There are many controversial figures in China’s history, but perhaps the most controversial figure for the last 1,356 years, is the only reigning Empress Regent in China’s history: Empress Wu Zetian. She’s commonly known for being “the most evil empress of China,” but modern historians often question the legitimacy of the multitude of stories of her violence and ruthlessness.
Born to a high-ranking and wealthy noble family on February 17, 624 AC, Wu was brought up to be a highly intelligent and respected young lady. Her father believed that women were more equal to men than was common and so he encouraged his daughter to read classical Chinese literature, play instruments, write in calligraphy, and was even well versed in history and politics, all of which was extremely uncommon for women back then.
By the age of 14, it was commonly known that Wu was both intelligent and beautiful, so she was summoned to the Imperial Palace to be an imperial concubine (a wife of sorts) to Emperor Taizong. When she was summoned, her mother wept that she was leaving, but Wu said to her, “How do you know that it is not my fortune to meet the Son of Heaven?” This made it clear to her mother that Wu had political ambitions, so she stopped worrying so much for her daughter. Although she wasn’t one of the emperor’s favourite concubines, she often accompanied him places acting as his personal servant. One of Wu’s duties was to tidy up the emperor’s bed-chamber, which gave her opportunities to interact with the emperor, an advantage many consorts didn’t have, as they weren’t allowed to interact with him unless summoned.
When Emperor Taizong died, his youngest son, Li Zhi, became Emperor Gaozong. The custom for consorts of a dead emperor was that any consorts who did not bear children with him were to be sent to monasteries to be Buddhist nuns. Wu, however, had a special connection with the now-Emperor Gaozong, and he brought her back to the palace to serve as one of his concubines. This was a dead giveaway to everyone that Wu and Gaozong had been having an affair during his father’s reign, which was obviously extremely frowned upon.
On the anniversary of his father’s death, Gaozong crossed paths with Wu as he was heading to offer incense at his father’s tomb. When they saw each other, they both began to cry. Empress Consort Wang saw this and did the opposite of what most wives would do; she helped Wu be more desirable to the Emperor and welcomed her to her palace. Wang wasn’t the Emperor’s favourite consort at the time, rather it was Consort Xiao. Wang had no children while Xiao has one son and two daughters with the Emperor, and Empress Wang wanted Xiao gone.
Unsurprisingly, Wu quickly became the Emperor’s favourite, and gave birth to her first son, Li Hong, in 652. In 654, Empress Wang and Consort Xiao teamed up to get rid of Wu, but to no avail. Wu soon had a daughter, but the daughter “mysteriously” passed away soon after. The most popular narrative of the daughter’s death is that Wu suffocated her own infant, and blamed the child’s death on Wang, saying that Wang was the last person to hold her and did it out of jealousy. As grimly intriguing as that theory is, many historians say that the child may have simply died from “crib death,” which is to suffocate on the blankets and stuff in the crib. Either way, Empress Wang was blamed for it and couldn’t clear her name, making Emperor Gaozong start looking for ways to have her deposed.
As angry as he was, he couldn’t get the chancellors to agree to depose her, so in 655, Wu accused Wang and her mother, Lady Liu, of witchcraft. Gaozong then barred Lady Liu from the palace, deposed Empress Wang, and locked her and Consort Xiao up. Wu was named Empress Consort, and quickly had Wang and Xiao executed to prevent them from ever exacting revenge. Once again, there’s a grimly fascinating theory and a theory that most historians go by. The fascinating one is that Wu ordered for Wang and Xiao’s arms and legs to be cut off, to throw their remaining body in a vat of wine, and then have their heads brought to her. However, the most widely believed theory is that she simply had them executed in a normal way. After their execution, Wu began seeing the two women in her dreams and believed herself to be haunted by them. Because of this, the royal residence moved to Chang’an.
As Empress, Wu began making moves behind the scenes, gathering allies and getting rid of threats, either by death or banishment. It’s believed that Empress Wu was actually the power behind the throne for over 18 years. Gaozong began to suffer from strokes, making him decide to give Wu almost equal power to himself. Wu would sit in on meetings with him and his chancellors, albeit behind a screen, and even held court without Gaozong present. Gaozong considered naming Wu Empress Regent (Ruler of the country) but was told not to by his advisors.
After Gaozong’s death, which he oddly went through in the presence of only Wu, Wu became Empress Dowager as well as Empress Regent. Because she had already poisoned who was supposed to be crown prince, and had many other princes exiled, her third son, Li Zhe, was named heir apparent. Just as before, Wu was still the one making all the decisions. She told her son, who was quite young, what to do until he married Empress Wei. Wei wanted to be as powerful as Wu, and did the same to Li Zhe as Wu had done to Gaozong; controlled him behind the scenes. As Li Zhe became more and more disobedient to Wu and more controlled by Wei, Wu had Li Zhe and Wei exiled and replaced him with her youngest son, Li Dan.
This time, Wu made no attempt to hide that she was in charge. Li Dan was not allowed to rule on matters, he never appeared in court or at imperial events, and no one was allowed to meet with him other than Wu herself. This went on for quite some time, and 688, members of the Li Clan plotted against Wu. Wu’s forces quickly rid of the threat, and Wu forced the rebels to commit suicide. In 690, Wu declared herself as Empress Regent and was quick to squash anyone who dared oppose her rule.
Despite the brutal things she did to become Ruling Empress, she was one of the last rulers in China’s Golden Age. She was a very peaceful ruler and made many steps to equality for women and peasants. She moved the country away from Taoism and toward Buddhism, due to the lack of gender equality in Taoism, and she lessened the taxes and gave more aid to peasants. Because of this, the country’s agriculture flourished, and the commoners were fond of Wu.
Throughout her reign, Empress Wu continued to use brutal tactics to rid of threats to her rule, although she did so secretly, and consistently gained more and more power and allies. China was engaged in very few military conflicts during her reign, although Wu was able to gain more lands for China. By 705, Wu was terribly ill and eventually was forced to abdicate the throne and name Li Xian Emperor. She died soon after, on December 16, and was buried by Emperor Gaozong. In a final way to spite her, they left her tombstone virtually blank, and no longer referred to her as having been Empress Regent, instead calling her Empress Consort.
Although Wu did indeed use brutal tactics, she wasn’t as evil as the men in her times liked to make her out to be. She was a very dedicated and capable ruler and a very impressive woman, but I think most people prefer reading about “terribly evil Empress Wu” instead of “Empress Wu who was just as brutal but just as capable as male rulers.”