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Wei Xiaokuan
Western Wei and Northern Zhou general who held Yubi against Gao Huan's sixty-day siege in 546 and in 580 crushed Yuchi Jiong's rising for Yang Jian
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 Zi Xiaokuan
Wei Xiaokuan, born Wei Shuyu and known by his courtesy name, came from Duling near Chang'an, joined the army at the end of Northern Wei and fought for Yuwen Tai in the Western Wei. In 546 the Eastern Wei strongman Gao Huan besieged him at Yubi with earth ramps, tunnels, fire and battering engines, and Wei answered every device; after sixty days, with four or five men in ten dead or wounded, Gao Huan fell ill, withdrew by night and died early the next year. Under the Northern Zhou he long held the Yubi frontier and spread a rhyme about a 'bright moon over Chang'an' that turned the Northern Qi ruler against his general Hulu Guang, whose courtesy name it echoed, and led to Hulu's execution. Before Emperor Wu's conquest of Qi he submitted three proposals for the campaign. In 580, when Yuchi Jiong rose at Xiangzhou against Yang Jian's regency, Wei commanded the expedition and took Ye within sixty-eight days. He died that winter aged seventy-two, with the posthumous name Xiang.
Life and times
Dates 509 CE–580 CE