The Rise and Fall of Wu Zetian
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- Опубликовано: 28 сен 2024
- So you think math is hard? Try summarizing the story of an eventful and passionate women in a 10 minutes video.... oh wait, we did!
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Historically is the third channel and project of Archmeton where he pairs up with skilled artists all around the world to create easy to understand and enjoyable historical videos about bizarre events.
#history #4k
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HISTORICALLY FUN FACT
If you're wondering what happened to Empress Wang and Xiao Shufei... It's too nasty to be included in the video,
Imprisoning inside the palace for the rest of their lives wasn't as nice as it might sound like. They both got locked up in a windowless room with only a hole to get food given through.
After Wu Zetian was made Empress of Gaozong, the emperor decided to pay them a visit. Seeing their conditions deeply saddened the Emperor, and after calling out "Empress!, Shufei! Where are you?" into the darkness, Empress Wang responded and begged; "If Your Imperial Majesty considered our past relationships and will allow us to again see the light of day, please rename this place 'Huixin Courtyard' ("the courtyard of a returned heart"). Gaozong being the dude he was, immediately responded with "I will do so right away". However, when our main character heard about this she was enraged and issued their death warrants.
Their exact punishment? Each of them got caned (hit with a stick) a hundred(!) times and got their hands and feet(!) cut off. After the first punishments Wu ordered the women to be put into large wine jars with the intention to "let these two witches be drunk to their bones". Both Wang and Shufei managed to survive this punishment for several days till they ultimately succumbed to the torturing. This might start to sound like Pope Stephen's story here, but after they died Wu ordered for both of them to be beheaded and afterwards had Empress Wang's clan surname (Wang) changed to Mang (Snake)
If this wrath surprises you, I don't blame you. Wu has ordered the deaths of many more in her tale, which we unfortunately couldn't fit in this video without it getting a really messy (and hard to follow) story!
Yeiks.
Even though I've heard torture like this in Chinese it still doesn't fail to surprise and scare me a bit. I'm just glad I was born in a decent place
This fact isn't fun....
Nasty
Much about her story sounds too farfetched. Almost like it is propaganda to make the new person in the throne look and sound legitimate. Too bad I have nothing to back that up.
An emperor died peacefully, without being poisoned or killed brutally by an ambitious general? That's an odd and unusual story I could hear in history
Well she was 65 when she claimed the tittle. She was just really old
He trying youth drug.
There were 4th choice who was Emperor favor son, but he was reject by court officers, as he also grandson of Sui Emperor..
Rome: Wait, that's Illegal!
Empress* :)
And then she became an assassin class servant in fgo as a kid.
And a caster as a adult with a swimsuit
Skadi for those who dont have skadi
@@rubyblooddemonking both are great indeed
Her being a child as an Assassin is due to the lengths that Wu did behind the scenes in the Chinese Court to ensure that her becoming the next heir to the throne was absolute. Consider that she was doing this at a very young age, it makes sense why her being summoned as an Assassin in her child state would be so. Her Caster version is her at a very young adolescent adult, while her Ruler version is when she was at her prime being the Empress of China.
There it is
So, she basically just girl bossed her way to the top and died peacefully. Truly inspiring.
How did she fall.
Old age she just kinda died
Huh
@@fatjellyfish9478 He didn't mention what happened after she died. The people in power basically tried to make it look like she never ruled, erasing her entire legacy (which he also didn't fully spell out because nobody's got time for trying to make a two hour video 😁) and vilifying her in manuscripts for centuries after.
Yeah lmao
immagine being such a girl boss bad bitch that for centureies people literally try to remove you from history.@@ms_scribbles
Considering how prone to murder she was (even for China at the time) I can’t exactly blame them. While they did vilify her much of the villainy was somewhat warranted.
It's a real shame that we don't know her birth name. Wu is her family name and Zetian is a title she chose meaning "Ruler of the Heavens"
Wu Zhao I think is one of her oldest.
😂
Zai getting the throne is basically "luigi wins by doing absolutely nothing"
Oh man, Chinese history is so rife with interesting stories, and Empress Wu is definitely up there in her infamy. So glad you branched into history too.
Romance of the 3 kingdom
I recommend Qin Shi Huang by Xiran Jay Zhao.
His story is full of childhood betrayals, blind assassins, sword masters, calamitous revenge, and one of the most unfortunate birth circumstances in the history of world leaders.
