Emperor Xuanzong

Li Longji (李隆基, 685–762), known by his temple name Xuanzong and in Chinese tradition as Emperor Ming of Tang (Tang Minghuang), ruled the Tang dynasty from 712 to 756, the longest reign of the dynasty. His era names were Xiantian (712–713), Kaiyuan (開元, 713–741) and Tianbao (天寶, 742–756). The Kaiyuan years, guided by able ministers, are remembered as the high point of Tang power and culture, the age of the poets Li Bai, Wang Wei and Du Fu. In the Tianbao years the ageing emperor left government to others, and in 755 the rebellion of An Lushan ended the golden age. He abdicated in 756 and died in 762.

Early Life

Li Longji was born in 685 at Luoyang, the eastern capital, the third son of Li Dan, later Emperor Ruizong, and his consort Lady Dou. His father was then emperor in name only. Real power lay with Ruizong's mother, the empress dowager Wu, who in 690 set her son aside and took the throne herself as Wu Zetian. In 687 the boy was made Prince of Chu.

His childhood was overshadowed by his grandmother's suspicion of her own family. In 693 his mother and another of Ruizong's consorts were accused of witchcraft and put to death on her orders, and Ruizong and his sons lived for years under close watch.

The Coup of 710

In 705 a palace coup forced Wu Zetian from power and restored her elder son, Emperor Zhongzong. Li Longji, by then Prince of Linzi, held court posts, and in 708 he was sent to serve as an official of Lu Prefecture, in modern Shanxi.

Zhongzong died suddenly in 710, and it was widely believed that his wife, Empress Wei, had poisoned him. She placed a young son of Zhongzong on the throne and appeared ready to rule as Wu Zetian had done. Li Longji moved first. With his aunt Princess Taiping, Wu Zetian's daughter, he led palace guards against the empress's supporters. Empress Wei fled, but she was caught and beheaded, and her faction was destroyed.

Li Dan was restored to the throne as Emperor Ruizong. His eldest son, Li Chengqi, gave up his claim, and Li Longji was named crown prince.

Accession and the Fall of Princess Taiping

The court of Ruizong's second reign was divided between the crown prince and Princess Taiping, whose associates filled most of the chancellors' posts. In 712, after astrologers reported that the heavens foretold a change on the throne, Ruizong abdicated in his son's favour. Li Longji became emperor and made his wife, Crown Princess Wang, empress. Ruizong, however, kept control of senior appointments as retired emperor, and through him the princess remained the strongest figure at court.

In 713, learning that the princess and her allies were plotting against him, Xuanzong struck first. Her leading supporters were executed and she was ordered to take her own life. Ruizong handed all authority to his son and withdrew from public life. Before the end of the year the era name was changed to Kaiyuan, "Opening Era", marking the start of Xuanzong's personal rule.

The Kaiyuan Era (713–741)

Xuanzong began his rule with energy and good judgement. His chancellors, above all Yao Chong and Song Jing, and later Zhang Yue and Zhang Jiuling, are counted among the ablest ministers of the dynasty. The government cut the number of surplus officials, restrained the spending of the court and carried out a registration of households that brought many families back onto the tax rolls. Improvements to grain transport along the canals kept the capital at Chang'an supplied. Later in the reign the emperor went as far as abolishing the death penalty.

The empire was strong abroad. Tang garrisons held the oasis cities of Central Asia, and trade along the Silk Road brought merchants, musicians and new goods to Chang'an. To defend the long frontiers, Xuanzong gave more and more power to military governors (jiedushi), who commanded large professional armies. The system kept the borders secure for a generation, but it was to prove the dynasty's undoing.

Religion

Buddhism had enjoyed lavish patronage under Wu Zetian. Xuanzong curbed the Buddhist establishment: many thousands of monks and nuns were returned to lay life, and the building of new temples was forbidden. He favoured Daoism, the faith of Laozi, from whom the Tang imperial family claimed descent. He wrote his own commentary on the Daodejing, the central Daoist text, and in 733 ordered every household to keep a copy, seeing Daoism as a belief that could unite his subjects.

Poetry, Music and Learning

Xuanzong was a musician and a calligrapher, and his court was the most brilliant of the dynasty. He founded the Pear Garden, an academy for training court musicians and performers, and the Hanlin Academy, where scholars drafted documents for the emperor. Li Bai served for a time at his court, and Wang Wei and Du Fu were both active during his reign. Court scholars also compiled reference works, among them the encyclopedia Chuxue ji, prepared for the instruction of the emperor's sons.

Great works were undertaken in the provinces too. In 713 the monk Haitong began carving the Leshan Giant Buddha, a figure of Maitreya, the Buddha of the future, into a cliff in Sichuan where three rivers meet. Tradition holds that it was meant to calm the dangerous waters at its foot. Standing 71 metres (233 feet) high, it was completed only in 803. Although Xuanzong favoured Daoism, he did not prevent such Buddhist works.

The Tianbao Era and Yang Guifei

From the 730s Xuanzong withdrew more and more from day-to-day government. His favourite consort, Wu Huifei, helped the rise of Li Linfu, who became chancellor in 734 and dominated the administration until his death in 752. Li Linfu removed his rivals and promoted frontier generals of non-Chinese origin, such as An Lushan, who could never compete with him for office at court.

After Wu Huifei died in 737, the emperor became infatuated with Yang Yuhuan, the wife of his son Li Mao, Prince of Shou. To ease the impropriety she was first made a Daoist nun, and in 745 she entered the emperor's household with the title Guifei, "Precious Consort". Her family rose with her, and her cousin Yang Guozhong succeeded Li Linfu as chancellor.

The An Lushan Rebellion

An Lushan, a general of Sogdian and Turkic descent, had won the favour of both the emperor and Yang Guifei, and by 751 he held three frontier commands in the north-east with some of the empire's best troops. Rivalry with Yang Guozhong drove him to revolt at the end of 755. His armies took Luoyang, and in the summer of 756 they broke through the Tong Pass, the last defence of Chang'an.

Xuanzong fled towards Sichuan. At Mawei, west of the capital, his escort mutinied, killed Yang Guozhong and demanded the death of Yang Guifei. The emperor gave way, and she was strangled. The crown prince, Li Heng, went north to Lingwu, where he was proclaimed emperor as Emperor Suzong. Xuanzong accepted the change and abdicated, taking the title of retired emperor.

Last Years

Xuanzong returned to Chang'an after the capital was recovered in 757. In 760 the powerful eunuch Li Fuguo had him moved to a palace within the palace city, where he lived in effect under house arrest during his own son's reign. He died in 762, shortly before Suzong and before the rebellion was finally put down. His reign of almost 44 years was the longest in Tang history.

Ceramics of the Golden Age

For collectors of early Chinese ceramics, Xuanzong's reign is the height of Tang sancai, the low-fired earthenware glazed in amber, green and cream. The finest tomb figures of horses, camels, grooms and court ladies, and vessels in the same glazes, were made for the elite of Chang'an and Luoyang in the first half of the eighth century, many of them at the Gongxian kilns in Henan. Production for the capitals declined after the An Lushan rebellion.

High-fired wares were developing at the same time. The Xing kilns of Hebei made fine white wares and the Yue kilns of Zhejiang green-glazed celadons; Lu Yu, writing his Classic of Tea in the decades after the rebellion, compared Xing ware to silver and snow and Yue ware to jade and ice. No surviving piece can be tied to the emperor himself. Our article on Tang art and inventions says more about these wares. The wider story is told in our guide to antique Chinese porcelain.