Biography
Crown prince and accession
Wang Yan was Wang Jian's eleventh and youngest son and was first named Zongyan. Wang Jian's original heir was Wang Yuanying. After Yuanying's death, Wang Jian considered Wang Zonglu and Wang Zongjie as possible successors. The *New History of the Five Dynasties* says that Consort Xu Xian, Chancellor Zhang Ge, and others backed Zongyan; Wang Jian then appointed him crown prince and established the Chongxian Office, later renamed the Tiance Office. This is a historical account of how the succession was arranged, rather than certain evidence of Wang Jian's private thoughts. When Wang Jian died in 918 (first year of Former Shu Guangtian), Wang Yan succeeded him and elevated his mother Xu to empress dowager.
Government and court life
Wang Yan came to the throne young. The *New History of the Five Dynasties* and *Zizhi Tongjian*, both cited by other accounts, describe him as leaving military and civil affairs to associates. Wang Zongbi controlled appointments, while the eunuchs Song Guangsi and Wang Chengxiu enjoyed his confidence. The sources also criticize the empress dowager and another imperial consort for interfering in appointments and operating commercial lodgings. These accounts describe concentrated power around the throne and convey later historians' criticism of the last Former Shu court; they should be read alongside the events themselves.
Wang Yan built the Xuanhua Garden and Qinghe Palace in Chengdu and favored companions such as Han Zhao and Pan Zaiying. In 920 (second year of Former Shu Qiande), he traveled north. The local official Duan Rong urged him to remain in the capital and send generals instead, but his advice was rejected, and prefectures on the route supplied the journey. He built Shangqing Palace in 923 (fifth year of Former Shu Qiande). Wang Zongshou also urged attention to affairs of state at a banquet, without changing the pattern of appointments and entertainments.
Later Tang invasion and death
After Later Tang destroyed Later Liang in 923 (first year of Later Tang Tongguang), Former Shu faced greater pressure from the north. In 924 (sixth year of Former Shu Qiande), Wang Yan sent Ouyang Bin to Later Tang and withdrew some border forces. Reports by the Later Tang envoy Li Yan on Former Shu's finances and government informed discussions of an invasion. When Li Jiji and Guo Chongtao advanced in 925 (first year of Former Shu Xiankang), Wang Yan was traveling toward Qin Prefecture and returned to Chengdu on hearing the news. Shu forces retreated or surrendered. Wang Zongbi took control of Chengdu; Wang Yan submitted a surrender memorial and met the Later Tang army outside the city. Former Shu ended.
In 926 (fourth year of Later Tang Tongguang), Wang Yan and members of his clan were summoned toward Luoyang. Emperor Zhuangzong accepted a proposal from Jing Jin and ordered Wang Yan and his family killed at Qinchuan relay station. His surrender did not bring the settlement previously promised by Later Tang. Extant sources record that Emperor Mingzong posthumously made him Duke Shunzheng in 927 (second year of Later Tang Tiancheng) and arranged burial according to a noble's rites; another account gives the third year, so the date here follows other accounts.
Wang Yan was born about 900; his courtesy name was Huayuan, his earlier name Zongyan, changed to Yan on his accession, and he was the eleventh son of Wang Jian, founder of the Former Shu, his mother being the consort Xu, afterward honoured as the Grand Consort Yisheng. First enfeoffed as prince of Zheng, he was made heir apparent after the death of the heir Wang Yuanying, his mother being in favour. On Wang Jian's death in 918 he succeeded, changing the era to Qiande, and became the last emperor of the Former Shu in the Five Dynasties.
His reign was known for extravagance and pleasure. Fond of letters and given to versifying with his companions, he gave himself to music and women and built the Xuanhua garden, the Qinghe palace and the Yingxian palace at great expense. In the first month of 919 he received the honorific title Emperor of Sagely Virtue, Bright Filial Piety. The government lay largely with the empress dowagers and the eunuchs and favourites about him while he travelled and toured, and his gardens and palaces about Chengdu were the very image of the luxury of Shu at the time. It is recorded that his mother, the consort Xu, and the empress dowager Xu both meddled in government, so that the sale of offices flourished.
In 924 his adultery with the wife of Wang Chengxiu, the lady Yan, famed for her beauty, brought a series of changes at court, and the Later Tang court, after sending envoys to look into the affairs of Shu, resolved on conquest. In the ninth month of 925 Li Jiji, prince of Wei of the Later Tang, invaded Shu in force; Wang Yan was then on a tour, the Shu troops were hurriedly raised and lost one action after another, and in the eleventh month Wang Yan surrendered at Chengdu in the ceremony of white robes, the jade disc held in his mouth and a sheep led with cords. The Former Shu, which had stood little more than thirty years, came to an end.
After his surrender Wang Yan and his family were moved toward Luoyang. In 926, on the road, Emperor Zhuangzong of the Later Tang had him killed, and many of his family with him. His life is commonly taken by later ages as a type of the ruler who loses his state through misgovernment in the Five Dynasties: he was not without literary talent, and his verses on the drunken toilette are occasionally noted in literary history, but his neglect of government and his extravagance brought the Former Shu down quickly. In later discussion of the rise and fall of the Former Shu, the founding work of Wang Jian is commonly set against the ruin wrought by Wang Yan, as an instance of the short life of the Ten Kingdoms.
