With the onset of the An Lushan Rebellion in 755, the outward expansion of the Tang came to a sudden stop. Yet the stubborn Steppe heritage of succession struggles did not go right out of the political arena with our last Turco-Xianbei monarch, though its fundamental aspects underwent a sea change.
The key transformation was that the court eunuchs replaced the regular imperial guards in deciding the outcome of the succession struggle,65 a natural development with the end of the glories of the expansion wars. The new power brokers would continue this role until almost the very end of the Tang. Fletcher's term “surrogate nomads” would now do full justice to them. Not by accident, the coming of eunuchal power at the Tang court closely resembled, for example, a similar development in the declining years of the Safavid dynasty of Iran, after the latter's practice of appointing the royal princes to provincial governorship (also an early Tang policy) was replaced by their confinement to the harem (similar measures were adopted by the Tang too, as discussed earlier) in order to avoid succession contentions.66 With the control of imperial guards gradually falling into the hands of the court eunuchs and the guard ranks filled mostly with rich playboys from the capital (ZZTJ 254.8237), the political drama was now played out within the walls of the inner palace. The strategic importance of the Xuanwu Gate, together with the prestige of the many guard units, was soon lost. For example, a late Tang source67 has an eyewitness report on the deplorable condition during the Yuanhe era (806–20) of an originally prestigious imperial guard office. However, these new changes are mostly beyond the scope of this book.
The Process of Sinicization
The case of Prince Chengqian had many historical precedents and parallels. In addition to Tuoba Xun, the Northern Wei heir apparent, two other prominent cases were that of the Sui heir apparent Yang Yong and Taizong's elder brother Crown Prince Jiancheng, Chengqian's uncle. Careful study of these cases reveals an interesting pattern of succession struggles during the era: the “bandwagon” of sinicization and the patronage of classical Chinese scholarship or other authentic Chinese literature and arts as a most effective tool in such contentions, when the regime was hard-pressed for political legitimacy to rule the entire Central Kingdom.
In the case of Emperor Yangdi of the Sui, we see his marriage at a young age to a daughter of a prominent southern royal family (in fact the daughter of a puppet Later Liang emperor); his patronage of the Southern Buddhist temples; his love of almost everything connected to the south, which before the final unification was seen even by many in the north as the site of the “legitimate” Chinese regime; and, last but not least, his status as an extraordinarily talented man of Chinese literacy68—all of this certainly had figured in his successful contention for the throne against his elder brother and the Confucian dizhang rule of succession.
Li Shimin's bid for the throne is a very old and thoroughly studied topic. Many factors for his triumph over his elder brother have been proposed: his unmatched military deeds in solidifying the dynasty, his command of a large group of talented followers, his ability to control the crucial Xuanwu Gate, his preemptive strike, and so on.69 But the issue of sinicization has not attracted enough attention in the context of his eventual command of political legitimacy and its role in the defeat of his brothers. In fact, Li Shimin set up an “academy” in his official residence to patronize classical literature and scholarship as early as 621, while the regime was not yet solidified (ZZTJ 189.5931-32). One has to admit that Li Shimin had remarkable political foresight and long-term planning in the struggle for succession.
The situation is perhaps best enlightened by the aforementioned quote of Emperor Gaozu when Li Shimin began to show his independence. It not only indicated the Li clan's ethnic self-identity as discussed earlier but also the notion that Li Shimin's political aspirations were prompted partly by his sinicization—being “taught by educated Hàn.”
The case of Prince Chengqian can be studied then in the same context. The hapless Prince was known to have frequently “ignored his learning,” whereas his main rival Li Tai was a diligent student and, following in the footsteps of his father, set up a literary “academy” to patronize classical scholarship; his courtyard was then “as crowded as a marketplace.” In the spring of 642, he even presented the court with a major work authored under his sponsorship (ZZTJ 195.6150, 196.6174). On the other hand, his reported love of hunting and war games aside, there were two interesting episodes indicative of his attitude toward the most important national affair in the Central Kingdom—agriculture. First, he was accused of having “interrupted farming” (ZZTJ 196.6168). Second, he was credited with saving the life of an attendant of the imperial manor from Emperor Taizong's order of execution (Tang huiyao 4.44). The incident demonstrated Chengqian's quality of decency, something the official history was reluctant to show. The attendant's alleged offense was, interestingly, that he had been ignoring the maintenance of the garden. It should also be noted that, judging by his surname Mu, this hapless attendant was undoubtedly of Xianbei descent.70
Proceeding from the cases I have reviewed here, a general rule in the succession struggle can be summarized as follows. The elder sons, Prince Yong, Prince Jiancheng, and Prince Chengqian (and the Tuoba Prince Xun in some sense), tended to be upstaged by their more “cultured” and more “sinicized” younger brothers, Emperor Yangdi, Emperor Taizong, and Prince Tai respectively.
One may find interesting parallels elsewhere. For instance, there were several cases of elder and more militaristic sons being passed over for succession in the Turco-Iranian realm, which has puzzled early Muslim and later authors.71 Bosworth has suggested they be a reminiscence of the Steppe custom of ultimogeniture. However, as many Mongologists have pointed out, the Mongol practice of ochigin, a term with a Turkic origin, regarding the inheritance of property might not necessarily apply to political power (khanship). In the Särbo-Chinese connection, the cultural aspect of these cases would also seem an interesting topic. One notes that, among the Ghaznavids for example, in contrast to the militarist elder brother Mas'ud, the younger brother Muhammad's tastes “were predominately literary and studious.”72
The paradox back in the Central Kingdom is that what these more sinicized younger sons had to overcome was the very Chinese primogeniture succession principle. Among other things, it created an acute dilemma for Hàn ministers and officials in taking sides. The famous courtier Wei Zheng is a good example. This deep self-conflict could be observed throughout Wei's life, on which most biographies, including Howard Wechsler's fine study, fail to elaborate. Wei Zheng was noted for his loyalty to Emperor Gaozu's original heir apparent, Prince Jiancheng. As shown by an interesting episode in Jiu Tang shu (71.2559), he was still quite unwavering on the dizhang primogeniture succession rule after many years of service under Emperor Taizong, whose ascension to the throne represented a breach of this very principle.
This politico-cultural aspect of Turco-Mongol conquest regimes, namely enhancing their legitimacy by patronizing