Empress Dou (Han dynasty)

Biography

Family Background and Early Years

Dou came from Guanjin County in Qinghe Commandery. According to the New Book of Tang: Genealogical Table of Chancellors, the Dou clan traced its origin to the Si surname. After the Xia ruler Xiang lost his state, his consort was said to have escaped through a cave, or dou, and given birth to Shaokang; their descendants then took Dou as their surname. Dou's father lived through the upheavals at the end of the Qin, withdrew to Guanjin, and made his living by fishing. He later died after falling into a river. When Dou was young, she was reportedly disliked by her family because her hair was thin and sparse. It was said that whenever the family went out on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month to view the Weaver Girl, she alone was not permitted to go; a light was later said to have shone into her room and was regarded as an auspicious sign.

Dou had two brothers: an elder brother, Dou Zhangjun, whose personal name was Jian and courtesy name Zhangjun, and a younger brother, Dou Guangguo, courtesy name Shaojun. When Dou Guangguo was four or five, poverty led to his abduction and sale. He passed through more than ten households before reaching Yiyang, where he was made to produce charcoal in the mountains. During a landslide, more than one hundred people were crushed to death, while he alone escaped.

Entering the Palace and the Years in Dai

After Emperor Gaozu of Han, Liu Bang, died, Emperor Hui, Liu Ying, ascended the throne, while Empress Dowager Lü held power. Dou entered the palace as a woman of a commoner household to serve Empress Dowager Lü and became known as Lady Dou. When Empress Dowager Lü released a group of palace women and bestowed five on each regional king, Lady Dou was among them. Because her home commandery of Qinghe was near Zhao, she asked a palace eunuch to place her among those being sent to Zhao. The eunuch mistakenly assigned her to the group going to Dai. Once the order had been issued, Lady Dou wept and complained but had no choice except to go to Dai.

After arriving in Dai, Lady Dou alone became especially favored by Liu Heng, King of Dai. She bore him a daughter, Liu Piao, and two sons, Liu Qi and Liu Wu. The king's queen had already borne four sons, but she died early, and all four sons also died in succession.

As Empress

In 180 BCE, the eighth year of Empress Gao, Empress Dowager Lü died. Zhou Bo, Chen Ping, and other ministers eliminated the Lü clan and welcomed Liu Heng, King of Dai, to the throne as Emperor Wen of Han. Several months after Emperor Wen's accession, officials requested the designation of a crown prince. Since all four sons of the former Queen of Dai had died, Lady Dou's elder son Liu Qi was the oldest surviving son and was made crown prince in the first lunar month of 179 BCE. In the third lunar month, Empress Dowager Bo stated that since the regional lords were all of the imperial surname, the crown prince's mother should be made empress. Lady Dou was therefore established as empress. Emperor Wen then distributed cloth, grain, and meat to widowers, widows, orphans, the poor and distressed, people over eighty, and orphans under nine.

Both of Empress Dou's parents had died early and were buried at Guanjin. Empress Dowager Bo ordered that her father be posthumously made Marquis of Ancheng and her mother Lady of Ancheng, and that Qinghe Commandery establish a funerary estate of two hundred households, with local officials assigned to maintain it according to the precedent of Lingwen Garden.

Empress Dou had been separated from her brothers for many years. After she became empress, her younger brother Dou Guangguo eventually learned that the empress bore the surname Dou and came from Guanjin. He submitted a memorial recounting events from childhood, including his memory that his elder sister had obtained rice water to wash his hair and food for him before she left home. Empress Dou and Emperor Wen summoned him, confirmed his identity, and the siblings were reunited in tears. Emperor Wen richly rewarded the Dou brothers with land, houses, and money and moved them to Chang'an. Zhou Bo, Guan Ying, and other ministers, fearing that the Dou brothers might repeat the abuses of the Lü clan, advised selecting virtuous elders and scholars to associate with them. Dou Zhangjun and Dou Shaojun consequently became modest and yielding men who did not use their status to behave arrogantly.

Empress Dou later became blind through illness. Emperor Wen then favored Lady Shen of Handan and Lady Yin. Lady Shen once sat on the same level as the empress. Yuan Ang warned Emperor Wen by invoking the fate of the “human swine,” after which Lady Shen's seat was moved to a lower position.

