Emperor Xuanzong Pt 1: Wow! Wu Wages Woo War With Wang

in your body. That's what I've learned greatly with the feelings in your body. Yeah, but that's okay. I'm excited, uh for my birthday? Hey, how's you know? Everybody out there's got a birthday. It's not that special. Um I hope yours is great? Maybe it's today. Happy birthday to all the people whose birthday is today, and you can go back and relisten to this episode on your birthday and it'll be like I personally wished you a happy birthday. Wow, what a good job watch. This is gonna be our

most replayed episode of all time. All right, put a put a pen in that we'll come back to this. But I think this is a great episode to be our most listened to episode of all time because it's a very cool story, very exciting, another one that just started small and just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger, because Imperial China is just the most fascinating place. I mean, talk about Game of Thrones style drama going on. My god,

it's that times ten. I can't believe it. And I we say this all the time on our show, and one of these days, somebody's got to give us a TV contract, But this one, oh man, I'm seeing an easy ten seasons out of this. Easy. That's if we cut half the characters. Oh my god, it's so good because this is the story of Emperor Schwan Song in eighth century China, and this guy was part of the Tongue dynasty and he had many many lovers throughout his life.

He was married, he had consorts and concubines, as a lot of the emperors did back then. Um, but they were not just lovers. They were all working behind the scenes. This is definitely one of those scenarios where behind every great man there was eight or ten scheme and women trying to take control of themselves because they did wield a lot of power. Um, and we're gonna hear all about their various machinations and schemes. And I'd say we just dive right into it because this story is wild.

Let's go hey their French, come listen well, Elien Diana got some stories to tell. There's no match making a romantic tips. It's just about particulous relationships of the might be any type of person at all, and abstract concept are a concrete wall. But if there's a story, were the second glance ridiculous roles a production? If I heart Radio.

The Tongue Empire in China was an imperial dynasty that lasted for about three hundred years between six eighteen and nine oh seven a d. And this is one of China's greatest periods. It's considered to be a golden age of culture and China earned a reputation during this time across the world for their contributions to arts like poetry and music, and one of the rulers most dedicated to being a total art boss was Emperor Schwan Sung, who started his rule in seven twelve a d. He was

born with the name Lee Longi. And this guy was the grandson of Empress woos E Tien before him, and she was a very intense and badass empress and the only woman to legitimately rule China in all of its history. And we are going to do an episode about her. Don't worry, She's got so much has been on the list for a long time. Yes, the end of her rules spoiler alert was in seven oh five, and it left a real vacuum for power and things got a

little rocky after that. So, after a few complicated years of classic royal familial politics, Lee Long, along with the help from his aunt Princess Taiping, helped put his father back on the throne as Emperor Rougeong in the year seven ten. But Long and Taiping were really the ones in charge here. The emperor didn't do anything without consulting them first. When his advisors came to discuss political affairs, his first question was always uh, did you ask Princess Tayping?

And if they said yes, he said, okay, did you ask Long? And then he would make his decision based on whatever they thought. Wow, So like the ultimate like not even ask your mother, but go ask your aunt and then go ask my son. Go ask your aunt and then ask your cousin. I love an emperor. That's clearly like, I don't want this, Yeah, I mean I like the chair and all the stuff, the job. He didn't really too, I mean, you know, didn't want to get too into the history. But this is his second

time being emperor. He was emperor before and got knocked out, came back. Is a lot going on back then, no wonder. He was kind of like, I thought, I was done with this whole thing, So why don't y'all do it? Yeah, Princess Taiping want to be in this position, so if she wants it, she can handle it. You go ask her, let her deal with it. So, with Long and Typing both being consulted on everything, naturally, the two of them

were locked into a power struggle as well. Yeah, Typing herself had been involved in like two cups already, so she was pretty good at getting clean. Yeah, you want a coup, Tai Ping, you needs, I got, I got revolutions, I got over throwing, I got it all. In fact, by the year seven eleven, she had accumulated so much power under Emperor Ruzong's rule that she had his administration cleaned out and just replaced everyone with chancellors that she liked.

But Lee Long had also been instrumental in putting his father on the throne, and he had already been named his heir, even though he wasn't Ruzong's eldest son. But like even the eldest son said, yeah, it shouldn't be me, it should be Lelong. Make it that guy. He said, I don't want it either. Dad's right. This job sucks, little bro. You know what you're doing. Why don't you take it? Get all these cou cou queens running around.

I don't want to be everybody's getting coued on. So this guy was in line for the throne, and Princess Tai Ping got the scheme in and dropping hints to the emperor that maybe leel Gee wasn't so trustworthy. He's like your son, he's scheming against you now. At this time, Lee Long had a wife named Princess Wong, but being a young fancy prince himself, he also had consorts and concubines galore, plenty of girlfriends, run around, side pieces, et cetera,

and a favorite of his, young Guipan, got pregnant. But Long was really worried that Princess Taiping, you know, wouldn't want him to have a bunch of sons, and that she might target his lover if she found out because Lee Long had two sons already with different consorts. She's like, that's too many sons. She's like, you got too many. Yeah, too many people could grab at this power. I'm not trying to hear that. It is so interesting. They like

they play such a long game. Um, you know, so someone can see, like, if you have a son today fifteen sixteen years from now, that's a powerful enemy of mine, right, And I gotta think sixteen twenty years ahead sometimes because that's how long some of their schemes take to play out. Crazy. So Lee Long is like, well, let me get ahead of it, and he starts to prepare a stew that

an ancient Chinese medicine was thought to terminate pregnancies. But he took a little nap while it was cooking, and he dreamt that a god came down and flipped the stewpot over, so he woke up. He told his close friend Jean Shwo about the whole situation and the dream, and Jean Shuo responded, quote, it is Heaven's will, you should not worry. So child was born. His name was Lisa Chung, and of course he grew up to really like Jang Shuo, who saved him from becoming a stew baby. Yeah.

