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Princess Pingyang
Third daughter of Tang Gaozu who raised a force of seventy thousand near Chang'an in 617 to support her father's rising and was buried with military honours
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.
- Roles
- Commanders
Princess Pingyang was the third daughter of the Tang founder Li Yuan by Empress Dou and the wife of Chai Shao. When Li Yuan rose at Taiyuan in 617, Chai slipped away from Chang'an to join him, while the princess went to the family estate at Hu county, gave away its wealth, and recruited outlaws from the southern hills. She sent her servant Ma Sanbao to win over the non-Han leader He Panren and absorbed other rebel bands, until her strictly disciplined army, called the Women's Army, numbered seventy thousand. When Li Shimin crossed the Yellow River she joined him north of the Wei, and with Chai Shao commanding a separate headquarters she helped take the capital. She died in 623, and Gaozu ordered a funeral with military bands, plumed standards and armoured guards; when the ritual office objected that women's funerals had no drums, he replied that she had beaten the drums of war herself, and she was named Zhao, for enlightened virtue and merit.
Life and times
Dates Birth unknown–623 CE