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In 195 AD, the warlords Li Jue and Guo Si, former subordinates of Dong Zhuo, turned on each other in a brutal power struggle that plunged Chang’an into chaos. Amid the violence, Emperor Xian of Han, the young and powerless figurehead of the crumbling Han dynasty, became a pawn in their conflict.
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The famous episode of Tao Qian’s Three Cessions of Xuzhou is not a historical fact, but a fictional narrative created in the 14th-century historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms. In this dramatized account, the aging governor Tao Qian, offers the governorship of Xu Province (Xuzhou) to Liu Bei repeatedly, who in turn humbly…
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Dong Zhuo’s arrogance, arbitrariness and cruelty ignited widespread fury across the empire. First, he deposed Emperor Shao of Han (Liu Bian), then had him murdered—along with his mother, Empress He and his wife. During the enthronement of the new emperor, Liu Xie, he executed any minister who dared to oppose him.
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In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the strategy of “controlling the emperor to command the warlords” is often cited as Cao Cao’s foundation for dominating northern China. Zhuge Liang famously remarked,