Li Chong

Biography

Family Background and Early Years

Li Chong came from the Li clan of Longxi and was a great-grandson of Li Gao, Emperor Wuzhao of Western Liang. His father Li Bao was Northern Wei General Who Guards the North and Duke Xuan of Dunhuang. The youngest of the brothers, Li Chong lost his father when young and was raised by his eldest brother Li Cheng, Administrator of Xingyang. He was calm, elegant, and broad-minded. Li Cheng often praised him: “CiErhis ability is extraordinary, and he is fit to be entrusted with the household.” Li Chong accompanied Li Cheng to Xingyang. At the time, sons of local officials often harassed the population and demanded goods, but Li Chong and Li Cheng's eldest son Li Shao maintained a reputation for probity, avoided private exactions, and acted openly, winning local praise.

Entry into Office and Favor under Empress Dowager Feng

In 471, the fifth year of Huangxing, Li Chong became a student of the Secretariat. He was sociable but did not engage in careless joking, and his peers respected him. Early in Yanxing that same year he was promoted to Secretarial zhongshan, handling palace documents. His careful, intelligent, and efficient work gradually won the appreciation of Empress Dowager Feng, and he rose to Director of the Inner Secretariat and Palace Gentleman of the Southern Office.

Early Northern Wei used a local system of clan-master supervision in which household registration was severely concealed; as many as thirty or fifty households might be registered as a single household. In the second month of 486, the tenth year of Taihe, Li Chong devised the Three Chiefs system: five households formed a neighborhood, five neighborhoods a ward, and five wards a community, each with a chief, in order to verify household registration and equalize taxes and labor service. Empress Dowager Feng was very pleased by the memorial and summoned the court to debate it. Secretariat Director Zheng Xi, Secretariat Director Gao You, and others opposed it, saying “Yan ShiKeYong，Shi Shi Nan Xing”. Defender-in-chief Tuoba Pi agreed that the system would benefit both state and people but proposed delaying implementation until the agricultural slack season after autumn. Li Chong argued that unless the system was introduced at tax-collection time, people would see only the burden of chiefs and household verification, not the benefit of equal burdens and lower exactions; if introduced during the assessment season, they would directly feel the advantage of fairer taxation and implementation would be easier. Empress Dowager Feng concluded: “LiSan Zhang，ZeKeYou Chang Zhun，FuYou Heng Fen；Bao Yin ZhiHuKeChu，Jiao Xing Zhi RenKeZhi。HeWeiErBuKe？” The Three Chiefs system was therefore implemented and, according to the source, benefited both public and private interests.

Li Chong was then promoted to Secretariat Director and Cavalier in Regular Attendance and soon transferred to Minister of the Southern Office, receiving the title Marquis of Shunyang. His favor under Empress Dowager Feng increased. He received monthly gifts amounting to tens of millions in cash and was advanced to Duke of Longxi. The empress dowager also privately gave him treasures and imperial objects unknown to outsiders. His household, previously poor, became wealthy. Yet the source says he remained modest and self-disciplined, skilled both at accumulating wealth and at distributing it to help others. Relatives and people from his home region shared in his resources. He treated people humbly, pitied the poor, sympathized with families whose status had declined, and recommended numerous officials for advancement, earning widespread praise.

A Powerful Minister under Emperor Xiaowen

Northern Wei custom had high princes and ministers addressed directly by personal name, but Emperor Xiaowen often called Li Chong “Secretariat Director” rather than naming him. After Empress Dowager Feng died, the emperor treated Li Chong with exceptional courtesy during his mourning. In discussions of ritual, law, wording of edicts, and the fixing of penalties, Xiaowen, although personally drafting texts, first sought Li Chong's opinion before deciding. Li Chong devoted himself fully to the ruler, withheld nothing he knew, and displayed constant concern and diligence. The source says even old ministers and imperial relatives could not compare with him; the realm increasingly trusted him and outsiders also regarded him as worthy. Emperor Xiaowen relied upon and respected him deeply.

In the twelfth month of 486 the court reformed the bureaucracy, reorganized offices, and established a five-rank nobility system. Li Chong participated in fixing the institutional forms, was enfeoffed Founding Marquis of Xingyang Commandery with eight hundred households, and was appointed Minister of the Court of Judicial Review. Soon he became Palace Attendant and Minister of Personnel and served as tutor to Yuan Xi, Prince of Xianyang. In the sixth month of 493 Emperor Xiaowen made Yuan Xun crown prince, and Li Chong was appointed Junior Preceptor to the Crown Prince. When the emperor established ranks of consorts and nine concubines in the inner palace following the Rites of Zhou, Li Chong's daughter was appointed a consort.

