Shu Qi

Also known as Zi Gongda · Mutai Shi

Shuqi was the third son of the lord of Guzhu at the end of the Shang and the younger brother of Bo Yi; a commentary on the Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji) gives his personal name as Zhi. The Shiji says his father had wanted him as heir, but Shuqi offered the throne to his elder brother, and when Bo Yi left he refused to rule and followed him, so the people chose the middle son. The brothers set out to join the Earl of the West and met King Wu marching east, whose horse they stopped to remonstrate; when the guards moved to kill them, Taigong Wang called them men of principle and had them led away. After the conquest the two lived on ferns on Mount Shouyang and starved there, singing that King Wu had replaced violence with violence. The Zhuangzi and Lushi chunqiu tell variants, and the Analects (Lunyu) notes that people still praised them.