I heard that story that you talked to my dad out of giving my mom this stew Thanks. But it's kind of sweet too, because I think that Lee long G at this point like really loved Yanguipan because he wasn't worried about him having another son. He was more worried about her safety rights. You want to give her that stew be like, if you're pregnant, you're in danger. No, I I see, I can see what he thought he was up to. Yeah, sure, but he turned out okay. Both Li Sa Chung and Young gay Pin they turned

out okay. She did not go for them. Okay, cool if you let them relax. But in late seven twelve, Princess Taiping started making moves. She went to the Imperial astrologers and she sort of strongly suggested that they go tell Emperor Ruzong, Hey, uh, you're a constellation in the sky is a little off. It sort of suggests that something about your leadership will change very soon. So they went and told him that Princess Taiping is thinking that the Emperor is going to hear this and think, oh shit,

my son is probably gonna try and overthrow me. I better cut him loose, because again, KU's all the time. I mean, his grandfather overthrew the emperor. He overthrew the emperors, so logical conclusion, my son will do same. Well. Emperor Ruzong was tired of that ship. He was so sick of cuse and he decided that instead of fighting it, why don't we just get ahead of it. He said, if my rule is about to change, let's not wait

for a coup to happen. I'll just go ahead and hand over the throne to my son now in an orderly transition. Then prophecy comes true. Bang bang boom, nothing bad happens, easy, beasy lemon, squeezy yeah, typing. Of course, it's super pissed. That's the opposite of what she wanted. She's like, no, don't do that, that's the last thing you want to do. Because she goes to her room and she's like, learned a lesson about cous today. Don't try to overthrow a guy who don't want the throne

in the place. Seriously, dear diary. One lessons about cous by princess typing by the expert herself. Expert herself. Well, the Emperor, of course insisted, no, I'm doing this. I don't care what you say, and he retired and he gave the empire to Long g who became Emperor Schwan Song. Well, obviously, within a year, Tai Ping is plotting a coup against Emperor Chuan Song. Girl can't help it, okay, she's like, this is what I do, all right, I may as well deny my own breath coming in and out. It's

cool to coup. She had that on her t shirt. So and for Schuan Song regularly took this like herbal viagral, so that he could keep up with the many many ladies that he was constantly entertaining. So Taiping was plotting to get one of his ladies in waiting to poison him with this tinctir. But word got out. People caught wind of the plant, and they advised him to act first. So long story short, he sent a bunch of soldiers out and caught or executed all Tai Ping's advisors and

chancellors that she had in her pocket. Princess Tai Ping fled to a temple in the mountains, but emperors one song ordered her to commit suicide. This was like a common alternative for aristocrats and high ranking officials because emperors didn't like ordering their execution. I guess it felt a little off, like, yeah, like the family is around it Thanksgiving and you're like take her out back and shooters. Kind of yeah. It was like you take yourself out back,

and you would do it. It's weird. They had the death penalty for commoners, but it was like ghosh for an emperor to order death, so it was like, just go kill yourself. Then I didn't do it. It's so weird. My hands are clean. It's very common and in at least in the history I read, every time someone was ordered to do it, they just did. I mean, you know, they're probably like, well, I'm gonna If I don't, they'll

just kill me anyway. So I've got my honor to keep, you know, I don't want to also be treason this and defy the emperor's order. Wid all right, I get I say, probably would send someone with the message like, hey, you've been ordered to commit suicide and we will stand here and do it well, because otherwise it feels like a really easy one to be like, Hey, well you dashed off a letter the Emperor that I am fully dead on no problem whatsoever, and I will just take

my ass to the next town. Here's a nice crisp twenty. Why don't you tell him that I cut my own bowels open. I'm about to go open a t shop somewhere something. My name is now Lucy, and I don't live anywhere near here. You've never heard of me before. But this is so interesting between the two of them.

I think there was so much tension between the Emperor and Princess Taiping, like that had obviously been there for a long time, and I think it was one of these situations where they were just waiting for the right opportunity, and I think Princess Taiping jumped the gun a little bit and the Emperor was able to go, got you, Now I can order your death. M She's like, wow,

charge it to the game now. With Princess Taiping gone, now emperiss when Song's rule was secure, World History dot Org says that due to his early policies in reforming laws and streamlining bureaucracy and providing for the people, Juan Song is one of China's greatest monarchs in history. His first twenty eight years were called the Cai Yuan period,

and it's considered among China's most prosperous and wealthy eras. First, he wiped out a bunch of unnecessary bureaucrats who had over the years all like basically bought their positions of power. And after that he made it nearly impossible to purchase political power anymore. Funny that that's important. Yeah, it's like you are all unnecessary. You just paid to be here.

He reminds me. I'm my high school football team because it was such a like I went to kind of a rich school and uh, and the football was like the most important thing. And there were kids who, you know, their parents made a little donation and they ended up on the team and for four years they didn't play. We had like forty people on the sidelines on our team to play, but it was on their college apps. You know, just about to say that's been for that

college application. It was crazy. I remember going to those games and sitting and being like, what are those fifty people for? And it was like, yeah, they're they're on the team, but they won't play so weird, So schwe Song kicks all these guys off the team. He revitalized the capital city's canal system, which had fallen into ruin under previous leaders, and he brought a lot of surrounding

areas under China's rule. He expanded the Tongue Empire to about four million square miles, which is nearly twice what it was. This is, of course, both diplomatic and a little militaristic action that ended up doing this naturally. Emptuan Song was not just a ladies man and a savvy ruler. He was also an outstanding calligrapher. He loved music and art.

