Li Gao

Biography

Family and appointment in Dunhuang

Li Gao's family came from Longxi. His grandfather Li Yan served Zhang Gui of Former Liang as a military commander, and his father Li Chang died young, leaving Li Gao to be born after his death. According to the historical biography, Li Gao studied the classics and literary writing while young and later learned martial skills and military texts. Those descriptions do not establish a particular teacher or a documented course of military training.

Late in the Later Liang period, Duan Ye founded a Northern Liang regime at Zhangye and appointed Meng Min inspector of Shazhou. Meng made Li Gao magistrate of Xiaogu. After Meng's death, Guo Qian, Suo Xian, and other Dunhuang officials advanced Li Gao as governor of Dunhuang and a general; Duan Ye subsequently confirmed him in higher offices. Suo Si, another Northern Liang commander, attempted to replace him in Dunhuang and rode west with cavalry. On the advice of Song Yao and others, Li Gao resisted. Suo Si withdrew after a defeat, and Li Gao's control of Dunhuang became firmer.

Independence and the move to Jiuquan

In 400 (the fourth year of Eastern Jin's Long'an era; the first year of Western Liang's Gengzi era), Tang Yao circulated a proclamation on behalf of six commanderies and acclaimed Li Gao commander in chief and Duke of Liang. Li Gao adopted the Gengzi era and established his center at Dunhuang. He sent troops toward Liangxing and the settlements west of Yumen and cultivated frontier land to build food reserves. The Jin Shu also records his Jinggong Hall, used for discussions of government and military matters, and a school whose intake he expanded. These undertakings linked defense with local administration.

In 405 (the first year of Eastern Jin's Yixi era; the first year of Western Liang's Jianchu era), Li Gao adopted the Jianchu era and sent envoys to Eastern Jin. In his memorial he presented his rule as the result of local support and described his plans for Hexi. He then moved his seat to Jiuquan, closer to the eastern area contested with Northern Liang, while his son Li Rang and others continued to hold Dunhuang. From Jiuquan he encouraged cultivation and resettlement. He fought and negotiated repeatedly with Juqu Mengxun. The Jin Shu records one raid in which Mengxun seized households near Jiankang; Li Gao pursued him to Mi'an, defeated him, and recovered the captives. This was one episode in a prolonged frontier struggle.

Final years and succession

Northern Liang remained Li Gao's main rival late in life. In his Shuzhi Fu he wrote of political aims that had not been realized. When dying, he entrusted Song Yao with advising his heir and urged careful handling of military and state affairs. Li Gao died in 417 (the thirteenth year of Eastern Jin's Yixi era; the thirteenth year of Western Liang's Jianchu era). His court conferred the title Prince Wuzhao and the temple name Taizu; historical records call his tomb Jianshi Mausoleum. His eldest son Li Tan had died earlier, so his second son Li Xin succeeded him. In 743 (the second year of Tang's Tianbao era), the Tang emperor posthumously honored Li Gao as Emperor Xingsheng. This later honor was not a title Li Gao held while alive.

Li Gao, courtesy name Xuansheng and childhood name Changsheng, was a native of Chengji in Longxi and founder of the Western Liang, reigning from 400 to 417. He read widely in the classics and histories and was skilled in prose, and in later years studied arms and military method. His family claimed descent from the Han general Li Guang; the Tang imperial house honored him as an ancestor and in the Tianbao years gave him the posthumous title of Emperor Xingsheng — a grant connected with the Li Tang house's construction of its own lineage.

In 400 he was raised at Dunhuang as grand commander, general-in-chief and Duke of Liang, founding the Western Liang, whose territory covered roughly what is now western Gansu. He afterward moved his capital to Jiuquan and maneuvered among the Northern and Southern Liang, sending envoys meanwhile to the Eastern Jin in the south for nominal support. In his reign he gathered refugees, founded schools and lightened taxes, the cultural work of Hexi continuing in his hands; he was himself known for his writing and left poems and rhapsodies.

