Emperor Ling of Han

Also known as Liu Hong

Liu Hong, Emperor Ling, a great-great-grandson of Emperor Zhang, was enthroned as a boy in 168 by the dowager Empress Dou and her father Dou Wu. That year Dou Wu and Chen Fan were killed after a failed move against the palace eunuchs, and in 169 the eunuchs launched a second proscription of officials in which Li Ying and over a hundred others died in prison. In 175 he had Cai Yong fix the texts of the classics, carved on the Xiping stone steles at the Imperial Academy; in 178 he founded the Hongdu Gate school and began openly selling offices. When Zhang Jiao's Yellow Turbans rose in 184 he lifted the proscription and sent Huangfu Song and Zhu Jun against them, and in 188 he turned some regional inspectors into governors with troops. He died in 189, posthumously named Xiaoling, and Dong Zhuo seized the capital months later. Zhuge Liang's Memorial on Dispatching the Troops names Huan and Ling as the reigns that ruined Han.