Like all history , trust me if you grew up like I did it was entirely indoctrination filled with racial superiority and to hate every foreigner
The animation is so smooth, its really sad seeing this channel be really underrated, because the quality of the content is higher than more famous hystory channels.
Keep up the good work man.
Thank you! We will only become better and hopefully picked by the algorithm by then :)
I didn't notice till you pointed out. It is a great channel.
Bro wtf is china map 😅
she gaslighted gatekeeped and girlbossed her way to the top and dipped peacefully. Dayum
Dip dip dip dip
I love this video man, Wu Zetian is one of the most interesting figures in Chinese history, and the way you covered the story is so entertaining, you guys have such a nice artstyle.. I can't believe you're working on so many high-quality channels at once, keep up the great work!
Seems like most Westerners - even history lovers like me - know very little about the history of anybody east of Mesopotamia. I know English and Roman history fairly well. The broad strokes, anyway (and the details of some periods/characters i find most fascinating).
But we western history buffs do at least know that the history of the China, Korea, and Japan is filled with crazy shit and fascinating stories. The formation of Chinese empires. The Mongolian takeover. The subjugation of Joseon and Korea, squished between the enormous Chinese empires of Han and Ming and the powerful Japanese.
I can't help but see the parallels with European history. The raiding japanese, feared seafaring warriors that raided costal areas and did some colonizing some raping and pillaging I presume. They seem not unlike the vikings of the 9th, 10th, and 11th century.
The development of many small kingdoms into a few large empires in China. That is like what happened in most of western europe. Especially the formation of england from its petty kingdoms mercia wessex essex kent northumbria etc.
I guess people just be people all thru history. We just fighting each other slowly consolidating into large nation states. Then the large nation states fight each other, just like happened in Mesopotamia.
@@burtan2000 So true man. Civ 6 really opened my eyes to how little I really know about history, even Asian history. There's so many interesting people and stories in our past, I would have never known about the Korean dynasties or Vietnam's struggle for independence against China. The Khmer literally strapped ballistas to elephants and rode them into war!
the art and the storytelling complements each other great job arch
I love the dichotomy of your channels Arch. I remember playing in a val tourney you hosted at around 15-20k subs on the archmeton channel! I am really impressed by how far you've come. Keep it up 🎉
We gotta do those val tourneys again in the future xD
@@HeyHistoricallythe shotgun tourney were our team lost was an experience a fun one for sure
Oh my god, what a wonderfully smooth and interesting video. You can tell the amount of effort from the animation and scripting, I hope you keep on growing because this channel is super underrated!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Both the animation and the narrator is Top Notch ! Keep up the good work !
You can't be a female emperor without being this much ruthless.
So sad how a girl has to premeditate the death and or exile of several of her family members and political opponents alike to succeed 😔
China actually had several queens ane emperesses other than Emperess Wu, it's just that Wu is the only one who called herself 'Emperor'.
Nice little animation and documentary.
Their names Li, is supposed to be pronounced as Lee in mandarin, but I see you're using the Cantonese pronunciation.
Good job 👍👍
He is not doing Cantonese pronunciation, he is just pronouncing it wrong, it should be "Lee Zhi" not "Lai zee" and it should be "Lee Cheng chian" not "Lai Cheng kian"
@@ShrekOwO On 2:40 you can hear him pronouncing "Li" as "Lee" on the 2 sons but Li Zhi
She was also the one who ruled the most competently and skillfully among them.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Empress Wu was an inspiration for the Character of Cerci in “ASOIAF” by George RR Martin.
Nah, Wu was actually smart
Great video arch. Can't wait till the next one comes out
Good video, and I would have loved to show it to my students. But I think it would have been massively improved by talking about the actual things she did as Emperor, since she presided over the height of the Tang dynasty, successfully annexed Korea, reduced corruption, and (in a miracle for a long ruling Chinese Emperor) saw no major rebellions during her reign. I think that reducing her to her ruthlessness in her rise to power (which was very real, don't get me wrong) plays a bit too much into stereotypes about female rulers and ignores the stuff she did that actually had an impact on the world.
Thanks for the feedback!
@@HeyHistorically thanks for the reply! Definitely gonna keep an eye on this channel for future vids :)
Each kingdom in the korean peninsula has been always "dual structure" of ppl of ruling class (chinese) and general public (koreans). these dualistic organizations .
