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English Translation of "Denouncement of Wu Zhao on Behalf of Xu Jingye"

Fun fact, this quote on the back of the UK special advance edition of Heavenly Tyrant comes from an actual proclamation by a rebel leader who took part in a failed rebellion against the historical Wu Zetian, the only female emperor in Chinese history! Except it accidentally made her sound so cool that she laughed at it. It is considered a Work of Exceptional Literary Merit TM but I wasn't happy with any of the translations available so I did my own. If you want to read some peak 1400-year-old incel whining, here you go:

伪临朝武氏者，人非温顺，地实寒微。昔充太宗下陈，曾以更衣入侍。洎乎晚节，秽乱春宫。潜隐先帝之私，阴图后房之嬖。入门见嫉蛾眉不肯让人；掩袖工谗，狐媚偏能惑主。践元后于翚翟，陷吾君于聚麀。加以虺蜴为心，豺狼成性，近狎邪僻，残害忠良，杀姊屠兄，弑君鸩母。人神之所共嫉，天地之所不容。犹复包藏祸心，窥窃神器。君之爱子，幽之于别宫；贼之宗盟，委之以重任。呜呼！霍子孟之不作，朱虚侯之已亡。燕啄皇孙，知汉祚之将尽；龙漦帝后，识夏庭之遽衰。

敬业皇唐旧臣，公侯冢子。奉先君之成业，荷本朝之厚恩。宋微子之兴悲，良有以也；桓君山之流涕，岂徒然哉！是用气愤风云，志安社稷。因天下之失望，顺宇内之推心，爰举义旗，誓清妖孽。南连百越，北尽三河，铁骑成群，玉轴相接。海陵红粟，仓储之积靡穷；江浦黄旗，匡复之功何远。班声动而北风起，剑气冲而南斗平。喑呜则山岳崩颓，叱吒则风云变色。以此制敌，何敌不摧；以此图功，何功不克！

公等或家传汉爵，或地协周亲，或膺重寄于爪牙，或受顾命于宣室。言犹在耳，忠岂忘心？一抔之土未干，六尺之孤安在！傥能转祸为福，送往事居，共立勤王之勋，无废旧君之命，凡诸爵赏，同指山河。若其眷恋穷城，徘徊歧路，坐昧先几之兆，必贻后至之诛。请看今日之域中，竟是谁家之天下！

- 《为徐敬业讨武曌檄》

The false ruler Lady Wu possesses an unpleasant personality and a lowly birthright. Once a minor servant in Emperor Taizong’s harem, she consummated a relationship with him while assisting him in his change of garments. During his later years, she defiled the Crown Prince’s palace as well. Hiding how she had been intimate with Emperor Taizong, she schemed to enter the new emperor’s harem. Within it, she was jealous and intolerant of the other beauties. Using trickery and vixen charms to delude our sovereign, she was able to put on the empress’ robes and cause the emperor to commit incest (1). With the heart of a snake or lizard and the nature of a wolf, she favors the insidious and murders the righteous and good. She slew her sister, slaughtered her brothers, assassinated the emperor, and poisoned her mother (2). She is hated by both men and gods, and heaven and earth cannot allow her to exist! She continues to harbor a treasonous heart, seeking to steal the symbols of sovereignty. She has confined the emperor's beloved son in a side palace while bestowing important responsibilities upon her thieving relatives. Alas! There is no Huo Zimeng (3) and no Marquis of Zhuxu (4). When a swallow pecked at imperial princes, it was known that the rule of Han would end (5). When the saliva of dragons flowed before its king, it was recognized that the Xia court would wane (6).

Jingye (7) is a seasoned official of Tang and a first-born son of a lord. It was owing to the legacy of his forefathers that he has received great grace from this dynasty. The sadness of Lord Wei of Song (8) was not without reason; must Huan Junshan's tears (9) have been for naught? Thus, [Xu Jingye] channeled his fury and aims to steady the empire. As disappointment prevails across the realm, he follows the will of the people and raised his flag of righteousness to banish the evil. We have connected with the Yue peoples to the south and conscripted from the Yellow River region to the north. We have gathered steely horses and assembled sturdy war wagons. With red rice from Hailing, we have filled our storehouses. With yellow flags on the banks of the Yangtze, how distant can restoration be? As the galloping of horses rise up, so does the north wind; as swords are drawn, so ends the conflict in the south. Our murmurs shall crumble mountains; our shouts shall shift the wind and clouds. With these against the enemy, what enemy would not be destroyed? With these to accomplish great things, what accomplishment is out of reach?

