Reunified Empires 59
surfaced in the court, she dealt with opponents ruthlessly, sending many
to death, including two of her own sons. When Emperor Gaozong died
in 683, Wu Zhao’s seventeen-year-old son became Emperor Zhong-
zong, and as the empress dowager, she was in virtual control of the
government. When the young emperor challenged his mother’s author-
ity within six weeks of assuming the throne, she had him replaced by
his younger brother, Emperor Ruizong, whom she locked in a separate
palace away from the decision-makers of the state.
After quickly suppressing an open rebellion by a number of impe-
rial princes, Wu Zhao assumed power directly in 690, declaring that the
Mandate of Heaven had passed to her own new Zhou dynasty.
Her Zhou dynasty lasted for fi fteen years, until she was over
eighty, in ill health, and very weak. She was fi nally forced to abdi-
cate power back to her son Zhongzong in 705, and she died a few
months later. Despite the terrible stories of her sexual escapades and
the many cruel punishments she dealt out to her political foes, even
her critics have had to admit that she was a more competent ruler
than many of the men who have occupied the dragon throne. She
brought new and much needed talent into the government by promot-
ing the use of examinations to recruit offi cials, and she strengthened
the power of the Tang monarchy by removing from power some of
the more entrenched families in the Tang aristocracy. The main lesson
male Confucian historians have drawn from Empress Wu’s momen-
tous career is that male rulers should never forget the terrible powers
of a beautiful woman to manipulate weak men and destroy the “natu-
ral” social order in which women are supposed to serve men and not
vice versa. Despite her being regarded as such a negative example, her
tomb was placed beside that of the emperor Gaozong, where it can
still be visited today.
The Tang was offi cially restored in 705, but the court was torn
with factional power struggles until 712, when Empress Wu’s grandson,
Xuanzong, assumed the throne and brought much needed stability to
the government. Xuanzong’s long reign, from 712 until 756, marked
both the high point of Tang power and Tang culture as well as the dra-
matic beginning of a long and torturous period of decline. In the early
years of his reign, Xuanzong seemed to embody all the virtues of a great
Chinese emperor, a philosopher-king who was both a conscientious
administrator and a brilliant intellectual. Xuanzong’s court became
the center of high culture in the mid-Tang. He established schools and
libraries, presided over elaborate and beautiful state ceremonies, and
patronized poets and artists, all without forgetting his duties in setting