Sima Shi

Also known as Zi Ziyuan

Sima Shi, courtesy name Ziyuan, eldest son of Sima Yi, was ranked in youth with Xiahou Xuan and He Yan. Before the Gaopingling coup of 249 he secretly kept three thousand sworn men, and on the day he led troops to hold the Sima Gate. After his father's death he took charge of the government and in 252 became general-in-chief. In 254 he executed Li Feng, Xiahou Xuan and others, deposed the Wei emperor Cao Fang and enthroned Cao Mao. When Guanqiu Jian and Wen Qin rose at Shouchun in 255 he led the campaign himself despite a recent eye operation; a night attack by Wen Qin's son Wen Yang so shocked him that the eye burst from its socket, and although the revolt was crushed he died at Xuchang soon after, in his forty-eighth year by Chinese reckoning. When his nephew Sima Yan founded the Jin, Shi was named Emperor Jing with the temple name Shizong.