He's a big horse guy. He owned a troop of dancing horses according to history dot com, and he brought a renowned horse painter named han On into his court, who would become the most famous horse painter in Chinese history. I mean, this guy parties. This is a pretty cool dude. Also, fun fact, there's a crater named for hang Gon on Mercury. Maybe it's shaped like a horse. Yeah, that would be kind of cool. Let's go check it out, Speculation Station.

It's shaped like a horse. Don't tell me any different. U Schwan Song was also an extreme poetry fan. You know how we feel about poetry around here, So he invited a poet named Lee Po into his academy. And Lepo writes beautiful, evocative, very visual poems. But he also writes a lot of verses about being drunk. And we've got to pepper this episode with some of these pickled poems.

So let's go down the poetry corner and here the mountain drinking song from Lee Po to drown the ancient sorrows, sweet dre hundred jugs of wine there in the beautiful night, we couldn't go to bed with the moon so bright. Then finally the wine overcame us, and we laid down on the empty mountain the earth for a pillow, and it's a blanket made of heaven. He's straight up like, I'm going to write a poem about how we passed out in the mountain last night. Without going into our tents.

We drank a jug of wine I doubt I've had that night we blacked out. I mean, we had a blanket made of heaven, and I don't remember what it felt like. Alright. So Schwanzong and his wife, remember who's now Empress Wong Um. They had a strong relationship for a few years. And while there's not a lot of information about her, we don't even know her given name, we only know her empress name um. It is said

that she was instrumental to his rule. She provided a lot of cow soul and suggestions that helped him in his early years. She even apparently played a part in helping Schwan Song's father take the throne before him, and she helped him deal with Princess Tai Ping. She's an not that coup action too, al right. It really feels like she probably should have written some of this ship down. She was pretty cool, lady. Empress s Wong never gave the Emperor a son, but she did raise his son,

Lisa Hung that he had with a different concert young weepen. Yeah, the stew baby, the stew baby, Yeah, he had the stew baby. She raised him, Yeah, and c Chung got a great education. Schuan Song really admired him. Now. There is a ranking system for consorts inside the palace that the Empress of course absolute top of the list, number one woman hbi C. As soon as Juan Sung was named emperor, he elevated his wife Princess up to empress

as well. Now under that there are four consort rankings Noble, Pure, virtuous, and then able. Under that there are nine imperial concubine rankings like Lady of bright deportment or Lady of cultivated beauty or complete countenance. And then there's a few more even below that, like the Lady of handsome fairness, for the Lady of Talents, or the Lady of Treasure, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Lots of titles. This is really reminding me of the

David Mammitt movie State and Maine. They're making a movie and the guys like, oh, I think I'm an associate producer. He's like, yeah, everybody's an associate producer. It's what you give your assistant instead of a raise. It feels like there's like, I don't know, make a bunch of titles to make him think that there's a good job. These are all I mean, it's just like a ranking system for all his girlfriends. Basically, Wow, imagine being the Lady of treasure it sounds big, but it's not the able

consort as ahead of me. But one of his favorite ladies was a woman named Choo, and she went from being a prostitute who could sing and dance to all the way become the second highest ranking consort in the palace, really climbed that ladder. And she was the one who had his earliest sons. Remember he had two already when Lisa Chung was born, and one of them, Lie Ying, was named Crown Prince and heir to the throne in seven fifteen. He was also not the oldest son there

was technically one. His other brother was one year older than him, but that guy had a serious injury and that was like took him out of the running basically, okay, So no one was worried about him coming out of nowhere. No Li Ying was firmly in that position, all right. So yeah, we've got a lot of players on the board here. Ember Schwan Song is married to Princess Wong or Empress Wong. Now together they're raising his son, Lisa Schung, this stew baby, and the Emperor's with Consort Joo is

Crown Prince Lee Ying. Everyone's getting along. Things are going great palace, Christmas is are lovely whatever. But another consort was about to rise to the top, and she was ready to bust heads and take what she wanted, take no prisoners. Her name was Consort Woo, and we'll learn about her right after these words. Welcome back everyone. Let's head back to leave Hoose Drunken Poetry corner with a verse called Drinking in the Mountains. Mountain flowers open in

our faces. You and I are triply lost in wine. I'm drunk, my friend Sleepy, rise and go with your dawn lute, return if you wish. And this one's great because he's like, I'm real drunk, all right, why don't you go and then get some music start the party over. I love it. I love it. I also love that the last poem was called the Mountain Drinking Song, and this one is called drinking in the Mountains. Like Lepo's like, right, what you know, I like two things. I like mountains

and drinking in the mountains. He's probably like, I like drinking any place, but I live in the mountains, so I also love this. It is mountain people like Appalachian mountain people like them. I'm drunk, my friends sleepy. Why don't you go and go come on back with a guitar and we'll have us a good old I'm ready for the Appalachian version of Leapo if anyone wants to mountain folks, They're so similar everywhere you go, love it whatever,

whatever the mountains, whichever mountain um. These Leapo poems about drinking are hilarious and wonderful. But he does have some beautiful poetry. To go look it up. Because I was reading them and I was like, damn, this is gorgeous, man. But then I kept finding other more and more poems about drinking, and I'm like, okay, buddy, well this is a sidetrack. But that's one of the things I love so much about Chinese and Japanese culture was that everybody

wrote poetry. It was just like a thing everyone did. And so you have so many people who are really very good poets who would write beautiful literature poems you know that you would want to like read for ages. And then there were some people were like, I wrote a high ku about sucking my wife behind a bar last night, you know, like it just like the most ridiculous. So oftentimes they were just for comedy. Reasons. There's just a form of entertainment and I just love that and

it would be so fun to bring it back. Make everybody write a quick poem about whatever they feel like, and lea po somehow did both, somehow some people can do. Get you a poet who can do both. That's what Schwan Song did. He was like, get this guy in my court. He is now poet laureate. Laugh, he makes me cry. That's what I want. Okay, So back to our drama are soap opera here, Embers one Song is ruling over a golden age of culture and art and poetry. He's doing it all with Empress Wang by his side.

