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Wu Zixu
Chu exile who took revenge for his father and brother by leading Wu's armies into the Chu capital, and who was forced to die after warning King Fuchai against Yue
At dusk on a hilltop, a large tent stands open with a table holding a map marked with small stones inside, a saddled horse tethered outside, and fire stands burning; campfires dot the river plain below, and one tiny sentry stands on the slope.
Also known as Wu Yuan · Zi Xu · Shen Xu
Wu Zixu, personal name Yuan, was a man of Chu whose father Wu She tutored the crown prince Jian. When King Ping of Chu, swayed by Fei Wuji's slander, put his father and elder brother Wu Shang to death, he fled through Song and Zheng to Wu. There he introduced the assassin Zhuan Zhu to Prince Guang, who had King Liao killed in 515 BC and took the throne as Helu. In 506 BC the Wu army won five battles and entered the Chu capital Ying; the Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji) says Wu Zixu opened King Ping's tomb and flogged the corpse three hundred times. Under King Fuchai he opposed making peace with defeated Yue and opposed the campaign against Qi; slandered by the chancellor Bo Pi, he was sent a sword in 484 BC and ordered to kill himself. The Shiji says the people of Wu built him a shrine by the river, called Mount Xu.
Life and times
Dates Birth unknown–484 BCE
- c. 485 BCEGuanwa Palace Revelry of Xi Shi