All the ancient Korean kings 朝鮮王 of the past were Chinese officials. The queen was a Chinese nobleman. The members of the palace are all members of the Chinese nobles and the Han blood family 漢血家族(including various technical staff. Scholars, architects, monks, senior soldiers ...). They are all Chinese , Chinese language (Han dialect) , and Chinese characters. They have always been proud of the Chinese descent and the Han blood family 漢血家族. They call the ancient Korea 朝鮮 as part of China. These clearly recorded in a large number of letters written to the Chinese emperor and Chinese history .
Only the "White clothes Ethnic白衣民族" (the ancestors of Koreans today) slaves and civilians speak Korean language.
After the 15th century, Chinese officials (King of ancient Korean朝鮮王) invented a characters for indigenous and slave language - Korean characters. In order to better manage slave work.
Korea is an independent country established in 1950 (the United States has power in military power). Korean language and Korean characters as the official language and characters are less than 70 years. The real history of the real today Korean people (White clothes Ethnic白衣民族) is only about 100 years.
*
Ancient Korea before 1910 = 朝鮮 (the name of the Chinese city).
The official language :
Chinese language (Han dialect) and Chinese characters.
Korea after 1950 = 韓國
The official language :
Korean language and Korean characters.
----------------------------------------
More than 90% of the territory of the ancient Korean Peninsula 朝鮮半島 was Chinese territory. It was where the Chinese lived (a small number of them were local indigenous people who were slaves). Only the southernmost part of the peninsula was the "white-clothed ethnic 白衣民族" (ancestors of Koreans today)lived. Their language was Korean language. Until the Ming Dynasty emperor changed their name to "Chosun 朝鮮". During this period, the Korean peninsula was under unified administration.
"white-clothed ethnic 白衣民族" (ancestors of Koreans today) joined as civilians and slaves in ancient Korean peninsula. They were governed by local Chinese officials and families. Only Chinese could use Chinese characters 漢字and live in Chinese palaces. And "white-clothed ethnic 白衣民族" (the ancestors of Koreans today) are forbidden to use and learn Chinese characters 漢字(except for a few mixed-race people and those who work in the palace).
Therefore, during the Korean Peninsula War in history, the Chinese emperor would send troops to the Korean Peninsula to help fight against the invaders.
Obligatory plug to promote Xiran Jay Zhao's books Iron Widow and the upcoming sequel Heavenly Tyrant which are about Wu Zetian reimagined as a mecha pilot ala Darling in the Franxx and it is absolutely epic
Yess someone says it! Love that book
Wait so, Tai Zhung, (I think I spelt that right?) the father of the three boys, was he also poisoned by monks? I noticed the bottle next to his grave and was wondering.
OH WAIT HES THE SAME GUY FROM THE BEGINNING! that makes sense now ok
Speaking of Li Shimin aka Emperor Tang Taizong, he was that same emperor that have a fratricidal problem conspired by both of his brothers, the older brother Li Jiancheng and his younger brother Li Yuanji, causing the Xuanwu Gate Incident that ended both Jiancheng and Yuanji’s lives before Tang Taizong ever became the imperial Tang Crown Prince and later, emperor.
Zong**
太重*
Your animation is smooth, amazing and adorable. Noticed you only have two videos so far. Looking forward to more.
That's at least the official version... especially with governors this are twisted muddled and adapted every time, so it wouldn't surprise me if the facts were very different and no poisons were used.
Production quality is out of this world🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
Hey man this video was awesome! I love Chinese history but its extremely overwhelming to get into this video was not only educational but kept my little ADHD monkey brain in check, so great job and I hope you make more videos!
That's some goooood storytelling. Nice one!
9:15 so pretty much standard fair for any successful emperor. minus the child birth.
0:00
This man sounded so Dutch, I felt my blood alcohol level immediately increase by 0.1% 😂🍻😂
damn that was so good arch keep it up
just found this channel from community post, time to binge all the videos
All of your channels are gonna explode. Mark my words!
Dude, I enjoyed this video alot, your content reminds me of linfamy and another animated history channel, please keep it up 🙏.
New vid!! Great content as always
So she gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss-ed her way to the throne
Help I love your art style! I’m definitely subscribing!
The pronunciations kill me.
Can you explain correct way to pronounce these? I am really interested
Bro is actively in the er
@deathracoffee
0:19 Wu Zetian "woo dzutt-yen"
1:45 Li Zhi "lee dzhhhhh"
2:29 Zhangsun "jahng-swun"
2:40 Li Chengqian "lee ch-hung-ts-yen
3:35 Li Tai "lee tie"
5:15 Gaozong "gout-zoong"
6:12 Xiao Shufei "showe shoe-fay"
8:22 Li Zhe "lee juh"
9:06 Zhou "joe"
@@ThelaretusXie Xie wode pengyou!