His super smart son Si Chung is doing great, and his other son, crowned Prince li Ying, is a suitable heir to the throne. But another consort was working her way up the ranks. Consort Wou Embers one Song, now in his thirties and nearing his tenth year in power, was spending less and less time with his wife, Empress Wong, and more and more time with Consort Wu. Now none of his previous consorts had gained favor over his wife,

but now things were changing. Maybe this is because Emperor Schwan Song was just one of those guys who always wanted a younger, hotter, newer model. You know, he refused to be happy with the woman he married as she aged a real DiCaprio time. Or maybe it's because Consort Wou was the grand niece of Empress Wu Zetian herself,

and she was extremely ambitious and thirsty for power. Now, Schwansong had always favored his wife, even though he could literally bang anybody he wanted, like anybody could be like, I don't like it too bad. And while Wong hadn't provided him with a son, which he did resent, they raised she shung together as their own, and everyone in the palace loved Empress Wong, including most of the other consorts.

But Consort Woo had her eyes on that throne, right, And that's just what I'm thinking here, is like some people said that, like, well, Empress Wong was getting older and he was just you know, he wasn't like an her as much anymore. But I'm like, it's not like he was resigned to only sleep with her for the rest of his life and he didn't like that she wasn't as hot as she used to be, you know, like, it's not like he had any indication that he didn't like her a lot, because for a long time he

really did, and he had all these other options. So I kind of speculations station. I think Woo had more to do with it than than Wong's just aging it was suggested, but we'll see. I kind of agree, because isn't the point of the empress is you know you you don't want to be constantly changing your empress. You would choose her for different reasons. It would just be like the hottest one that does change. You want to be like, this is the smart one. She's you know,

got an even temper. She's not gonna coop me out of her with some other dude like that would be more important. I think qualities in an empress, Well, the Emperor and Consort Wo. I keep almost saying Constance Wu, well, I can't wait for Constance Woo to player and in our movie that we're going to make our ten season thank you. We have so many ten seasons shows of make That's why no one's called us. That's too long. Cut it down to five, all right. Well, the Emperor

and Consort Wu had several children together. Of course, as he and many of his concubines did. It's estimated he had over fifty children with various consorts, but the first three of their children actually died early in their childhood. But their fourth child was a son named Lie Mao or eventually his name was Lie Moo. They changed their names all the time, but let's just stick with that

for now. Um. Now, this kid, the Emperor asked his own brother, the Prince of Ning, to raise him, so he went off to live with the Prince of Ning and his wife, and all the while, Consort Wu is doing that thing where she just kind of tries to casually talk shit about Empress Wong without you know, actually being treasonous. You know, she's got to kind of carefully just poison the Emperor's ear a little bit. It's about his own wife gradually taking more and more of the

Emperor's time, trying to drive a wedge between them. You know, I imagine like a like, don't you wish your empress was hot like me? You wish your empress was a freak like me, because you know she probably was probably a freak. Yeah, I could totally see them like, I don't know, hanging out in bed together like consort. Woo, your hair is so beautifully long and flowy like a waterfall, O Emperor, anything you like must be correct, So I'm so happy to please you. If only the Empress had

such long, thick hair is mine. It's just too bad. But I suppose she has many other wonderful quality. You know, it's always the ship like some like you're too good at that? Watch out right? You want to consort? My husband? Try it? I dare you try it? Ladies all come, want to give Diana an opportunity to try and scheme against you. I've opened a terrible Pandora's no, Diana, I'm only sleeping with these five other women so that you can try and scheme against them, testing your skills. I

just want to see your skill. Well, Wong was not having it. She's hearing all these jellyfish stings coming from this bitch. She's like, mmm, I've done nothing but help this emperor. I helped put his dad in power. I helped put him in power, I helped him make the make him the great ruler that he is today. I'm raising his son by another woman. What more I got to that's true? So she starts telling him about himself.

She's like, hey, don't forget, I'm your wife. That bitch sucks a little less subtle than well, she don't have no treason. She can be a little more flat about it. But maybe she should have been a little more subtle because he argued about it with the Empress. Um, so this just pushed them further apart. She should have been like, oh, don't I smell nice today? Oh? Yes, you smell quite lovely. Oh it's too bad consort who stinks like rotten fish

all the time. Now, before long, Schwan Song was looking for a way to depose his Empress, and he was mostly blaming it on her failure to produce him a son, which again is weird to me because he already had like all these sons, and one of them was already the crown Prince. I mean, it's just convenient, exactly. I really think this is more of Consort Wou pushing him to get rid of her somehow, and he was, you know,

he's kind of fed up there, like fighting. They're an old married couple, and he's like, yeah, this hot young girl is right, yeah, you know, old like us. So the Emperor went to a close associate of his name Young Choo, and he said, hey, man, uh, I kind of want to depose my wife, you know, get her out of power, strip her of her empress titles. She's really she's just kind of cramping my style, okay, And Jung Jao is like, yes, I'm on it, let me

go figure some stuff out. But apparently this dude had loose lips, because a short while later, Empress Wang's own brother in law came to Empresschwan Song and said, uh, hey, this guy Jung Joo is talking about deposing your wife and the emperor. You know, he thinks fast. And he's like, whoa what that's crazy. I can't believe he would say that. And everyone's like, yeah, this guy sucks. You need to

exile him. And Schwan Song is like, yeah, well you're right about hey, Jung Jao, you can't be talking ship like that. I'm exiling you forever. Get out of here by. But all this made Empress Wang feel real nervous because she's always looking over her shoulder. She knows moves are being made against her. She's the O. If she could only have a son, her safety would be assured. So she went to her brother Wong show Ye for help. Show He's like, okay, I got a great idea. How

about magic? So he went to a Buddhist monk named ming Wu and they started doing some old school mystical ship. They offered sacrifices to the Big Dipper and a Chinese constellation called nand then they brought the Empress an amulet which was made from wood that had been struck by lightning. And I carved the symbols for heaven and Earth into the amulet alongside the Emperor's name, and we're like, okay, this is how you get a son. Just wear this amulet.

