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Lu Yijian
Northern Song chief minister for most of Renzong's early reign, who guided the court through the end of Empress Dowager Liu's regency and pushed through the deposition of Empress Guo
In a council hall, a long table holds an unrolled map scroll, a brass-cornered chest and a brush pot, with tall-backed chairs around it and a bronze lamp at the left; a figure stands with their back turned on the balcony at the right, with palace roofs beyond.
Also known as Zi Tanfu · Xuguo Gong · Wen Jing
- Roles
- Chief Ministers
Lu Yijian, courtesy name Tanfu, came of a family from Laizhou that had settled at Shouzhou, and was a nephew of the chief minister Lu Mengzheng. He passed the metropolitan examination in 1000 and became chief minister in 1029. In 1033 he insisted on proper rites for the emperor's birth mother, Consort Li, and when the dowager died later that year he submitted eight proposals for the emperor's personal rule, but was dismissed after Empress Guo told the emperor he too had been the dowager's man. Back in office, he led the move to depose Empress Guo; censors led by Kong Daofu and Fan Zhongyan who protested were sent away. Dismissed and recalled again, he returned as chief minister in 1040, was made Duke of Xu, and retired in 1043, dying the following year with the posthumous name Wenjing. The History of Song (Songshi) says Renzong wept before his ministers, asking where he would find another man so devoted to the state.
Life and times
Dates 979 CE–1044 CE