As Empress Dowager

In 157 BCE, the seventh year of the Later Yuan period of Emperor Wen, Emperor Wen died and Crown Prince Liu Qi became emperor. Empress Dou was honored as empress dowager. She revered Huang-Lao learning and ordered Emperor Jing and members of the Dou clan to study the Laozi and respect its teachings. She intervened in government and restrained Confucianism; throughout Emperor Jing's reign, Confucian erudites largely remained officials available for consultation and did not attain major influence.

In 154 BCE, the third year of Emperor Jing, the Rebellion of the Seven States broke out. Emperor Jing wished to employ Dou Ying, but Dou Ying had earlier offended Empress Dowager Dou by opposing the idea that Emperor Jing should pass the throne to the King of Liang and had been removed from the palace register; he initially claimed illness and would not accept appointment. Empress Dowager Dou felt ashamed about this. Emperor Jing later appointed Dou Ying general-in-chief, and after the rebellion was suppressed, he was made Marquis of Weiqi.

Empress Dowager Dou deeply favored her younger son Liu Wu, King of Liang. Emperor Jing once said while drunk that after his death he would pass the throne to the King of Liang, which greatly pleased her. Dou Ying objected that Han law required succession through the eldest son and eldest grandson. During the Middle Yuan years of Emperor Jing, Liu Wu came to court, and Empress Dowager Dou repeatedly pressured Emperor Jing to make him heir, but she did not succeed.

Emperor Jing's eldest concubine-born son, Liu Rong, King of Linjiang, was prosecuted for an offense by the commandant Zhi Du and was forced to commit suicide. Empress Dowager Dou was enraged by the death of her eldest grandson and bitterly hated Zhi Du for his harsh enforcement of the law. Emperor Jing first dismissed Zhi Du and later sent an envoy to appoint him administrator of Yanmen. When Empress Dowager Dou learned of this, she angrily ordered Zhi Du's arrest. Emperor Jing defended him, but the empress dowager replied, “Was the King of Linjiang not also a loyal subject?” Zhi Du was eventually executed. Not long after his death, Xiongnu cavalry again raided Yanmen.

As Grand Empress Dowager

In 141 BCE, the third year of the Later Yuan period of Emperor Jing, Emperor Jing died, and Crown Prince Liu Che became Emperor Wu of Han. He honored his grandmother Dou as grand empress dowager. Emperor Wu favored Confucianism, but Empress Dowager Dou frequently intervened in government, and he did not dare openly defy her; political affairs continued to be submitted to her for approval.

During the Jianyuan era, Imperial Censor Zhao Wan and Chamberlain Wang Zang advocated establishing the Mingtang and Biyong according to ancient models, revising the calendar and court dress, conducting imperial tours and the Feng and Shan sacrifices, and allowing political matters to proceed without always seeking the grand empress dowager's approval. Empress Dowager Dou became furious and ordered Emperor Wu to imprison Zhao Wan and Wang Zang; both died in prison. Until her death, Emperor Wu did not give major appointments to Confucian scholars.

In 135 BCE, the sixth year of Jianyuan, Empress Dowager Dou died. By testament, she gave all property of the Eastern Palace to her only daughter, Liu Piao. She was buried with Emperor Wen at Baling.

Her Name, Her Early Portents, and the "Dou Family Green Mountain"

According to the Record of the Three Adjuncts as annotated by Zhi Yu, the empress Dou of Emperor Wen was named Yi and was a woman of Guanjin in Qinghe; her father, in the troubles at the end of the Qin, had hidden himself as a fisherman and drowned. After Emperor Jing came to the throne and she received her exalted title, she sent envoys to fill in the pool in which her father had drowned and to raise a great mound over it south of Guanjin, which men called the "Dou family green mountain," as the Commentary on the Records of the Grand Historian also records. As a girl her hair grew daily thinner until she was bald, and her family were often ashamed of her for it; and on the night of the seventh day of the seventh month, when all the household went out to look at the Weaving Girl, she alone was not allowed to go, after which a beam of light shone into her chamber, which later ages took for a portent granted her by heaven (the Jingchu Seasonal Records quoting the Traditions of the Age). Besides the children she bore in Dai, the king of Dai had a queen who bore four sons; the queen died early and her four sons died one after another, a chance fact that was the precondition of her son Liu Qi being made heir apparent.