I would love an amulet native wood that's been struck by lightning. I mean, at least there's vibes there. That's something cool and hard to find and kind of awesome. I can see that being statistically feels very unlikely to get struck by lightning. Again. True, it might be like a nice talisman against a disaster. With my luck, I would put that on and immediately get struck by lightning. And they'd be like, well, exception proves the rule. There was actually a lightning rod in the annual Oh geez,

very rude. Well, Okay, so this little magic spell they cooked up was not exactly cool behavior because it sort of looked like trying to use magic to circumvent the will of the gods. Like if she wasn't naturally having a son, it wasn't meant to be, and now they're

trying to use magic to undo that. There's not a ton of clear reasoning behind this in the research, but whatever happened, this little magic stunt must have been enough for Emperor's one Song to use against his wife, because once word of this magic got out, her brother's show Yee was immediately exiled and Empress Wong was deposed. She was brought down to the rank of commoner and sent

to live in a lesser palace. On his way to exile, her brother, show Ye received the order to commit suicide, and then only three after Wang was deposed, inn she died. And we don't really know how, but it said that the emperor always regretted his actions. He felt bad about deposing her and exiling her to this little palace somewhere. He was like, actually was kind of a good ruler when Wong was here. Yeah, fell badly about what I did, right,

So I'm thinking speculation Station. Maybe he expressed that he felt badly. Maybe he was talking about how this seemed like a bad idea, and Consort Woo decided, well, I'm gonna go take this lady off the board for good. Ohring her, you can bring her back. I mean, it's happened before. We've seen in other kingdoms where I remember in Thailand. I mean this was much more recent. But that guy like kicked his wife out and then brought her back and the reinstated her. Stuff like it could happen.

So again, speculation Station, Consort Wou killed that woman with that personally fetched and definitely true. She sent someone one of her little minions. Well, I think that's probably more. She didn't do it herself, but I think I think you're right. She probably ordered someone to do it. Yeah. I want that the Empress to know it was me. Tell her, well, whatever happened, Concert, we definitely did it. But whatever happened, Consort Woo now had the Emperor's full attention.

There was no woman more powerful than her at the palace. She was elevated to the rank of Huife, which was the highest ranking consort only beneath the title of Empress, to Woo. All that meant was that she had one more stare to climb, And we'll hear about a whole new batch of schemes that she cooked up right after this. Welcome back to the Tongue Dynasty, where Consort Woo is

making dangerous moves to bring herself into power. So before things get too dark, let's go down to poetry corner and hear another drunken verse by Lee po called a vindication. If Heaven loved not the wine, a wine star would not be in Heaven. If Earth loved not the wine, the wine spring would not be on the earth. Since Heaven and Earth love the wine, need a tippling mortal be ashamed. The transparent wine, I hear has the soothing virtue of a sage, while the churchid is rich, they say,

has the fertile mind of the wise. Both the sage and the wise were drinkers. Why seek for peers among the gods and goblins? Three cups opened the grand door to bliss. Take a jugful. The universe is yours. Such is the rapture of the wine that the sober shall never inherit. I love this straight up, like it is so cool to get drunk, that sober people ain't ever even gonna know. Sober people have not the key to heaven. I do, and it's right at the bottom of this bottle.

Didn't Benjamin Franklin say, alcoholist proof that that gods love us and want us to be happy? That sounds like this is what I mean. This is a whole other topic we could go on and on about, but so fascinating to me that every culture, all across this globe, independently of each other, found out if you let this grape just go bad, it looks you up in the best way. That is something that is so universal. Literally

with human beings. We want to get wasted, Yes, we want anything, but our standard reality took one look around and we're like, na, this is no. Let's try something else. I don't like it all right. Well back to the story now, concert Wou was so close to being named empress she could almost taste all her rivals have been taken out. She had the emperor's favor, and in the year seven, Schwan Song decided he wanted to elevate her

to the rank of empress. All her dreams were coming true, but his officials were like, wait a minute, hold on their partner not so fast, because remember, Consort Woo is the grand niece of the Empress Wo Zetian, and Wu Zetian tried to eliminate the entire Tongue dynasty and rename it for herself before she was overthrown, so her family still have a lot of beef with the imperial throne.

So his chancellors were like, guess what. The people of China don't like the Woo's and more specifically, they don't like Consort Wu. She sucks. Everyone knows it, everyone but you, I guess. So this is really not a smart move. You know those people where it's just like you know, someone's dating someone and everyone in your friend group hates this person, but they just they just can't break them up, and you know you could. SE's so clear that they're

like manipulating them and using them to get what they want. God, it's hard. It's so hard because then you do so often they will break up and you get to say all your true feelings and then they don't, and you're like, well, I supposed to do. Don't let me make a speech at your wedding. I get now. His advisors also pointed out the obvious political struggle that would come with naming her empress, because the Emperor had two sons with Consort Wu, but he had already named his son lie Ying the

crown prince and heir to the throne. If Consort Wu was named empress, things we're gonna get messy around the line of succession. She's gonna want her son to be emperor next, and then it's gonna put you boy, lie Ying in danger. So the Emperor heard all this, He's like, all right, you right, you right, you right, Okay, bad move, no doubt, won't name her empress, but everybody listen here and listen good, y'all are basically going to treat her

like an empress. Okay, everybody in this palace. She is your empress in all but name. Okay, she is number one, she's HBI c's you wait on her hand and foot, and you do what she says. That's right. But obviously, Concert Wou was not thrilled about this little compromise because she's been working towards that empress title for a while. I kind of get it. Nobody wants to be like, you're the CEO of Disney and name only Yeah, I

would take it. I would be the CEO of Disney in name only about all that name and salary maybe, but you know they're gonna do some ship and then let you like usher you in front of everybody to be stone. Yeah, but I still got that like billion dollars a year. Right, that's true. And maybe you get to go to the parks for free. Thought about that.