Garçon Wat Hoch! Ninguém Se ne frega.
The pronunciation is so jagged it's insane
I remember playing Civilization 5 as a kid and loving her because she was one of the only "beautiful woman of power" (I was biased as an asian) and to know this was her rise & fall is hilarious and respectful. She did what she had to do for a woman of her time, and to think it lasted that long - until her eventual death of age, is very commendable.
All the attention paid to the nasty things she had to do to win and keep power can gloss over the fact that she was a seriously talented ruler, and China positively thrived during her reign.
The second most well known Chinese Empress who wielded real power and reigned for a significant period of time was Ci Xi, but Ci Xi was an utter disaster of a ruler who brought China to ruin during her reign.
The animations are cute and engaging, while the narration is nicely paced
She wasn't just an average ruler, but actually one of the most successful emperors in Tang dynasty, stabilizing the economy and equalizing the exam system. She also promoted woman's rights and had a lot of talented female officials in her court
Emperor Wu is my iconic. She’s not badass like that even base on true story. She brought up new things in China such as central examination to promote a new wise blood to the government, nourish buddhist , raise feminine for chinese women and so on. BTW , I like your animation.
Come for the shotgun video game lore stay for the well animated history videos that's what my grandfather always told me
she so cool and wonderful and deserved all and was even so beyond hardworking,, such cool knowledge! thank u!!
This has to be my favourite art style
ur a goat bro all ur channels are fire as fuck and amazing production value for the size
Imagine trying to disprove her existence as a Chinese Emperor, but actually made her even more famous. I love this kind of animation. It's not only educational, but also entertaining.
And I also hate Wade Giles spelling of Chinese pronunciation. Zh is spelled as Ch, and G is spelled as K. So I know the pain to learn Chinese, but you don't even try to do it. Hope your channel try to be more accurate, better informed, and admit some mistakes.
Great content as always.
Hey Kevin, you seem very passionate about history just like are but a tat more knowledged, if you want to share your wisdom so we can prevent those mistakes can you shoot me an email so we can get in touch? Email is heyhistorically@gmail.com
@@HeyHistorically
I'm not that knowledgeable, I'm more towards casual. I just love learning about the history of the entire humanity, no matter what the civilization they're from. It's just that our knowledge grows and things we knew might be obsolete, and new knowledge was discovered each time.
So, thank you for your work and reply. It's rare for a content creator to reply to their viewers. It almost feels honored to be able to be in touch with a creator like you. Hope the others want to do the same, you gave us a good example.
@@kevinabiwardani7550 if y sau that 古 is spelt as ku then how is 哭 spelt as?? and theres 祝, how is then spelled 楚?
I swear to God the way he spell the “Li” in “Li Zhi” so different than the rest of the “Li” bugs the heck out of me
Crazy how you did so much research on her, but did not bother to learn to pronounce her name correctly.
I like the way china always breaks up, and then comes back together
She was actually a very good ruler!!! She made the country rich and prosperous. You are talking like she is just wicked
We need more videos like these
Next week our next one!
@@HeyHistorically Can you do Henry II of England next and how he founded the Angevin Empire?
Lest goo a 10 min historically vid🔥
Keep up the good work man
Love from Sarah's brother
"Why won't they let a woman rule a coutry ?"
The algorithm gods have sent me here and I found this amazing channel
Edit: Oh it makes sense now I watched his other channels.
subscribed. I hope you reach 1M subscribers in a year, you deserve it!
Finally accualy good history channel similar to oversimplified, definably recommending to my history teacher, but a slight insignificant sugestion, as a history geography boy please make the borders accurate, but still a 10/10 content
I didnt even watched the video and already subscribed.
Thats good!!! Thank you :)
I think i'ts unfortunate that this video doesn't show the positive impact of Wu Zetian's rule. She actually did quite a few good things for China, for example creating the first welfare system, allowing commoners into the court, improving women's rights...
saw this while doing a project abt china. instantly subscribed :)
i lost the track of how many people got exiled in this video bruhh
As crazy as her story sounds, if you read enough palace politics from different kingdoms, empires of the world, it doesn't stand out too crazy. There's a lot of unusual, ruthless plays for power and maintaining it. Let's not forget what Late Roman Republic and Imperial internal power plays were like, which often devolved into civil war, murder, etc.
With China being as large and old as a civilization and imperial power that it was, you are going to get a lot of crazy history. Hell, China was just so large, that it's broken up several different times and had to be reunified just as many times over.
