Eh, I guess this pic will have to do. Anyway, I should have written about her before Princess Pingyang first because she came before that, but oh well. Madam Xian was such a bad-ass ‘cause she was loyal to three rulers from three dynasties. Three. (Oh yeah, they were the Liang, the Chen, and the Sui.) But before we talk about her, we have to do a li’l bit of history, first.

After the Han Dynasty collapsed, there were a lot of things to be done. I mean, errbody wanted a piece of the pie that was China, and of course the ‘barbarians’ from the North were like, “Aww yeah, this is mine!” and they basically started attacking the areas - guess where? - in the North. So all them Han Chinese peeps panicked and stuff and placed their government in the South, which was real far away from the ‘barbarians.’ 

Oh yeah, this is the period known as the period of the Six Dynasties. There was a lotta chaos, y’know the drill. China pretty much undergo this pattern of disintegrating and reuniting again, and you can so tell ‘cause this usually meant a change of dynasties. Anyway, back to the topic!

The Li Tribe and Madam Xian’s Marriage

Madam Xian belonged to this tribe called the Li tribe, and this tribe lived in the Yang Jiang area of Gao Liang Jun (it’s called Guangdong Province today). She wasn’t actually Chinese, though,  and her family controlled most of the land there. When she was a kid she dreamt that all the tribes would get along, and in a way, she tried to make them happen when she became an adult. It’s also real important that her tribe was matriarchal so she really had more freedom than most women. But her role suddenly became more traditional ‘cause she had to go marry Feng Bao, who was the the Governor  of Gaoliang. This happened in 535 CE. Anyway, this marriage is like, real important because it made sure that her tribe and the Han Chinese peeps got along.

Hey, at least she got to keep her surname. (Y’know, ‘cause of the matrilineal thing.)

Relations Between Other Tribes/Peoples: Li Qianshi

Anyway, not long after that, this dude, Liangwu from the Southern Chi dynasty got all fed-up and tried to found his own dynasty, the Liang. Yeah, he probably wasn’t very imaginative. So he ruled for a while, and another dude, Hou Jing, rebelled against him. While Liangwu called like, his supporters to help him, no one gave a shit, not even Li Qianshi, who was also rebelling against him.

Whoa, right? So it was basically a bunch of people rebelling against each other, and since Madam Xian was in a position of power, Li Qianshi was all, “Hey! Can you like, support me in my rebellion?”

But he didn’t say that. What he did was that he tried to get Madam Xian’s husband, Feng Bao, to Gaozhou, which was in Guangdong. When Feng Bao got to Guangdong, Li Qianshi was to kidnap Feng Bao and ransom Madam Xian into helping him.

Of course that totally didn’t happen, ‘cause Madam Xian was a smart cookie and she told her husband not to go, and since the dirty method didn’t work, Li Qianshi launched an all out rebellion. The rebellion spread to the place where Madam Xian was governing and shiz, and she got real pissed off.

This is what she did. She went to Li Qianshi wit’ her troops, sayin’ that she totally wanted to apologise for her husband not going to Gaozhou earlier. Once they were in the city, they shrugged off their disguises and basically pwned him, which was awesome.

The Chen Dynasty

Right. One rebellion down, two more to go. She totally took out the Hou Jing rebellion and supported Chen Baxian, who became the emperor of the new Chen dynasty. 

That’s all right? Nope! Rebellion broke out like, again, and Madam Xian totally had to send her son to whoop ass. Then, she arranged a meeting between the emperor and the rebels so they could like, negotiate terms. This probably wasn’t very successful ‘cause Madam Xian had to step up the plate and stop another rebellion, and the emperor rewarded Feng Pu and was all, “Imma let you be magistrate of Yangchun,” which was so what happened

Ouyang He Against the Chen

But that wasn’t all. See, this other dude, called Ouyang He also wanted himself some power, and he totally went against the Chen. (Seriously? What’s up with these rebellions?) Anyway, Ouyang He was a dick and he captured Madam Xian’s son so that Madam Xian would support him. (Man, these politicians don’t really know any new tricks.) Anyway, Madam Xian didn’t even rescue her son, and charged against Ouyang He, and totally freed her son. This time, errbody really had to step up and the court honoured her for her loyalty and ingenuity.

Too bad that the Chen dynasty fell after 32 years, and the Sui dynasty came up. In the next post, we’ll talk about Madam Xian’s support for this dynasty, and the thangs she did fo’ it.