You all are either hereditary nobility, or members of the imperial clan, or bearers of military responsibility, or had been entrusted with the late emperor's last will. With such vows still ringing in your ears, how could you forget your loyalty? The soil on the imperial tomb has yet to dry, yet where is our young orphan ruler? (10) If you can turn calamity into fortune, send off our late emperor and serve our new one, and together save the imperial house without forfeiting His Late Majesty's will, your titles and rewards shall be as lasting as the mountains and the rivers. If you hold your desolate cities out against us, hesitate along the wrong path, ignore the signs of the inevitable, and fail to answer this call in time, you will surely be eliminated. Please regard the realm of today—who does it truly belong to?

- Denouncement of Wu Zhao (11) On Behalf of Xu Jingye

(1): Empress Regnant Wu was a minor concubine of Emperor Taizong of Tang but had an affair with his crown prince, who later became Emperor Gaozong of Tang and took her as his empress after a series of dramatic court machinations. This was indeed considered incest and was not adapted in Iron Widow because DUH, OF COURSE NOT. Even in those times, it was considered fucking weird. (Weird fucking?)

(2): She did kill her two stepbrothers (because they had always been misogynist assholes to her) by framing them for poisoning her niece. She MAY have pushed her sister to commit suicide, but there's not enough definitive evidence. The accusations that she had anything to do with her mother or Emperor Gaozong's deaths, though, are utter nonsense and not backed up by ANYTHING. What's notably missing here is the infamous charge of her smothering her baby daughter to frame her rival Empress Wang, which supports the theory that the story was made up by later historians and not something of contemporary record. Because if there was any legit dirt on Empress Wu, you KNOW Luo Binwang would've included it here.

(3): Huo Zimeng, AKA Huo Guang, was a powerful official in the Western Han dynasty ~600 years earlier, famous for seizing control of state affairs while the dynasty went through a succession crisis.

(4): The Marquis of Zhuxu, AKA Liu Zhang, was a grandson of Emperor Gaozu of Han and played a key role in overthrowing the family of the powerful Empress Dowager Lü after her death.

(5): Refers to Empress Zhao Feiyan, whose name means "flying swallow" and who allegedly killed all the babies her emperor husband had with his concubines. Shortly after this, the Western Han dynasty was usurped.

(6): Refers to the legend that at the end of the Xia dynasty (China's first dynasty ever), two dragons descended in the court, and the King of Xia kept their saliva in a wooden box. In the subsequent Western Zhou dynasty, during the reign of King Li of Zhou, the box was opened and the saliva flowed out, impregnating a palace girl. She gave birth to the beautiful but cold-mannered Bao Si, who would become an object of obsession for King You of Zhou and be blamed for the demise of the whole dynasty. There is a running pattern here of references to stories in which women "ruined" dynasties.

(7): Xu Jingye is a disgraced official leading this rebellion against Empress Wu.

(8): Lord Wei of Song, AKA Zi Qi, is the brother of the infamous King Zhou of Shang, whose tyranny caused the demise of the Shang dynasty. Lord Wei had tried many times to talk some sense into King Zhou, but it didn't work, and so he defected to the rebels. For this, he retained noble status in the subsequent Zhou dynasty (different Zhou than King Zhou), but he was obviously still very saddened by what happened.

(9): Huan Junshan, AKA Huan Tan, is an official in the Eastern Han dynasty who was exiled for pushing back against the emperor's superstitious practices of divination.

(10) Refers to the dead Emperor Gaozong and the alive-but-exiled Emperor Zhongzong, Gaozong and Empress Wu's 3rd son.

(11): The personal name Empress Wu chose for herself, 曌 (Zhào) being a specially created character meaning "the sun and moon in the sky." I did not use this in my book even though it would've been more accurate than "Zetian," which was really a title, because I could not be bothered to explain that this Zhao is different from the Zhao of my family name even though they are pronounced exactly the same.

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capriiq

4 months ago

Qin Zheng and Zetian's perfect holiday song 💚❤️

Audio Source

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capriiq

6 months ago

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