The Twists of the Succession and the Empress's Title, and the Recognition of Dou Guangguo

In the first month of 179, when the officers asked that an heir apparent be set up, Emperor Wen declined again and again, saying that he was without virtue, that the gods had not yet accepted his offerings and the people were not yet content, and that if he could not seek out a worthy and virtuous man throughout the empire to whom to yield the empire, to set up an heir in advance would only add to his want of virtue; he reviewed the worth of the kings of Chu, Wu and Huainan and of the kinsmen and meritorious servants of the imperial house, and held that to insist on one's own son regardless of worth was not to be anxious for the empire. The officers pressed him, saying that to establish the successor as a son was of old standing, that the high founder had himself led the officers and taken the empire and established the princedoms, and that for sons and grandsons to succeed one another without end was the great principle of the empire; and that "your son so-and-so is the eldest, of pure and kindly benevolence, and we beg that he be set up as heir apparent," and the emperor consented, granting every man in the empire who stood in the place of his father a rank of nobility, and enfeoffing the general Bo Zhao as marquis of Zhi. In the third month, when the officers asked that an empress be set up, the empress dowager Bo said that since the princes were all of the same surname the mother of the heir apparent should be empress, and so Lady Dou was made empress; and the emperor, on account of the empress's investiture, gave to the widowed, the orphaned, the childless and the poor throughout the empire, to those of eighty and above and to orphans of nine and below, cloth, silk, grain and meat according to their number. Her parents having died early and been buried at Guanjin, the empress dowager Bo decreed that the officers posthumously honour her father as marquis of Ancheng and her mother as lady of Ancheng, and that Qinghe set up a park of two hundred households with a chief and his deputy to guard it, in all things according to the rule by which the empress dowager Bo's own father, the marquis of Lingwen, had been provided.

The empress had long been parted from her brothers. Her younger brother Dou Guangguo, when four or five years old, had been seized and sold because the family was poor, and the household never knew where he had been taken; after more than ten sales he was at last sold to a man at Yiyang, and while working for his master went into the hills to make charcoal, when "a hundred or more lay down for the night under the bank, the bank collapsed and crushed them all, and Shaojun alone escaped and did not die." Divining that within a few days he should be a marquis, he came with his master's household to Chang'an; and hearing that the new empress was surnamed Dou and came from Guanjin, he knew the empress for his sister. He remembered his county and surname, and that he had once fallen from a mulberry tree with his sister, and using this as his token he presented a memorial recounting the old affairs. The empress told Emperor Wen, who summoned Guangguo and questioned him in detail, and he could answer everything; and when asked for a further proof he said that "when my sister went west she took leave of me in the post-house, begged water to wash my head and food to feed me, and so went away." The empress then took him by the hand and wept, "her tears falling across her face," and all the attendants about her fell to the ground weeping and helped the empress in her grief; and the emperor, moved, gave Dou Guangguo much wealth, fields, land and houses, and gave gifts besides to the Dou kinsmen of the empress's own clan, having them move to Chang'an. But the Marquis of Jiang, Zhou Bo, and General Guan Ying were troubled, saying that while they lived their lives would hang on these two men, that they were of base origin and must be given masters and retainers, lest they repeat the great affair of the Lü family; and so men of years and scholars of upright conduct were chosen to be about them, and Dou Changjun and Dou Shaojun became yielding gentlemen who did not dare to be arrogant for their honour.

The Seat of Lady Shen and Dou Ying: The Succession to the Prince of Liang, the Rebellion of the Seven States, and the Marquis of Weiqi

The empress afterwards lost her sight through illness, and Emperor Wen turned to favour the ladies Shen and Yin of Handan. Lady Shen often sat on the same mat with the empress in the palace; and once when the emperor visited the Shanglin park, the empress and Lady Shen accompanying, and the chief of the gentlemen's bureau laid out the mats, Yuan Ang drew Lady Shen's seat a little further back, at which Lady Shen in anger would not sit and the emperor too was angry and went into the palace. Yuan Ang then said that he had heard that when high and low are ordered they are in harmony; that now that an empress had been set up Lady Shen was a concubine, and how could concubine and mistress sit together, which was precisely to lose the order of high and low; and he advised the emperor that if he loved her he should give her rich gifts, since what he did for her was in fact bringing harm upon her — had he not seen the "human pig"? The emperor was then pleased, and told Lady Shen, who gave Yuan Ang fifty catties of gold. Further, when Emperor Jing had not yet set up an heir, he drank with the prince of Liang, Liu Wu, and said in ease that after ten thousand years he would pass the succession to him; the prince declined, but was glad at heart though he knew it was not meant in earnest, and the empress dowager was glad too. Dou Ying, however, came forward with a cup and said that the empire was the high founder's empire and that father and son succeeded one another, which was the covenant of Han, and how could the emperor pass it to the prince of Liang of his own will; and the empress dowager therefore hated Dou Ying, who also thought his office small and asked leave on grounds of illness, whereupon she struck him from the register of the palace gates and forbade him to attend court. In 154, when the seven states of Wu and Chu rebelled, Emperor Jing looked over all the sons of the imperial house and the Dou and found none better than Dou Ying, and summoned him; he firmly declined, pleading illness and unfitness, and the empress dowager too was ashamed; and the emperor said that with the empire in peril could the prince's grandson decline, and made him great general with a thousand catties of gold. Dou Ying recommended such famous generals and worthy men as were at home, Yuan Ang and Luan Bu among them; and all the gold given him he laid out under the colonnade, letting the officers take what they needed as they passed, and none of it ever came to his house. He guarded Xingyang and directed the troops of Qi and Zhao, and when the seven states were broken he was enfeoffed marquis of Weiqi, and wandering scholars and retainers vied to attach themselves to him; and at every great deliberation of the court the marquis of Tiao, Zhou Yafu, and the marquis of Weiqi stood first, and no marquis dared treat them as equals.

