Royals › Empress / Consort
Fu Hao
Consort of the Shang king Wu Ding who, according to oracle-bone records, led armies against the Tufang and Qiang and presided over sacrifices, and whose intact tomb was opened at Anyang in 1976
Mural of the event “Lady Fu Hao's Campaigns”, which this person took part in.
In the course of Shang expansion, the Qiangfang and Tufang tribes in the north and northwest continuously harassed the frontier and the situation became dire. The court needed a wise and brave commander to march out and decisively stabilize the northwestern defense.
Also known as Hou Muxin · Bi Xin
Fu Hao was one of the consorts of the Shang king Wu Ding, known from oracle-bone inscriptions found at Yinxu near Anyang; her temple name was Xin, and later inscriptions call her Mother Xin. The inscriptions record her leading campaigns against the Tufang, Bafang, Yi and Qiang, one of them mustering three thousand of her own troops and ten thousand others for a war on the Qiang. She also conducted sacrifices on the king's orders and held lands of her own. Wu Ding repeatedly divined about her childbirths, illnesses and fortunes. In 1976 archaeologists excavated her tomb at Xiaotun in Anyang, the only Shang royal tomb at Yinxu found unlooted; it held more than nineteen hundred bronzes, jades and other objects, many of the bronzes inscribed with her name.
Life and times
Dates Dates unknown; consort of the Shang king Wu Ding
- 1300 BCEApex of Shang Bronze MetallurgyTook part
- 1250 BCEWu Ding's Golden AgeTook part
- c. 1250 BCEWu Ding Reign and Fu Hao
- 1200 BCELady Fu Hao's CampaignsTook part
- c. 1200 BCETomb of Fu Hao Excavation
- 1200 BCEFu Hao Campaigning Against Qiangfang