Wait a minute, CEO Disney has to get free park admission, right, What if Bob Chappick right now is like three hundred dollars all right, Now he's got a pet, and now he's got a problem with it. So Consort who was not super happy about this, but she's adaptable. She knew she didn't need the title to get everything she ever wanted. So her mother was made a lady, her brothers were given official positions at court, and her sons and daughters

were made princes and princesses. And Schwan Song's chancellors were right. What she really wanted was to make her son lie Mao the new crown Prince and heir to the imperial throne. But she needed a little more help to get him there. And that brings us to this week's villain of the week, Lee Lynn Foo, Oh, Lee Lynn Fou, This squirrely little creep. He had risen the ranks in court through good connections and pure luck and not the scheming and wheeling and dealing.

His uncle was Jiang Jiao, if you remember, he was the Emperor's friend who took the blame for trying to depose Empress Wang the first time. Now, Lynn Fu was nicknamed God New, which I looked at translations and as far as I can tell, it means like a knee or a knee like bend. So maybe this guy was like crooked. He was always bent over, or maybe he was like always kneeling down to get what he wanted, and maybe he was always on his knees to get what he wanted. And what I'm saying, you know what

I'm saying, Oh my good. They called him can New, and it doesn't seem like it was um a kind nickname. They sort of used it disparagingly, but he also owned it, like the penguin in Gotham. But crooked makes a lot of sense. Yeah, I think crooked. I had a history professor, by the way, who I loved because actually he would call Lee Po this whenever he had an alcoholic historical figure, he would go, he's a bit of an elbow crooker.

Oh that's good. I always liked that. Yeah, I know it's not really related, but well, this guy lind Fu nicknamed Canu, he applied to a low level position at the Ministry of Justice called the simin long Gen, but the Chancellor at the time said, quote, people who are to serve as long must have good talent and virtues. Is no long He ain't got no talent or virtues. Flynn Foo's like, am I at my roast right now? Interview? All the high ups are roasting him. But he also

had connections. Somebody must have been pulling some strings for him, because just a few days after the Chancellor said that, lind Fu got that position anyway. Okay, So with friends in all the right places, Linfu worked his way up the ranks until he was working under the staff of lie Ying himself the crown Prince and heir to the throne. So he's already trying to get as close to power as possible, and he could smell it when other people were doing the same. So after Empress Wong was deposed

and consort who started making moves. He wanted in on the action. This guy's like an ancient Chinese Veris from Game of Thrones. He had a bunch of eunuchs around the ballast bringing him all the whispers they heard his little sparrows, so he used them to get a message to Consort Woo like he I worked for leaguing, great guy and everything, but something is just kind of telling me little gut instinct that Li Mao would be such

a great emperor. So if you would be interested, check yes or no and return messengers sent the un back to me in the Unich back with he stamps a big yes on the Unix head. It's like, oh, brands it into for Unix. But man, it is like game with her, like all these that's what the power is, you know. It's how often do we see this? Again? A lot of TV shows that we watch now where the servants you know, have all the info, they know the dirt. Hell, yeah, get on their side, you get

what you need. It's very true, very true. That's still true honestly. I mean, if you think about being a server or something like how often you go to like a fancy party at a hotel or whatever. If you know, the server or the maitre d you know, like whoever is in charge, you can get back wherever you need to go. I don't thank you where you need to go. You were working a catering gig and you came back and you said, hey, I just guess what I heard

Chap X out Bob Iger's coming back. And I was like, damn, you heard that. I heard the call. Well, concert Wo now had a really good player in her pocket in Linfu, and she started advising him him on who he should support that could later help him out. So he would like, go recommend some minister to be appointed that she gave him my heads up on, and then later that person would remember him and say, oh, yeah, you you spoke up for me when it came down to my nomination.

Maybe I owe you a little favor. The world is built on little favor. Oh exactly. It was a long game, but by the mid seven thirties, lin Fu is close enough to Emperor jue Song that he was able to just flatter the guy constantly. Oh Emperor, oh, you smell so nice today. That was a very good decision. Emperor, Oh, I love the way you wear your shoes. Whatever, it took. Blattery will get you everywhere, especially with one's song, and between this and Consort Wose influence, Lin Fu became one

of the emperor's favored advisers. Now it was all about convincing him to switch his airs. And then in year seven thirty six, the perfect situation arose. Lie Ying met up with two of his brothers, Lee Yao and Lee Jew, who were both princes born of two different consorts. Together they started talking shit about how their mothers, who were all at different times favored consorts of the Emperor, had

all lost favor to this consort Wou. Lady. You know, basically they're like man Dad's new girlfriend sucks, like pretty harmless stuff. But this guy Young Hi, who was a male consort for one of Consort Wo's princess daughters and a total wet blindness, overheard them and he goes running too. Consert Woo telling her all about it, she probably had to hide the biggest smile of her life. She's like, finally my time has gone. She called Lie Ying to

come before her and the Emperor. As soon as Ying walked in, she burst into tears and starts yelling at him like all dramatic, like, you know, it's one thing to insult me. I'm used to it, But in doing so, you've defamed your father, the emperor. I just don't know how we could move forward from this actual age. Oh wow, you are too good at this. In another time it plays, I might have been a consort, you could have really

been the power behind the throne. Doubtful. I feel like I'd be one of those consorts who's like, I'm just gonna like hang out and clean things or whatever. You'll enjoy. It depends if you got bored enough for not because like you know, I don't think you've I don't think you would have felt like getting up and doing all the work, but not that you're not a hard worker. But it would have been worth it. You know. It's a lot of responsibility, although you do like taking on