The Grand Empress Dowager: The Failure of the Jianyuan Reforms and the Humiliation of Yuan Gu

In 141, when Emperor Jing died, the heir Liu Che came to the throne as Emperor Wu and honoured his grandmother the empress dowager Dou as grand empress dowager. Emperor Wu loved Confucian learning, and the grand empress dowager often intervened in government, so that he dared not oppose her and referred all business to her as she wished. In the Jianyuan years the marquis of Weiqi, Dou Ying, and the marquis of Wu'an, Tian Fen, both favoured Confucianism and advanced Zhao Wan as censor-in-chief and Wang Zang as master of the palace, inviting the elder Shen of Lu to set up a Bright Hall, and ordering the princes to return to their fiefs, abolishing the frontier barriers and regulating dress by the rites, to bring about great peace; the new measures also cut from the registers of the clan those of unruly conduct, and many Dou kinsmen by marriage were caught up in it — and as the consorts' families were mostly marquises and the marquises mostly married princesses and none wished to return to their fiefs, slander of Weiqi and his friends reached the grand empress dowager every day. She loved the words of Huang-Lao, while Weiqi, Wu'an, Zhao Wan and Wang Zang laboured to exalt Confucianism and disparage the Daoists, so that she grew the more displeased with them; and in 139, when Zhao Wan asked that business need not always be reported to the Eastern Palace, she flew into a rage, dismissed and drove out Zhao Wan and Wang Zang, deposed the chancellor and the grand commandant, making the marquis of Baizhi, Xu Chang, chancellor and the marquis of Wuqiang, Zhuang Qingzhai, censor-in-chief, while Weiqi and Wu'an retired to their marquisates. She also reproached Emperor Wu with the words that this was to be another Xin Yuanping, and the emperor accordingly abolished the Bright Hall and handed Zhao Wan and Wang Zang to the judges, and both killed themselves, and all that they had begun was done away. She had also once summoned the master of the Odes, Yuan Gu, and asked him about the Laozi, and when he answered that it was merely the talk of ordinary households she said in anger that it could not compare with the writings of the Confucians, which were like the statutes for prisoners, and had him sent into the animal enclosure to stab a wild boar; and the emperor, knowing that she was angry and that Yuan Gu had spoken plainly and was without fault, gave him a sharp weapon, and Yuan Gu entering the enclosure stabbed once and struck the boar's heart, so that it fell at once, and the grand empress dowager was silent and had no ground to punish him further. In 135 the grand empress dowager died, and by her testament she gave all the money and goods of the Eastern Palace to her only surviving daughter, the grand princess Liu Piao, and was buried with Emperor Wen at Baling.

Major Activities

Political Influence

Empress Dowager Dou lived through three reigns and was an important defender of Huang-Lao politics in the early Western Han. She required Emperor Jing and Dou family members to study the Laozi and revered the Daoist concept of governing through non-action. Under her influence, Confucian scholars did not receive major appointments during Emperor Jing's reign. After Emperor Wu ascended the throne, she intervened even more directly by removing Zhao Wan and Wang Zang, both promoters of Confucianism, thereby restraining Confucian influence in the early years of his reign.

