Northern Qi: A Visual History

Northern Qi (550-577) was the state created when Gao Yang deposed the puppet emperor of Eastern Wei, the eastern successor of the Northern Wei. Ruling from Ye over the populous North China Plain with a mixed Xianbei and Chinese elite, it was militarily and economically superior to its western rival Northern Zhou for two decades, and produced the Northern Qi legal code that influenced the Sui and Tang. But its emperors' cruelty and instability, purges of able generals and reliance on favourites let the Zhou conquer it in 577.

When it existed: the era ribbon

The bold bar is Northern Qi. The lighter bars are empires and wars from the same era and the same part of the world. Click any bar to jump to its page.

Registered population, Northern Qi vs Northern Zhou

Qi's material superiority makes its defeat the more striking.

Timeline of the Northern Qi

1. 534
   Gao Huan sets up Eastern Wei
2. 550
   Gao Yang founds Northern Qi
3. 553
   Khitan and Rouran defeated
4. 564
   Northern Qi code
5. 572
   Hulu Guang executed
6. 573
   Prince of Lanling forced to suicide
7. 576
   Zhou invasion
8. 577
   Ye fallsNorthern Qi ends.

Gao Huan's legacy

Gao Huan, a Sinicised Xianbei frontier soldier, had emerged from the Six Garrisons revolt to control the Eastern Wei court from 534, fighting Yuwen Tai's Western Wei to a draw. His son Gao Yang forced the last Eastern Wei emperor to abdicate in 550. Gao Yang was capable in his early years, defeating the Khitan and Rouran and building walls, but became a violent alcoholic who murdered relatives and officials on whims.

Strength and rot

Northern Qi held the richest agricultural land in China and issued a code of law in 564 that was a direct model for the Sui and Tang codes. Its Buddhist cave art at Xiangtangshan and Tianlongshan is superb. But six emperors in 27 years included murderers, drunks and a boy; Emperor Wucheng handed the throne to his son and ruled as retired emperor while his empress ran a scandalous court.

Fall

Emperor Houzhu (565-577), a talented musician, gave power to eunuchs and favourites, executed the great general Hulu Guang and the prince Gao Changgong (the masked 'Prince of Lanling') on false suspicions, and squandered the treasury. Northern Zhou's Emperor Wu invaded in 576, took Jinyang, and captured Ye in early 577; the Gao princes were later executed. The Zhou now ruled the whole north, and Yang Jian would take it from them in 581.

Related empires and wars

Chosen automatically by overlap in time and geography, plus a few hand picked connections.

Empires of the same era and region

• Northern Wei (386 to 535)
• Northern Zhou (557 to 581)
• Sui dynasty (581 to 618)
• Liang dynasty (502 to 557)
• First Turkic Khaganate (552 to 603)
• Rouran Khaganate (330 to 555)

Wars of the same era and region

• Goguryeo-Sui War (598 to 614)

8 surprising things about the Northern Qi

1. The Prince of Lanling was said to be so beautiful he wore a fearsome mask into battle so his own troops would take him seriously; a Tang dance about him survives in Japan.
2. Gao Yang once killed a concubine at a banquet, played her thigh bone as a lute and then wept over her at the funeral.
3. Emperor Houzhu composed a hit song, 'Song of Boundless Sorrow', while his state collapsed.
4. The Northern Qi code of 564 is the direct ancestor of the Tang code, and thus of Japanese and Korean law.
5. Northern Qi built its own Great Wall sections, some of which survive in Shanxi.
6. Colour-glazed and painted pottery of the Northern Qi shows Central Asian musicians and dancers.
7. The Gao family were culturally Xianbei though ethnically Chinese; Gao Huan spoke Xianbei to his troops.
8. The last emperor was granted a title in Chang'an, accused of plotting a year later, and forced to drink poison.

Sources

• Northern Qi Wikipedia
• Northern and Southern dynasties Encyclopaedia Britannica
• Gao Yang Wikipedia
• Mark Edward Lewis, China Between Empires (2009) Harvard University Press

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