more responsibility than you actually like. That is true, And honestly, if it was if I was like, if I could convince myself for my son, this is for my son, could have China, Like, I probably would do a bunch of crazy ship if it's just for me, I would not bother. That's true. You do not take care of yourself. If I thought it was like a bigger picture situation, I could probably do all kinds of weird shit. Well, okay,

so Empress one Song is super mad about this. You know, his son, the crowned Prince, the future of the Empire, is out here talking shit about consort, who is supposed to be basically be the empress at this point, and he considered deposing lee Ying, stripping him of that title consort. Woo. Of course she's just like drooling all over herself at this point, like, yes, this is it. I can wait, We're almost there. I mean, if you think that's the best,

of course you should. I hate that it's come to that, damn. So he's like he's like about to sign the paper. But his senior chancellor, Jong Xu Ling said, hey, man, look, I'm going back through the history books here, and every time a crown prince gets replaced, the empire ended up taking a serious hit. It's not a good move. We're always like, we're losing states. There's a lot of people fighting. It gets ugly. It's a bad idea. So I think

we should stick with what we got. So John managed to keep le Ying in the line of succession, which, of course meant that leland Fou had to get rid of John oh Man, he put himself on the crossfire. Oh my god. And within a year and through some very complicated schemer that I swear to you could play out as an entire season art on this show we're talking about. Look into this history between leland Fu and and Jong Ju Lin because it's wild, it's so schemy,

it's such good soap opera drama stuff. Um. But at the end of it, leland Fu managed to accuse Jong of factionalism, and the emperor demoted him. And this moment mint him demoting Jong is believed to be the beginning of the downfall of shuan Song's reign, crumbling from its once golden age. Historians Seema Guang wrote quote, after Jong Ju Ling was demoted, officials were all concerned about keeping their positions, and honest words no longer had a place

in government. And we've seen what happens when honest words no longer have a place in government. Let this be a cautionary tale, but it won't because it already happens. They learned anything just keeps happening. Honestly, I don't think it's ever stopped happening. It's been happening since the dawn of time. True, very true, but this got particularly ugly at this point. Just couldn't trust anybody anymore. Well, Woo and lyn Fu had everything in place, and in seven

thirty seven they made their big move. Wu sent a message to Lie Ying and his the same two brothers who were talking about her before, and said, quote, there are bandits in the palace, please report at once in full armor. So all three men stowed it up. They charged into the palace, hundreds of warriors behind them, riddy to fight. And guess what concert. Wu went straight to the emperor like, oh my god, your three crazy sons

are back. They're trying to do what treason? And he asks his unix, who are like yeah, they they're definitely here there in full armors, swinging their swords around. So young we the same wet blanket who rat it on them for talking shit about concert will last year's Like wow, formal accusation of treason against those three. So schwant Song heard all this and he ordered the royal guards to

disarm the three princes and their armies. And the three princes are getting you know, just rammed into the corner. All their swords are getting taken away, and they're shouting like, no, you're we're being wronged. Let me speak to my father, Let me speak to my father. But Woo's allies kept

them silenced. Chuan's on consulted with his chancellors. But of course, guess who was the most powerful dude in court right now, Lee Lynn Fu Well Lin Fu turns the Emperor, who's facing this very difficult decision about what to do, and he said, quote, this is your Imperial Majesty's family matter. We will not interfere, oh, which is so tricky because he's basically saying, like, hey, Emperor, if your family matters to you more than the empire, I am not going

to get involved. Like you totally make that decision for yourself if you want to favor them over you know, this whole treason accusation that's on you. So he's basically making it so he has to do something about it. It's so gross. He's such a like grima worm tongue, like that little finger. Yeah, like I just whispering things to the king and making him do shit. And so without speaking King to the princes, he deposed all three stripped them of their powers and ordered their deaths by suicide. No,

not all three of his sons. Sad I'm a little maddish one song. It feels like he's kind of got his head up his ass to the end of his reign here. They've really later part of his reign here. There's definitely like you can't not blame him for making all these terrible decisions that he made, but he is also like being so hardcore manipulated right now. But he's fallen for it too. I mean, there's there's an element

of it that's like willingly that that is. I guess that's where I get a little mad, because I'm like, surely it isn't that part of being a king, queen, emperor, president, whatever. People are going to try to manipulate you to their own ends, and you need to have a strong enough sense of yourself and whatever that you can not play into their hands. But you know, as you say that he's got all these people run around, he probably does that know half of anything that's going on, right, and

they're so good at it. It's one of those things too where it's like, well, yeah, he could go out and protect his son, but after everyone has said all the things they said. Does that not look like he's ignoring his advisors and just doing, you know, treating putting his family first, which an emperor can't do. There's some I don't want to get too spoiler early, but it reminds me of some of the stuff in towards the end of House of the Dragon in the first season.

Not to just bring it back the Game of Thrones again, but but similar kind of stuff where you know, she had a decision to make and once someone said, hey, let me do it. Uh, you know, she couldn't say no because then it looked like she was protecting her family and not being a strong ruler. So even though it was definitely the wrong decision, she wasn't really able to make the right one without looking bad. I think there's some of that in there too, but he's definitely

is not blameless in this well. Unfortunately, due to his stupid decisions, the Crown Prince is now dead, so of worse, Immediately, Consort Woo and Leland Foo start dropping hints that her son Lee Mao should probably go ahead and be the crowned Prince. I mean, he's standing right here, why not? But Schwan Song was pretty depressed by all this, which why not three of his sons are dead his favorite

wife died years ago. Like he's making the bad choices, so he didn't rush into any decisions about his air. Over the next few months, it said that Consort Woo was haunted by visions of the three princes, and later that year, only in her forties, she became inexplicably ill. In December she passed away, and many say she died of fright. Wow, she got that ghost sickness. She had a dream where they were like, oh, one to three Princess Aura before you, and then she had a second