She also broke the early Han convention that a person without merit should not be made a marquis. Under Emperor Jing, her younger brother Dou Guangguo was made Marquis of Zhangwu, her nephew Dou Pengzu was made Marquis of Nanpi, and her cousin's son Dou Ying was made Marquis of Weiqi after suppressing the Rebellion of the Seven States. This opened a precedent in the Han for enfeoffing imperial in-laws as marquises through kinship.

Forcing Zhi Du to Death

Zhi Du was a prominent harsh official under Emperor Jing, known for strict enforcement of the law without regard to powerful families. Emperor Jing's eldest concubine-born son, Liu Rong, King of Linjiang, was prosecuted by Zhi Du and forced to commit suicide. Empress Dowager Dou was enraged by her grandson's death and came to hate Zhi Du. Emperor Jing first dismissed him and later appointed him administrator of Yanmen to defend against the Xiongnu. When the empress dowager learned of the appointment, she ordered Zhi Du arrested. Ignoring Emperor Jing's argument that “Zhi Du is a loyal minister,” she retorted, “Was the King of Linjiang not also a loyal subject?” Zhi Du was ultimately executed. Not long after his death, the Xiongnu again invaded Yanmen.

Intervention in the Succession

Empress Dowager Dou favored her younger son Liu Wu, King of Liang, and wanted him to succeed Emperor Jing. Emperor Jing once said while drunk that he was willing to pass the throne to the King of Liang, which delighted her. During the Middle Yuan years, she repeatedly exerted pressure on the emperor, but ministers opposed the proposal on the grounds that succession from father to son was the Han convention, and she ultimately failed.

Suppression of Confucianism

Empress Dowager Dou once summoned the erudite Yuan Gusheng and asked what kind of book the Laozi was. Yuan answered that it was merely a book read by ordinary households. The empress dowager became furious and ordered him into a pigsty to kill a pig. Emperor Jing feared that Yuan would be unable to overcome the animal and gave him a sharp blade, with which he killed it. The episode illustrates the intensity of Empress Dowager Dou's hostility toward Confucian scholars who disparaged the teachings she favored.

Travels and Tomb

In her early life, Empress Dowager Dou traveled from Qinghe to Chang'an, then to Dai, and later returned to Chang'an. After her death, she was buried with Emperor Wen at Baling. In October 2001, the tomb of Empress Dowager Dou at Baling was looted, and many funerary ceramic figures were stolen and sold. Six were smuggled abroad and offered at Sotheby's in New York in March 2002. After China's National Cultural Heritage Administration and Ministry of Foreign Affairs negotiated with the American side, Sotheby's withdrew the sale; the six figures were returned to China in June 2003.

The Beginning of Enfeoffing Consorts' Kin, the Defence of Huang-Lao Politics, and Its Institutional Effects

The empress dowager Dou lived through three reigns and was the most important defender of the Huang-Lao politics of the early Western Han. She required Emperor Jing and the Dou kinsmen to study the Laozi and to honour "governing by non-action," and under her influence Confucian scholars were not given weight in Emperor Jing's reign; after Emperor Wu came to the throne she intervened directly in government and dismissed Zhao Wan and Wang Zang for exalting Confucianism, so that Confucian learning was suppressed in the early years of his reign. Her reverence for Huang-Lao did not come wholly from considerations of government but was to a considerable degree a use of the Laozi as a tool to guard her own power, which is why she was so harshly hostile to Confucianism; and later writers, noting her fondness and her conservatism, have held that her administration was narrow, belated and retrograde, and that she was directly responsible for the failure of the Jianyuan reforms, though her faults did not injure the foundations of the state.

In the institution of consorts' kin her role was more concrete: after Emperor Wen's death Emperor Jing enfeoffed Dou Guangguo as marquis of Zhangwu, and Dou Changjun, who had died earlier, had his son Dou Pengzu made marquis of Nanpi, while in the rebellion of the seven states Dou Ying, the son of a cousin of the empress dowager, was made marquis of Weiqi for military merit — three marquises in all from the Dou. Of these Dou Changjun and Dou Pengzu, uncle and nephew, had no merit whatever, and the Table of Marquises of the Imperial Consorts of the History of the Han says plainly that they were enfeoffed because they were the brother and the brother's son of the empress dowager; hence the practice of enfeoffing the emperor's maternal uncles by marriage really began here, breaking the early Han rule that no one be made marquis without merit and opening the precedent of enfeoffing consorts' kin by grace, which has been seen as one of the institutional starting points of the later swelling of consort power. As to her kin, her doting on her youngest son, the prince of Liang, Liu Wu, was equally far-reaching: she pressed repeatedly for him to be made heir, and though Emperor Jing had once in his cups promised him the succession, it was never done, the ministers holding to the covenant of Han that father and son succeed one another; and later ages therefore judged that the empress dowager Dou and Emperor Jing "did not understand the principles of right" and spoiled the prince of Liang, so that he was enfeoffed with more than forty towns and a park three hundred li square, built great palaces, and went out and came in with the clearing of the road, until "for a small disappointment he fell ill and died." As to her destruction of Zhi Du, it bore directly on the northern frontier: while Zhi Du was at Yanmen the Xiongnu never dared come near, and they even made a straw image of him and had their horsemen gallop and shoot at it without hitting; but soon after he was beheaded the Xiongnu cavalry invaded the Yanmen country again.