He died in 417 at sixty-seven, his son Li Xin succeeding him. The state then fell behind in its wars with the Northern Liang and was destroyed by it in 421. Though it lasted only some twenty years, its administration of Hexi and its preservation of culture are fairly representative of the regional regimes of the Sixteen Kingdoms.

Its offices and schools largely followed Wei and Jin precedent; the region was both the corridor between the central plains and the western regions and a refuge for scholars from the plains. The state Li Gao founded, with the other Hexi regimes of the time, preserved a comparatively intact Chinese cultural tradition in the north amid the general disorder, an influence continuing beyond the Northern Wei.

The founding of the Western Liang is connected with the contests among the Later, Northern and other Liang states in Hexi. Li Gao had served the Later Liang, holding the governorship of Dunhuang among other posts; in 400, with the Later Liang in disorder, the local forces about Dunhuang raised him as their head and he styled himself grand commander, general-in-chief and Duke of Liang, founding the state named Western Liang. It stood opposed to the Northern Liang for years, the fighting lasting until its fall.

In his reign he kept in touch with the Eastern Jin, sending envoys repeatedly by way of Shu or by sea to Jiankang to declare himself a subject. The gesture nominally made the Western Liang a dependency of the Jin and gave him standing in Hexi, while to the north he maintained good relations with the Rouran and to the west with the states of the western regions, keeping the Hexi corridor open.

Under his son Li Xin the wars with the Northern Liang went badly, and in 421 the Northern Liang took Dunhuang and the state fell. His descendants were prominent under the Northern Wei and the Tang, the Tang imperial house claiming descent from him — a lineage of value for studying politics and family ideas from the Northern Dynasties into the Tang.

Among the Hexi regimes the Western Liang is known for its cultural work. Under Li Gao and his sons Li Xin and Li Xun the schools and monasteries about Dunhuang and Jiuquan developed; the claim that some of the Mogao caves were cut in this period is disputed as to date, but the state's administration of Dunhuang is connected with the region's cultural accumulation.

After its fall the territory was absorbed by the Northern Liang and afterward by the Northern Wei. Among Li Gao's descendants Li Bao and Li Chong held office under the Northern Wei, Li Chong being known for his part in Emperor Xiaowen's reforms. The family's continuance between Hexi and the Northern Wei is a concrete case for the study of politics and family movement from the Sixteen Kingdoms into the Northern Dynasties.

The Western Liang, like the Southern and Northern Liang, was a regional regime of the Sixteen Kingdoms in Hexi, its rise and fall closely tied to the region's geography and economic base. The oasis agriculture and Silk Road trade of the corridor were the precondition of any state there, and the contests among them centered on such oasis cities as Dunhuang, Jiuquan and Zhangye. Li Gao's choice of Dunhuang as his starting point and his later move to Jiuquan answer to the distribution of those oases.

His policies of gathering refugees and founding schools resemble those of the other Hexi states of the time: with disorder and movement of population constant, gathering refugees both restored production and increased the pool of soldiers, while schools helped keep the support of scholar families. The measures show that the Hexi regimes shared a common basis of governmental experience.

His writings had considerable influence in Hexi at the time; he is recorded to have composed poems, rhapsodies and political essays, some of which survive in later collections and in citations by local gazetteers. That a man of letters governed a state is unusual among the rulers of the Sixteen Kingdoms.

After his death the state was held together by his descendants for some years. Following its fall the clan continued between the Northern Wei and the Sui-Tang; the Tang's posthumous honors to Li Gao were one measure by which the house established its legitimacy, giving the Western Liang's founding a place in Tang official narrative and shaping later assessments of the Hexi regimes of the Sixteen Kingdoms.

The Western and Northern Liang stood opposed according to geography and economy: the Northern Liang held Zhangye and Guzang, controlling the middle of the corridor, while the Western Liang held Dunhuang and Jiuquan, controlling its western stretch. The contest for the oasis cities between Jiuquan and Zhangye makes up the substance of Hexi politics in this period.

His time at Dunhuang fell in a period of Buddhist flourishing in Hexi, the monasteries and caves of Dunhuang continuing to develop. The Western Liang's patronage of Buddhism resembled that of the Northern and Southern Liang, its religious activity providing the social conditions for work at Mogao.

