Chen Sheng and Wu Guang Uprising

Background

In his youth, he was once hired to work the fields with companions. During a break he went to a ridge and, after a long sigh, said: “If any of us becomes rich and honored in the future, let us not forget one another.”

Course of Events

Chen Sheng, courtesy name She, was from Yangcheng (southeast of present-day Dengfeng, Henan). Born into poverty, he made a living as a hired farm laborer. In his youth, he once worked the fields with companions. During a break he went to a ridge and, after a long sigh, said: “If any of us becomes rich and honored in the future, let us not forget one another.” His companions laughed and replied: “You are only a hired farmhand. How could you become rich and honored?” Chen Sheng sighed and said: “How can swallows and sparrows understand the ambition of a wild goose or swan?” This became the source of the saying about small birds being unable to comprehend lofty ambitions.

Wu Guang, courtesy name Shu, was from Yangxia (present-day Taikang, Henan) and also came from a poor farming background. He was known for caring about others and enjoyed considerable prestige among the conscripted troops, many of whom were willing to follow him.

In the autumn of 209 BCE, the first year of Qin Er Shi, the Qin court conscripted poor residents from the lüzuo households to garrison Yuyang (southwest of present-day Miyun, Beijing). Local officials in Yangcheng assigned two military officers to escort nine hundred labor conscripts to Yuyang, and Chen Sheng and Wu Guang were selected as unit leaders to help manage the men. When the group reached Dazexiang in Qi County, heavy rain blocked the roads and they estimated that they would miss the deadline for reaching Yuyang. According to the Qin law described in the source, missing the deadline was punishable by death.

Chen Sheng and Wu Guang discussed their situation. They reasoned that fleeing would mean death, while rising in revolt to accomplish something great could also mean death, and asked whether it was not better to die for a great cause. Chen Sheng then analyzed the political situation: Qin Er Shi was the younger son of the First Emperor and, in Chen Sheng's view, had not been the proper successor; the prince Fusu, who had repeatedly remonstrated and been sent away with an army, was believed by many people to be virtuous, while few knew that he had been killed; Xiang Yan, a former Chu general who had repeatedly won merit and cared for his soldiers, was deeply loved by the people of Chu, and some believed he had died while others thought he had escaped. Chen Sheng proposed raising the banner of rebellion in the names of Fusu and Xiang Yan, expecting many people to respond. Wu Guang agreed.

The two sought divination. The diviner, understanding their intentions, told them that their undertaking could succeed and bring achievement, but asked whether they had sought an omen from spirits. Chen Sheng and Wu Guang interpreted this as advice to first establish their prestige among the men. They therefore wrote “Chen Sheng shall be king” in cinnabar on white silk and placed it inside a fish. When the conscripts bought and cooked the fish, they found the silk message and were astonished. Chen Sheng also secretly sent Wu Guang to an old shrine near their encampment. At night Wu Guang lit a fire and imitated the cry of a fox, calling: “Great Chu shall rise; Chen Sheng shall be king.” The soldiers heard the cries during the night and were alarmed. The next morning, discussion spread through the camp and the men repeatedly looked toward Chen Sheng.

After preparing opinion among the troops, Wu Guang repeatedly declared that he intended to flee in order to provoke the officers escorting the group. One officer, drunk, beat Wu Guang and drew his sword. Wu Guang seized the weapon and killed him, and Chen Sheng joined him in killing both escorting officers. They then assembled the conscripts. Chen Sheng told them that the rain had caused them all to miss the deadline and that, according to the stated rule, they faced execution; even if they escaped execution, most would die on the frontier. He declared that if a great man must die, he should die with a name remembered by later generations, asking whether kings, marquises, generals, and ministers were born to their positions. The conscripts responded together.

The rebels then raised their movement in the names of Prince Fusu and the Chu general Xiang Yan in order to appeal to popular sentiment. They bared their right arms as a sign, called themselves Great Chu, built an altar for their oath, and sacrificed the heads of the slain officers. Chen Sheng proclaimed himself general and Wu Guang commandant.

The rebel army first attacked Dazexiang and, after taking it, moved against Qi County. Once Qi was captured, Chen Sheng sent Ge Ying of Fuli to seize the territory east of the county. The main force successively attacked Zhi, Cuo, Ku, Zhe, and Qiao and captured them all. Its strength grew continuously as it advanced. By the time it reached Chen County, it reportedly had six or seven hundred chariots, more than one thousand cavalry, and tens of thousands of infantry. The commandery governor and county magistrate were absent. Only the commandery vice-governor remained to lead a defense at the city gate; he was defeated and killed, and the rebels occupied Chen County.