Moving the Capital to Luoyang and Building the New Capital

In the eighth month of 493 Emperor Xiaowen led an army south and appointed Li Chong General Who Assists the State, commanding the escort. The Northern Wei army departed Pingcheng and moved toward Luoyang. Heavy rain continued through the ninth month, yet the emperor insisted on advancing. Officials knelt before his horse to remonstrate. Li Chong asked to turn back because the troops were exhausted and provisions insufficient. Emperor Xiaowen angrily declared: “FangYuJing YingYuZhou，YiTongQuYu，ErQing DengRuSheng，LvYiDaJi，FuYue You Chang，QingWuFuYan！” and prepared to ride on. Prince of Anding Tuoba Xiu, Prince of Rencheng Tuoba Cheng, and others wept and pleaded with him. The emperor then said: “Jin Zhe Xing DongBuXiao，DongErWuCheng，HeYiShi Hou？……RuoBuNan Luan，JiDangYiDouYuCi.” The officials were thus compelled to accept moving the capital to Luoyang.

The source explains that Xiaowen had intended from the beginning to move south to Luoyang but feared opposition and therefore used the southern campaign as a device. Before the move, Li Chong privately advised that the emperor temporarily return to Pingcheng and formally move south only after the Luoyang palaces were ready. Xiaowen replied that he would inspect the mountains and rivers in the four directions and afterward stay temporarily at Ye; he never returned to Pingcheng. Soon Li Chong was appointed General Who Guards the South. On the first day of the tenth month of the seventeenth year of Taihe (26 October 493), the emperor ordered Li Chong and Dong Jue to supervise construction of the Luoyang palaces. Li Chong was later retitled Founding Marquis of Yangping Commandery without changing the size of his fief. After the move he determined the base plan of Luoyang, designed the imperial ancestral temple, and supervised palace construction. The Mingtang, Circular Mound, ancestral temple, and Taiji Hall at Pingcheng were also, according to the source, designed by him. He later rose to Vice Director of the Department of State Affairs and was retitled Founding Marquis of Qingyuan County.

Final Years and Death

When Li Chong was in his forties his hair had already grayed, though the source says his appearance remained handsome and showed little sign of age. Li Biao, whom Li Chong himself had promoted, later acted against his interests, and Li Chong joined other nobles in attacking him. Normally mild, Li Chong became violently agitated when angry, suffering palpitations, confused speech, and repeated angry denunciations of Li Biao as a petty man. Medicine could not help. A physician diagnosed damage and rupture of the liver. Li Chong died more than ten days later at age forty-nine. The court posthumously awarded him Minister over the Masses, gave him the posthumous name Wenmu, and buried him at Mount Fuzhou.

Self-Discipline, Impartiality and Generosity with Wealth

Though he stood high in office, Li Chong was always strict with himself and impartial in his dealings. In earlier years his elder brother Li Zuo and the governor of Henan, Lai Chong, had come over to Wei together from Liangzhou but were long at odds, and Li Zuo wove charges against Lai Chong that starved him to death in prison; later Lai Chong's son Lai Hu accused Li Zuo of corruption, Li Zuo was thrown into prison, and Li Chong with the rest of the family, though innocent, was caught up in the affair and imprisoned with him until a general amnesty released them. Afterwards, when Li Chong was trusted with power, Lai Hu was serving as a gentleman of the southern bureau and feared that Li Chong would take revenge, and kept out of his way; but Li Chong comforted him instead and told him to set his mind at ease, and when Lai Hu was later implicated in a case of corruption Li Chong of his own accord memorialized that Lai Hu had nothing to do with it, so that he escaped involvement. Being favoured by Empress Dowager Feng, Li Chong's honours grew daily, with gifts of many tens of millions of cash each month, and he was raised to duke of Longxi, while the empress dowager also privately gave him treasures and articles for imperial use of which outsiders knew nothing. His family had been poor, and from this time it grew rich; yet he remained modest, strict with himself, and as good at gathering wealth as at scattering it to help others — his kin and even ordinary men of the same district almost all received something from him. He pitied the poor and rootless and those whose families had declined, and many officials at court rose only through his recommendation, so that men praised him on every side.

Debate on Campaigning in the Qinghui Hall and the Feast for the Heir

After 493, Emperor Xiaowen once received his ministers in the Qinghui Hall, saying that the sage's great treasure is office and merit, that he had moved the pole of government to the centre and established himself at Song and Luo, and that though the great structure was unfinished the lines of order were laid out; but that there were unsubmitted petty men in the south and fierce barbarians close at hand, and that this was why he grieved day and night, that "the plan to take the south is settled," only the date being uncertain, and that diviners had all urged him that a campaign now would surely succeed; this being a matter of family and state, each minister should speak his whole mind, and none should waver merely because he had spoken first. Li Chong answered that "in the method of war, human affairs come first and divination after; now the divination is auspicious but human affairs are, I fear, not ready — this year's harvest falls short of the usual, the capital has only just moved and the people's livelihoods are unsettled; to add a campaign to this I hold unwise, and it should wait until next autumn." Emperor Xiaowen granted that "the president's words are not without reason" but held to his resolve on grounds of the danger to the altars of state and the nearness of the enemy, arguing that in the past he had led two hundred thousand men without leaving the capital region, which was abundance of human affairs but not of season, while in other years the season was good but human affairs lacking, so that if he always waited for human affairs there would never be a campaign at all, and closed by saying that if the autumn expedition failed to win a victory the three ministers should be handed to the minister of justice, and dismissed the assembly. When Yuan Xun was made heir apparent, Emperor Xiaowen held a feast in the Qinghui Hall, saying that setting up an heir was a matter that harmonized the three powers, illumined the seven ancestral temples, delighted the ten thousand and was celebrated by heaven and men alike, and reflecting that the way of heaven and earth is now full and now empty, that no good thing lasts forever, and that if heaven itself is so, how much more human affairs, in which rank rises and falls from of old. Li Chong answered that with the heir taking the position of the heir apparent all the people felt honoured, but that he had formerly disgraced the office of tutor by failing to guide Yuan Xun in the right way, and was ashamed before the emperor, and that he was both glad and ashamed to be included in the feast through the emperor's kindness; and Emperor Xiaowen said that he himself could not change Yuan Xun's dullness, so why should Li Chong apologize.