Tip from someone who has barely any idea what theyre talking about: you should use a different font in your videos to make yourself more distinguished from Oversimplified
Great video as always!
I see where you're coming from. Is the font really the same? I went out of my way to look in the deepest parts of the font world to find this one haha
@Historically never mind, it's not the exact same font. However, its uncannily similar to one of the fonts he uses. I don't know how many people would draw this connection, or if it's even an issue at all.
I love this animation style. Very witty naration too
"By The emperor himself" got some zombies flashbacks there
brutal facts : before wu became the emperor one of the emperor's concubine decided to assassinate wu's son. wu caught on to her schemes , destroyed her throat so she couldn't speak , severed her limbs and threw her into the pigs pen where the concubine crawled and died in a messed up way
Tang's Golden Age was nearly 300 years.
She's not average. Her leadership is part of the 300 years.
I loved the drama as a kid
I love these sound effects!
I think this channel will go far.
I like all the little sound effects.
Amazing animations ! And a crazy story o-o
Plenty of women ruled imperial China in all but name.
Honestly 20+ rule before dying in bed as a old women isn't so bad.
Y'all, if you guys want to watch a Chinese Drama with a super awesome female lead, I suggest watching Yanxi Palace. It's super super awesome, and it gives a look at all the political stuff that happened in the harem.
Let’s go!
Thank you for being reminded that most of my history comes from fate Grand order
Did not expect the JOJO reference 😂😂🔥
I like how wu wang and xiao ans the emporer were in earky 20s. Story seems like a dorm room beef lol
this is the best history channel.
cant wait for part 5
So she technically whored her way in? wow
The definition of Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girlboss
Her abilities are fun in Civ 6
The other two wives of Li Zhi who were held in prison were eventually beaten to death by Wu Zetian own thugs after an event when Li Zhi missed them so he visited them and decided he would release them after seeing their pitiful living inside prison. Wu Zetian had eyes and ears all over the place, caught wind of this and dealt with it before Li Zhi did anything.
558 Emperors in 300 years? So an average reign of 5 years and 4 and a half months.
Talk about gaslight gatekeep girlboss
Yoo can u do the ottoman empire, khalid bin waleed, salhudeen ayubi, the real dracula, and 7th century arabia?
Ill write them down and look into it!
Wow I am astonished as to how you only have essentially 5k Subscribers, would’ve never known, I thought you had like 100k Minimum ngl.
Bro the thumbnail change got me acting unwise.
Very interesting... I want more.
Oversimplified replacement right here.
Cant replace greatness, but you can join it!
Sri Lanka had a queen named anula who also did poisonings
Advance wars soundtrack bangs. Good choice
I can imagine the chaos of the aftermath when there was no legitimate heirs left to take the throne.
Wu Zetian had to choose whether to give the throne to her son (who was part of the Li clan) or her nephew (Who has part of the Wu clan). Giving the throne to her nephew would mean that her dynasty would continue but she wouldn't have a place in her nephew's ancestral temple while if she chose to pass it to her son then her spirit would have an imperial home but the Tang dynasty would be restored. She ultimately chose to pass her throne to her son, she renounced her title as emperor on her deathbed and wished to be buried with Gaozong as his empress, it was vital move so she would be considered an ancestor to all the subsequent Tang dynasty emperors so they could not erase her legacy or talk bad about her because of Confucian culture. This was because women were considered links between families so she was stuck between the Li clan and the Wu clan. This is probably why women after her didn't try to become emperor because what was the point of founding a dynasty only to have to throw it all away in the end
Source; I'm part Chinese myself and two more in depth video by an actual Chinese person on RUclips who does videos about Chinese history like this with their sources listed in the links of their videos (Xiran Jay Zhao. The sources they used also came from legitimate Chinese sources [using the term legitimate as in, originally in Chinese such as "The Old Book of Tang/旧唐书"])
I have never seen Mediaval Chinese look this accurate (Not 10/10 but its fine) in any Western media. Damn. Good work!
There was a coup that ended her reign and placed emperor zhongzong back on the throne
These chibis are too cute.
Remember kids, there was a lot of historical revisinism to ensure Daoist beliefs were'nt hurt.
The animation is awesome but I don't get how you managed to pronounce "Li" in so many different ways while reading the same script, especially since it's among the most common surnames in the world. Not to many the many variations on "Chengqian" while is pretty easy if you know the q is pronounced similarly to the English "ch".