Chen Sheng called together the local Three Elders responsible for moral instruction and local notables. They told him that he had donned armor and taken up weapons to punish an immoral ruler, destroy the violent Qin regime, and restore Chu, and that on the basis of such merit he should become king. Chen Sheng therefore proclaimed himself king and named his state Zhangchu.

After Zhangchu was established, people in many commanderies and counties who had suffered under Qin officials killed those officials and responded to Chen Sheng. He appointed Wu Guang acting king and placed him over the generals advancing west toward Xingyang; ordered Wu Chen, Zhang Er, and Chen Yu of Chen County to seize the former lands of Zhao; and ordered Deng Zong of Ruyin to attack Jiujiang Commandery. In Chu territory, thousands gathered in rebellion in numbers too great to count. Within less than three months, leaders in Zhao, Qi, Yan, Wei, and other regions raised banners to restore the former states and proclaimed themselves kings.

Chen Sheng sent Zhou Wen to lead rebel forces west into Guanzhong, approaching the Qin capital Xianyang. Qin Er Shi panicked and ordered the general Zhang Han to organize convicts and enslaved laborers working at Mount Li into an army for a counterattack. The aristocrats of the restored states occupied their own territories and provided no support. Fighting alone, Zhou Wen was ultimately defeated. Wu Guang was killed at Xingyang when his subordinate Tian Zang issued a false order in the name of higher authority. In the sixth month after the uprising, Chen Sheng withdrew to Xiachengfu (southeast of present-day Guoyang, Anhui) and was killed while fleeing by his charioteer Zhuang Jia. Zhuang Jia took Chen Sheng's head to the Qin army to claim a reward.

Historical Assessments

Sima Qian devoted a hereditary-house chapter to Chen Sheng in Records of the Grand Historian, placing him alongside feudal lords. Although the phrase comparing the tyranny of Jie and Zhou with the virtue of Tang and Wu was not directly applied to Chen Sheng, Sima Qian treated the uprising in a framework comparable to dynastic overthrow and affirmed Chen Sheng's role as the first to rise. In his concluding appraisal, he wrote that although Chen Sheng died, the kings, marquises, generals, and ministers he had dispatched ultimately destroyed Qin, and that the undertaking had begun with Chen Sheng.

Jia Yi, in “The Faults of Qin,” described the fall of Qin as a case in which a single man rose in revolt and the ancestral temples fell, recognizing Chen Sheng's uprising as the direct trigger of Qin's collapse.

Ming scholar Guo Zhengyu commented that the calamity of dynastic collapse often arose not from foreign peoples but from commoners, arguing that although Qin had conquered six states, it was Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, and a few common people who eventually threw the empire into disorder. He emphasized the decisive role of popular rebellion in the overthrow of a dynasty.

A Ming commentator, sometimes identified as Li Zhi, argued that Chen She was a transported laborer without exceptional talent or virtue, yet one call at Yuyang shifted the Qin mandate and made Liu Bang's later success possible. The passage argues that had Chen Sheng remained humble after victory and continued to care for the people, he might have become another major contender for the Central Plains. It concludes that Qin was ultimately ruined by the First Emperor rather than by Chen She, while Chen She both overthrew Qin and, through the same causes, destroyed himself. The source notes that this passage has often been mistakenly attributed to Zhou Enlai but is actually Ming literary commentary.

Qing scholar Wang Mingsheng, in Critical Discussions of the Seventeen Histories, affirmed Chen Sheng's merit in initiating the uprising while also criticizing his arrogance after becoming king and his loss of popular support, including his killing of old acquaintances, regarding these as important reasons for the movement's rapid failure.

Mao Zedong, in The Chinese Revolution and the Chinese Communist Party, called the uprising of Chen Sheng and Wu Guang “the first peasant uprising in Chinese history,” treating it as the beginning of peasant resistance to feudal rule. Modern historical scholarship generally regards the Dazexiang Uprising as a severe blow to Qin rule that created conditions for Liu Bang and Xiang Yu to overthrow the dynasty and gave the movement an important place in the history of Chinese peasant wars.

Results and Impact

While being sent to garrison the frontier, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang rose in revolt at Dazexiang, igniting armed resistance against Qin.

The event exposed and deepened the Qin state's political or social crisis and prompted the ruling group to adjust appointments, military policy, or local governance.