Emperor Xuanzong of the 9th Century

Li Chen (810–859), known by his temple name Xuanzong (宣宗), ruled the Tang dynasty from 846 to 859 under the era name Dazhong. He was born Li Yi and was known as the Prince of Guang before he came to the throne. He should not be confused with the better-known Emperor Xuanzong of the eighth century, whose temple name is written with a different character (玄宗).

He is often called the last capable emperor of the Tang. His diligent, frugal rule earned him the nickname "Little Taizong", after the dynasty's most admired ruler. Most of those who followed him were either children or the creatures of eunuchs and warlords.

Life before the Throne

Li Yi was born in 810, the thirteenth son of Emperor Xianzong. His mother, Consort Zheng, was a palace servant of low rank. After Xianzong's death in 820, Li Yi's elder half-brother came to the throne as Emperor Muzong, and in 821 Li Yi was made Prince of Guang.

For the next quarter of a century he lived quietly while three of his nephews, Jingzong, Wenzong and Wuzong, reigned in turn. He was thought to be slow-witted, and he seems to have encouraged the impression, which kept him out of danger in a court where princes were often seen as threats.

Early in 846 Emperor Wuzong fell gravely ill. The palace eunuchs, believing Li Yi would be easy to control, issued an edict in Wuzong's name that made him heir. His name was changed to Li Chen and he was given charge of state affairs. The officials who dealt with him were soon surprised by his intelligence and decisiveness. Wuzong died a few days later, and Li Chen came to the throne.

The Reign of Emperor Xuanzong

Xuanzong came to power at a time of bitter rivalry among court officials, and he moved quickly to put his own stamp on the government.

The Fall of Li Deyu

The dominant figure at Wuzong's court had been the chancellor Li Deyu. Xuanzong disliked his hold on power and removed him within days of taking the throne, sending him out of the capital as military governor of Jingnan. Over the following years officials associated with Li Deyu were dismissed, and Li Deyu himself was demoted again and again, partly over the case of a minor official, Wu Xiang, whose execution under Wuzong was now judged to have been unjust. He died in exile at Yai Prefecture, on the island of Hainan, around 850.

Reversing Wuzong's Policies

Xuanzong ended the persecution of Buddhism that Wuzong had begun in the Huichang era, allowing monasteries to be rebuilt and monks and nuns to return. He brought in Bai Minzhong as his leading chancellor in place of Li Deyu.

The Recovery of the North-West

Since the An Lushan rebellion of the 750s, the Tibetan empire had held much of the Tang's north-west, including the Hexi Corridor, the route to Central Asia. In the 840s Tibetan power collapsed in civil war, and Xuanzong took advantage. In 848 Zhang Yichao, a local Han Chinese leader at Shazhou (Dunhuang), drove out the Tibetan officials, and in 849 Tang forces recovered a number of frontier prefectures further east. In 851 Zhang Yichao submitted the prefectures of Hexi to the Tang. Xuanzong made him military governor of a new Guiyi circuit.

The Tangut Rebellion

The Tanguts in the north-west rose in rebellion, and the campaigns against them went badly. Concluding that the risings had been provoked by the abuses of local officials, Xuanzong replaced them with men of better reputation and in 851 sent Bai Minzhong to oversee the region. The Tanguts submitted the same year. Bai did not return to the capital as chancellor during Xuanzong's lifetime, and Linghu Tao became the leading chancellor in his place.

A Careful Ruler

The histories describe Xuanzong as diligent, thrifty and attentive to detail, reading memorials closely and keeping a firm hand on his officials and his own family. He was less successful with the eunuchs, whose control of the palace armies he never managed to break.

Death and Legacy

Like several Tang emperors before him, Xuanzong came to rely in his later years on alchemists who promised him long life, and he took the elixirs they prepared. They are said to have made him irritable and suspicious. In 859 he developed an ulcer on his back that confined him to bed and kept him from his chancellors. He died that year, aged forty-nine.

He had not named an heir, and the eunuchs placed his eldest son on the throne as Emperor Yizong. Under Yizong and his successors the problems Xuanzong had held in check returned: rebellions spread, the court lost control of the provinces, and within fifty years the Tang had fallen.

Ceramics of the Reign

No ceramics are tied to Xuanzong's court in particular, but his reign falls in a productive period for the kilns of the late Tang. In the north, potters in Hebei, Henan and Shaanxi made sturdy stonewares under brown and black glazes for storage and everyday use, like the jar shown here, alongside the white wares of Xing and the first white porcelain of the Ding kilns at Quyang. The Huangbao kilns in Shaanxi, later famous as the Yaozhou kilns, made black, white and green-glazed wares.

In the south, Yue celadons and Changsha painted wares travelled to the coast for export. Chinese white bowls reached the Abbasid world in such numbers that potters in Iraq imitated them in tin-glazed earthenware during the 9th century.