Personal Relations

• Father: Dou, posthumously made Marquis of Ancheng.
• Mother: Dou, posthumously made Lady of Ancheng.
• Elder brother: Dou Zhangjun (Dou Jian).
• Younger brother: Dou Guangguo (Dou Shaojun).
• Husband: Emperor Wen of Han, Liu Heng.
• Sons: Emperor Jing of Han, Liu Qi; Liu Wu, King Xiao of Liang.
• Daughter: Grand Princess Guantao, Liu Piao.
• Nephew: Dou Ying, Marquis of Weiqi.
• Yuan Ang: Advised Emperor Wen on proper hierarchy and helped protect Empress Dou's position.
• Zhou Bo and Guan Ying: Recommended choosing mentors for the Dou brothers to prevent arrogance among imperial in-laws.
• Empress Dowager Lü: The empress dowager whom Dou served when she entered the palace.
• Empress Dowager Bo: Emperor Wen's mother, who helped bring about Dou's appointment as empress.
• Emperor Jing of Han, Liu Qi: Her son; under her influence, Confucianism was restrained.
• Emperor Wu of Han, Liu Che: Her grandson; after his accession he was constrained by her political influence.
• Zhi Du: Executed at Empress Dowager Dou's insistence after Liu Rong's death.
• Yuan Gusheng: Punished by being sent into a pigsty to kill a pig after disparaging the Laozi.
• Zhao Wan and Wang Zang: Imprisoned and died after recommending that political affairs no longer always be submitted to the grand empress dowager.
• Dou Ying: Removed from the palace register after opposing succession by the King of Liang.

Historical Assessment

Han Period / Contemporary Sources

• Records of the Grand Historian: Hereditary House of the Imperial In-Laws records Empress Dowager Dou's life and states that she “favored the teachings of the Yellow Emperor and Laozi,” requiring Emperor Jing and members of the Dou clan to study them.
• Book of Han: Biographies of Imperial In-Laws records her suppression of Confucianism, noting that the erudites merely held office and awaited questions, with none advancing.
• The episode involving Yuan Gusheng reflects contemporary Confucian dissatisfaction with Empress Dowager Dou's reverence for Huang-Lao learning.

Wei-Jin through Tang-Song Periods

• Huangfu Mi's Diwang Shiji of the Western Jin records Empress Dou's personal name as “Yifang.”
• Sima Zhen's Shiji Suoyin cites Huangfu Mi and records the story that Dou's father fell into a spring and died, and that after Emperor Jing established her status, envoys filled in the abyss and raised a tomb mound.
• Zhang Shoujie's Shiji Zhengyi records that Qingshan, associated with the Dou clan, lay south of Guanjin.

Ming and Qing Periods

• Ming and Qing scholars often evaluated Empress Dowager Dou's intervention in government through the framework of “female disorder,” while also acknowledging the role of her Huang-Lao preferences in maintaining the policies associated with the Wen-Jing era.
• Wang Fuzhi's Du Tongjian Lun discussed her suppression of Confucianism, judging her conservative while recognizing that she helped preserve continuity in early Han policy.

Modern Period

• Modern scholarship often evaluates Empress Dowager Dou from the perspectives of political and intellectual history, viewing her as one of the last major defenders of Huang-Lao politics; her death is often seen as clearing the way for Emperor Wu's later policy of elevating Confucianism.
• Some scholars regard her forcing Zhi Du to death and favoring the King of Liang as characteristic examples of intervention by imperial in-laws and as an early precedent for the politics of maternal relatives in the Han.
• Other scholars emphasize her role in the Wen-Jing era and argue that Huang-Lao policies of limited government were closely connected to the period's stability and prosperity.