King Xuan of Zhou

King of the Zhou dynasty (d. 782 BC)

King Xuan of Zhou, personal name Ji Jing, was king of the Chinese Zhou dynasty; his reign has been reconstructed to be 827/25 – 782 BC.^[1] He worked to restore royal authority after the Gonghe Regency. He fought the "Western Barbarians" (probably Xianyun) and another group on the Huai River to the southeast. In the ninth year of his reign, he called a meeting of all the lords. Later he intervened militarily in succession struggles in the states of Lu, Wey and Qi. Sima Qian said "from this time on, the many lords mostly rebelled against royal commands."^[1] According to Zhang Shoujie's annotation Correct Meanings (史記正義) to Sima's Shiji,^[2] King Xuan is said to have killed the innocent Du Bo and according to tradition was himself killed by an arrow fired by Du Bo's ghost.^[3] His son King You would the last king of the Western Zhou.

The Stone Drums of Qin were long mistakenly ascribed to King Xuan.^[4]

Family

• Queen Xian of Zhou, of the Lü lineage of the Jiang clan of Qi (週獻後 姜姓 呂氏), known as Queen Jiang; a daughter of Duke Wu of Qi; married in 826 BC; the mother of Crown Prince Gongsheng
• Lady Hou
• Nü Jiu (女鳩)
• Crown Prince Gongsheng (太子宮涅; d. 771 BC), ruled as King You of Zhou (r. 781–771 BC)
• Prince Yuchen (王子餘臣; d. 750 BC), claimed the throne as King Xie of Zhou (r. 770–750 BC)
• Prince Changfu (王子長父), ruled as the Marquis of Yang

Ancestry

See also

• Family tree of Chinese monarchs (ancient)
• Song gui - a ritual bronze attributing his appointment of an official.

Notes

1. Alternatively 姬靜.

References

Citations

1. Shaughnessy (1999), p. 347.
2. Volume 4 quote: ｢周春秋云宣王殺杜伯｣
3. Ivanhoe (2005), p. 96.
4. Douglas (1885), p. 470.

Bibliography

• Douglas, Robert Kennaway (1885), Baynes, Thomas Spencer (ed.), "Peking", Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. XVIII (9th ed.), pp. 469–470.
• Shaughnessy, Edward L. (1999), "Western Zhou History", in Loewe, Michael; Shaughnessy, Edward L. (eds.), Cambridge History of Ancient China, Cambridge University Press, pp. 292–351, doi:10.1017/CHOL9780521470308.007, ISBN 978-0-521-47030-8
• ——— (2023). Writing early China. SUNY series in Chinese philosophy and culture. Vol. 16. Albany: State University of New York Press. ISBN 978-1-4384-9522-4.
• Ivanhoe, Philip (2005), Readings in classical Chinese philosophy, Indianapolis: Hackett, ISBN 978-0-872-20780-6