Power and Politics in Tenth-Century China: The Former Shu Regime ...

first unified Chinese empire, Qin (221–206 BCE), presents the first example of this strategy. Relying on Shu’s wealth, human capital, and crucial location, the Qin subjugated the Chu state to its southeast and ultimately achieved the great unification of China in 221 BCE.¹² The same military strategy was also followed by its successor, the Han (206 BCE–220 CE). In his competition with the other hegemons, Gaozu (r. 206–194 BCE), the founding emperor of Han, took Shu as his base, from which he conducted an expedition against his enemies with the aid of Shu supplies and manpower, and finally unified the country.¹³ About five centuries later, in 279, the Western Jin (265–316) launched a military expedition from Shu and achieved a reunification after almost a century of division. Another short-lived, yet historically important, dynasty in Chinese history, the Sui (581–618), showed the same interest in Shu. One year before the founding of Sui, Yang Jian (r. 581–605) sent a force to seize the passes along the Shudao so that the entire Shu region could later be occupied easily. In the year 589, with the aid of a navy trained in eastern Shu, the Sui conquered the last southern regime and reunified China after three centuries of division under the Southern and Northern Dynasties.¹⁴

The second distinct characteristic of Shu is its strong separatist tendency. The incorporation of the Shu area into China proper during the Qin–Han period did not discourage its tendency toward separatism, in part a result of its geographic isolation from the heartland of China and its self-sufficient economy. The Shu people were historically known for their “inclination to revolt due to formidable topography” (shi xian hao luan ).¹⁵ An old saying has it that “Shu always precedes other regions in causing tumult and is the last in the world to accept imperial governance” (, ).¹⁶ As a rule, once rebels sealed the Shudao from the inside, the region would soon become an independent state not easily pacified by the central government, especially in the context of political disorders in the heartland. This independent spirit has continued into the modern period and even influenced policies of the People’s Republic of China in the twentieth century.¹⁷ Indeed, from the beginning of the Qin annexation, the history of Shu can be read as a continuous series of conflicts between the indwelling forces