-year-old child, who is only out of kindergarten now, is about to enter the threshold of the first grade of primary school, what kind of government affairs can be handled, but his title and official position are already very high.
Later, Li Xian successively led the Emissaries of the Yiwu Army and the Emissaries of the Zhaoyi Army.
Although Tang Dezong was very fond of this son (grandson), this Li Jian was too short-lived, and died in the fifteenth year of Zhenyuan (799), only eighteen years old.
Emperor Dezong of Tang was so grief-stricken that he announced his resignation from the dynasty for three days and posthumously made Li Xian the Crown Prince of Wenjing. Moreover, on the day of the funeral, Tang Dezong personally led the group of courtiers to cry bitterly and send them to the Tonghua Gate.
In this way, a strange phenomenon appeared in the Tang Dezong dynasty, that is, the two princes of life and death: Li Xuan, the prince of life, and Li Xie, the prince of death. Moreover, the dead prince is also the biological son of the prince.
Crown Prince Li Xuan did not know how he felt in his heart, he was obviously his own son, but he had become a younger brother, and his identity was the same as that of a prince.
As for why Tang Dezong wanted to let his grandson be his son, history has always had different theories. The three most common statements are analyzed below:
First, Tang Dezong really loved this grandson too much. The New Book of Tang Dynasty Volume 82 says that Li Chen: "See love for the emperor, and be destined to be a son." That is to say, Tang Dezong made this grandson his son for no other reason, but only because he loved him too much.
The second is that Li Xian looks like a palace girl that Tang Dezong once loved. This is a deduction of the Ming legend "Two Worlds of Love" and the Qing legend "Qinglian". It is said that during the anshi rebellion, the teenager Li Shi received meticulous care from a palace girl qinglian who was four years older than him, and the two had a relationship. Later, Qinglian, who was pregnant with Liujia, gave up his horse to him and fled in order to save Li Shi, and he himself died under the rebel horse.
Since then, Li Shi has always been obsessed with Qinglian. Later, he found that his grandson Li Xian looked very similar to Qinglian, and thought that the heavens had given him an opportunity to compensate, and he was very happy and accepted him as a son. Although this story is very touching, it is a pity that it is only a literary and artistic work after all, so it is not acceptable.
The third is under the influence of Tang Suzong. Emperor Li Yu's wife Cui Shi (崔氏) had two sons: one was Li Mi (李邈) and the other was Li Kai (李偲). Emperor Suzong of Tang, Li Heng, was very fond of Li Kai's grandson, and he was made the King of Zhao and adopted as his adopted son.
In summary, Tang Dezong Li Shi adopted his grandson as a son, which had both traditional and personal factors. The traditional factor is that his grandfather Tang Suzong once adopted his grandson as a son, so it is not worth the fuss that he adopted his grandson as a son. The personal factor is that he really likes this grandson too much, more than he loves his son, so he wants to make his grandson his son.
【About the author】Qi Yunke, male, born in 1988. In recent years, he has published more than 700,000 words in media at all levels. Signed author of The Reading Platform. He is a member of the Henan Writers Association, the vice chairman of the Runan County Writers Association, and a specially invited director of the Xincai County Writers Association.
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