Shi Jingtang

Also known as Shi Shaoyong · Houjin Gaozu · Sheng Wen Zhang Wu Ming De Xiao Huang Di · Erhuang Di

Shi Jingtang, a Shatuo born in Taiyuan, married a daughter of the Later Tang emperor Mingzong and became military governor of Hedong in 932. The last Later Tang ruler, Li Congke, distrusted him, and when ordered in 936 to move to Yunzhou he refused and was besieged in Taiyuan by Zhang Jingda. He sent Sang Weihan to ask the Khitan for help, offering to become a vassal, to treat Yelu Deguang as a father, and to give up the Lulong circuit and the prefectures north of Yanmen Pass, the Sixteen Prefectures. That winter Deguang invested him at Jinyang as emperor of the Great Jin with the reign title Tianfu, and their armies took Luoyang and ended the Later Tang. He paid the Khitan three hundred thousand bolts of silk a year, and crushed the Chengde governor An Chongrong, who opposed the vassalage. Shi died at Yedu in 942, with the temple name Gaozu. The prefectures stayed in Khitan hands, and the Northern Song failed to retake Youzhou.