their head. Every day after that, she's like, just kill me now. Oh no, I'll never get three princes out of my head. Well this was a real kick in the pants to all Lynn Fu, because without consort who's backing, his machinations became more obvious and he started to fall for the emperor's favor. Chuan Song posthumously honored Consort Wou by naming her Empress jen Shun, which means the virtuous

and serene Empress. That is hilarious. He says that in someone at court is like I feel like he turned to them and he's like, what would be the funniest possible thing we could name? This is part of it too, because I'm like, it's almost a bigger diss that he named her empress after she died. I mean, it wasn't because back then, like this was definitely an honor to have your family, you know, you have your name in

the books forever. I mean her Wikipedia page now is under the name Empress jen Shun not not Constance woos so Um. But but still it does feel like kind of a dig, like, Okay, now I'll make you empress now that you did, and I'll call you virtuous and serene,

right sarcasm, It's a backslash s stream sarcasm. But even though he named her empress, he was pretty sore about everything that went down with his sons, and he refused to put any official state mourning periods in place for her death, and everyone was like, do you we didn't want to mourn her. Yeah, So I mean speculation station. Again, it feels like this is kind of a this is kind of a dig, like he was not really honoring her. He was kind of acknowledging that he was piste off

how she treated him. When Lee maw her son was once again suggested as the heir to the throne, the emperor said, you know what, no, I'm not doing it. Put my foot down. I know who my heir is. It's my boy Lee Sash, the stew baby who was raised by me and Empress Wang. He's real smart, he's real savvy. I like him. I'm making him a crown

prince and heir to the throne. And he was crowned in seven Nice there you go, say, hold out true and the best decision that has made in many years many It sort of makes me feel like Empress Wog was even more instrumental than people say, because after she died, he immediately was like kind of doing some dumb ship. It's like clearly she was there being like babe, what no, let's do this insteady. Now, after he crowned Saschung Juan

Song really started to slip. It said that he brought tens of thousands of beautiful women into his palace to please him, and many of them were never allowed to leave. Pretty creepy. But then he met young Guife who would capture his heart for the rest of his life. But that distracted him from his duties and left a power vacuum that our friend Leland Fou was all too happy to that guy. That all ended in tragedy and was documented in a poem called a Song of Everlasting Sorrow,

and we will hear all about that in our next episode. God, there's so much more, isn't that what you wanted to start with the song of Everlasting Sorry? Yeah, I found the Song of Everlasting Sorrow and was like, oh, here's a cool story. And then I found all this this concert Woo and Prince and Empress Wong and all this stuff. Is there's so much leading up to it that it had to be a prequel episode, basically when you did Calico Jack and you found out that whole thing about

oh his parents, parents and their spoons situation. I love when one story leads to another, like yeah, it's so great, and this one is like, it's the same guy but everyone else while Leland Fu is coming back, of course to I guess he's the villain of the week um and he will be back to cause a lot of trouble. And it's just so interesting to see that period. Like

we said, when Leland Food got jung Uh demoted. I mean, there are many places where things started to go downhill, but that was really the lynch pin where it just it was never coming back after that, and the Talent

dynasty never really uh ascended to its heights again. Well, and you see it, like they said, he got rid of all the people who would just paying to be there for for power and position, and things were going great because you actually had people who knew what they were doing, wanted the same things as you, like all that sort of thing, wanted what was best. And then the minute you turn it over to people who were just looking out for themselves, that's when everything starts crumbling.

It's like one of the easiest things to see and one of the hardest things to do. I guess if power is to be like I know exactly how it should go, and people are hard, people are hard, and there's always somebody scheming for power, and sometimes those people are really good at it. Because if you can read people, if you can know how to talk to them and tell them what they want to hear, and if you know how to make promises that you don't necessarily have to deliver on, you get a lot done. Some call

it lying um the names should be Liland Food. Take that just from centuries later. He's like, but you're still saying my name r Q, bitch. I guess we are. Yeah. Yeah, what if what today right now, in this room, in our lives would be different if Leland Food didn't sucks so bad, you know, or if concert we would never come along, or if he gave the stew to that

to his consort and Lisa Shung wasn't born. I love those little things, and I mean I don't love them, but I'm fascinated by those parts of history where like this one, dude, I mean, it really shows you one person can make such a difference, because you know, China might be a completely different country today, which of course would mean the world is a completely different place today had this one little dick not come in to screw things up for everyone, little dick. I love this stuff

and I can't wait for the next episode. Chinese history is so rich, oh my god, with this kind of stuff, because of course it goes on, it goes back so long, but and it's so meticulously recorded. But like you said, so much soap oppera Shenanigan's happening. It's just like insane.

It's true of so many royal families. And then what's interesting is like when you we've seen this on this show, when you get down into just like a regular as person's household, some of this stuff is just as dramatic on such a smaller scale, but it's just as rich and interesting. But there is something about it when it's in these palaces with all these you know, the consequences. The states are so high when you're literally talking about a world power and and two people like trying to

undermine each other for it. Right, concert WU is out here like this is for me and everyone else is like no bit changes everything for everyone? Right. I love it. We hope you loved it too. You'll have to let us know. Please do reach out. Our email addresses ridic Romance at gmail dot com. That's right, or you can find us on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at Oh Great, it's Eli, I'm at Danamite Boom, and the show is at dict Romance. Follow along. We love hearing from y'all.

Whatever you got to say, send it our way. Throw us a rating on Apple podcast. It really helps people discover us and start listening. And I guess until next time, We'll see you the next one. Love you so long. Friends, it's time to go. Thanks so listening to our show. Tell your friends, neighbor's uncles, and dance to listen to a show ridiculous Well dance m hm