Su Wu

Also known as Zi Ziqing

Su Wu, courtesy name Ziqing, came from Duling and was a son of Su Jian, Marquis of Pingling. In 100 BC he led an embassy, carrying the imperial staff of office, to return Xiongnu envoys detained in Han, but his deputy Zhang Sheng was drawn into a plot to kidnap the chanyu's mother, and the whole mission was seized. Pressed to defect, Su stabbed himself; thrown into a pit, he survived on snow and felt. The chanyu then sent him to the empty shores of the Northern Sea, Lake Baikal, to herd rams, saying he could go home when they gave milk. He kept the staff until its yak-tail tassels fell away and refused even his old friend Li Ling. Released after a peace in 81 BC, he returned white-haired after nineteen years and became director of dependencies. Emperor Xuan made him a marquis; he died in 60 BC past eighty, and in 51 BC his portrait was the last of eleven hung in the Qilin Pavilion.