His elevation as heir apparent was bound up directly with the death of the earlier heir, Wang Yuanying. Wang Yuanying, Wang Jian's eldest son, fought with the minister Tang Daoxi and rose in arms against him, was defeated and killed; thereafter Wang Yan, whose mother the consort Xu was in favour, was preferred among the sons and made heir. Wang Jian hesitated over the decision in his last years but never altered it.
Once on the throne Wang Yan gave himself up to pleasure and building. Fond of novel dress and bright colours, he is said to have had the palace women wear Daoist and Buddhist robes for amusement; the lines of his song on the drunken toilette — here we walk, there we walk, forever after flowers and willows — are commonly used to describe the glitter of his life. He travelled again and again, leaving traces at Mount Qingcheng and Qinzhou, and the escorts and supplies his journeys required wearied the countryside. The government of the Former Shu lay much in the hands of eunuchs and favourites, the empress dowager's family and the old servants each holding office, and few at court gave him plain counsel.
In 925 Emperor Zhuangzong of the Later Tang, having looked into the true state of Shu, resolved on war and sent Li Jiji, prince of Wei, with the privy counsellor Guo Chongtao at the head of a great army. The Shu troops were heavily beaten at Sanquan; Wang Yan hurried back to Chengdu from his tour in alarm and surrendered in the eleventh month. The Later Tang thus gained the treasuries of the Former Shu and the wealth of Shu, while Wang Yan was sent to Luoyang and killed with his family the following year. Of his death the histories record that Zhuangzong was at first inclined to spare him and changed his mind on the urging of his actors and favourites.
In later discussion of the fall of the Former Shu the cause is commonly put down to Wang Yan's dissipation and the corruption of its government, with the note that the wealth and comparative quiet Shu had enjoyed since Wang Jian had left ruler and ministers sunk in ease. The rise and fall of the Former Shu is often taken as an instance of the short life of the Ten Kingdoms, and Wang Yan himself as the type of the ruler of the Five Dynasties who lost his state through extravagance.
Though the Former Shu lasted only a short time its economy was notably prosperous. In Wang Jian's reign the fugitives had been called back and taxes lightened, so that Shu recovered by degrees after the disorders at the end of the Tang; under Wang Yan that accumulated wealth only fed the extravagance of ruler and ministers. The histories describe full treasuries, splendid palaces and gardens and considerable collections of books and antiquities, all of which passed mostly to the Later Tang when the state fell.
The Later Tang's campaign took less than three months from the march out to the surrender, a speed that surprised contemporaries. Apart from the weakness of the Shu armies, the misjudgment of ruler and ministers was a chief cause: Wang Yan had neither trained his troops in earnest nor answered the Later Tang's moves effectively. The Later Tang itself was at once shaken by the killing of Guo Chongtao, leaving a vacuum of power in Shu which Meng Zhixiang in the end filled, founding the Later Shu.
Wang Yan's literary activity is also recorded; many of his verses in answer to the poets of the day survive, among them the song on the drunken toilette. They are not without merit as literature, though they sit oddly with his conduct in government. The fate of the imperial house and the old servants of the Former Shu about its fall was harsh as well: Wang Yan's family was killed on the road, and some of the officials of Shu took service under the Later Tang or the Later Shu. In later discussion of the fall of the Former Shu, Wang Yan's extravagance and neglect of government are put first, with the note that the Ten Kingdoms generally lacked firm institutional foundations and that their fortunes turned on the character of a single ruler; his figure accordingly stands in the histories as a representative of the dissolute rulers of the Five Dynasties.
The circumstances of the fall of the Former Shu are recorded in some detail: Wang Yan came out to surrender in white robes with the jade disk in his mouth, leading a sheep and bound with grass, and was killed on the way to Luoyang at the Qin-chuan post station at the age of twenty-eight; in 927 he was posthumously enfeoffed as the duke of Shunzheng and buried with the rites of a feudal lord. The state lasted barely a dozen years, and its palaces, books and wealth passed largely to the Later Tang, after which Shu briefly lay open to whoever could seize it, until Meng Zhixiang took it and founded the Later Shu.
Among the Ten Kingdoms the Former Shu court was noted for the splendor of its building and its arts: the Xuanhua park, the Qinghe and Yingxian palaces and the Yishen pavilion rose one after another, halls and galleries joined within the grounds. Wang Yan also forbade a popular custom, dressing his palace women as Daoist priests with rouged faces, and composed such collections as the Fireworks Collection and the Rules of the Inner Court; of his lyrics few survive, but they are often cited by later critics as evidence of the continuation of late Tang and Five Dynasties song in Shu. The fate of the ruling house, the old officials and the artifacts of the Former Shu around its fall, together with the later discovery of such remains as Wang Jian's Yongling tomb, are important threads in the study of this short-lived state. Later accounts of its fall generally tie it to the common weakness of the Ten Kingdoms, whose fortunes turned on a single ruler and whose economic and cultural prosperity could not sustain political independence; Wang Yan's figure accordingly stands in the histories as a representative of the dissolute rulers of the Five Dynasties.