Its offices and local administration broadly followed the institutions of Wei and Jin. The difficulties the state faced were like those of the other Hexi regimes: limited population, modest military strength and long opposition to its neighbors. His strategy was to ally abroad with the Eastern Jin and cultivate learning at home, a policy that served him fairly well and let the state last more than twenty years in Hexi.

After his death the state was kept going by his sons Li Xin and Li Xun in turn. Li Xin lost ground in the wars with the Northern Liang, and Li Xun, holding Dunhuang, died when the city fell, ending the line. After the fall its clan and old ministers were mostly moved to the Northern Liang capital and afterward dispersed through the north with the Wei unification.

In the annals of the Sixteen Kingdoms the Western Liang fills little space, its story interwoven with the activity of the Northern and Southern Liang. The record of Li Gao himself is comparatively full, connected with his rule as a man of letters who left more writing than most; later judgment of him centers on his preservation of culture and settling of a region in time of disorder.

The sources for him are chiefly the record of Li Gao, Prince Wu Zhao of Liang, in the Book of Jin and such works as the Spring and Autumn of the Sixteen Kingdoms, some of his writing being preserved in encyclopedias and gazetteers. Dunhuang documents and the inscriptions at Mogao also supplement the study of Dunhuang society under the Western Liang.

The state's local organization rested on the commanderies and counties about the Xi and He provinces, its offices following Wei and Jin precedent. In his Dunhuang years Li Gao attended to the discipline of officials and the encouragement of farming, its administration comparing well with those of the other Hexi states.

Among the Hexi states the Western Liang was known for its cultural work, a character chiefly due to his own standing as a man of letters and his attention to schools.

The policies of his reign broadly continued those of the Zhangs' Former Liang.

Major Activities

Frontier defense and households

From Dunhuang, Li Gao used Yumen and Yangguan as western strongholds and expanded farming garrisons to support his contest with Northern Liang. After the move to Jiuquan, the Jin Shu records that he redistributed households that had earlier migrated toward Dunhuang from the Jianghan and Central Plains regions among several commanderies, including Kuaiji, Guangxia, and Wuwei. other accounts's stated overall total contains an evident textual error; this entry relies on the historical text's component account instead. Li Gao's armies sometimes repelled Mengxun but did not achieve his aim of uniting Hexi.

Schools and writing

The Jin Shu records a school at Dunhuang with five hundred additional students and portraits of earlier rulers and exemplary figures that Li Gao commissioned as models for his officials. His surviving literary record includes Shuzhi Fu and Huaishu Fu. His written instructions to his sons discuss military command, personnel choices, restraint in punishment, and study. They show his attention to learning and government, without proving that all later cultural achievements at Dunhuang resulted from his personal policies.

Personal Relations

• Li Yan and Li Chang: His grandfather and father respectively. Li Yan held a military office under Former Liang, and Li Chang died early.
• Song Yao: Li Gao's maternal half-brother, who worked with him in Dunhuang and was asked to assist the successor.
• Li Tan, Li Xin, and Li Rang: His sons. Li Tan died before him, Li Xin succeeded him, and Li Rang held Dunhuang.
• Ladies Xin and Yin: Lady Xin, daughter of Xin Na, was an earlier wife. Lady Yin was Li Xin's mother and was honored as empress dowager after Li Xin's succession.
• Duan Ye and Juqu Mengxun: Duan Ye had appointed Li Gao before their regimes separated. Mengxun, the ruler of Northern Liang, was Li Gao's main rival in later Hexi politics.

Historical Assessment

The Jin Shu describes Li Gao's rise through local support and his frontier administration. It also reports his own late acknowledgment that he had failed to unite Hexi. Omens and predictions in the biography belong to its historical narrative and are not treated here as verifiable events. Taken together, the encyclopedias and the Jin Shu support an assessment centered on founding and maintaining Western Liang, farming and defense in Hexi, and schools in his territory. Northern Liang's competing power limited both his expansion and his ability to stabilize the whole region.