Memorial Against Garrisoning Nanzheng

When Emperor Xiaowen campaigned south, Li Chong was made concurrent president of the left and left to hold Luoyang. After the imperial carriage crossed the Huai, separate edicts sent the general of the south, Yuan Ying, and the general of the pacified south, Liu Zao, against Hanzhong, and six thousand men were called up from Yong, Jing and Qi to garrison Nanzheng once the city was taken. Li Chong memorialized against it, saying that Qinzhou was perilous and bordered the Qiang and the Yi, that since the western army set out the court had sent pay and reinforcements without pause, and that with the Di and Hu in revolt on every side, hauling grain and donning armour had not ceased to this day; to send garrison troops in advance to a place beyond the mountains, though they were exempted from labour service, would still, he feared, alarm the people, and if the city were never taken it would only stir up the populace and perhaps join the Hu and bind the Yi, with consequences hard to guess. He went on that the western road was perilous, a single track a thousand li long, with a garrison deep beyond the borders and alone at the mouth of a host of rebels; if the enemy attacked it could not be relieved in a moment, and when the food was gone no grain could be transported — as the ancients said, "though the whip be long, it does not reach the horse's belly," and Nanzheng was for the state exactly the horse's belly. The king's campaigns, he said, are meant to save the people, while the barbarian foe guards what he holds out of love for the land, and of the two principles the virtue differs in depth; the emperor's gracious fame had gone far already, why be so hasty for one city? Wei already covered eight of the nine provinces and held nine parts in ten of the people, and only the far north of the desert and the lands beyond the Yangtze remained unsubmitted, to be bound in time and not in haste today; the thing to do was to open the frontiers wide, take cities and strongholds, accumulate goods and grain until there was enough to sustain a war, and only then establish offices and appoint generals for the work of swallowing the enemy. As it was, Zhongli and Shouyang lay close at hand and were not taken, and Zhu city and Xinye but a step away had not submitted; if the eastern lands could not be held by near forces, could the far west be held by distant ones? If troops must be posted, he feared the end would be to hand them to the enemy; and now that the capital stood in the centre of the land and bordered the enemy's territory, the need was to gather men who would die, to sweep the south; to send out a lone and scanty force and abandon it to destruction would make men fear to hold a frontier in future campaigns, and then to get them to fight to the death would be no easy matter. From all of which he concluded that "not to garrison is best." Emperor Xiaowen followed his advice.

The Case of Li Biao and His Death

In 498, when Emperor Xiaowen campaigned south, Li Chong and the minister of personnel, the prince of Rencheng, Yuan Cheng, held that Li Biao was arrogant and rude, and so arrested him and memorialized his crimes; the memorial was written in Li Chong's own hand, unknown to his household, and its language was so fierce and blunt that Li Chong also made confession of his own faults. Emperor Xiaowen read it and sighed for a long time, then said that "Li Biao may be called utterly reckless, but Li Chong's conduct too goes too far." At the time Li Chong was in a great rage, again and again recounting Li Biao's faults, glaring and shouting, smashing the table, seizing the censors and making them kowtow, their hands bound behind them, abusing them as he pleased. Li Chong had always been mild in temper, but this rage brought on a sudden illness: his thoughts were disordered, his spirit unhinged and his speech incoherent, and he wrung his wrists and cursed, calling Li Biao a petty man; medicine did nothing, and a physician diagnosed the liver as wounded and ruptured. He died some ten days later at the age of forty-nine, and the court posthumously made him minister of works with the posthumous name Wenmu and buried him on Fuzhou Mountain. Emperor Xiaowen held a mourning rite for him at Xuanhu and wept aloud, issuing an edict that Li Chong "was by nature firm and gentle, cultivated himself in virtue and righteousness, received teaching in the household and showed moral conduct in affairs of state," that in the early Taichu years when the emperor was still young he had long since entrusted him with secret and weighty matters, which Li Chong handled well, and that after the move to Luoyang, when the court chose officials for pure and important posts, Li Chong's rank rose to the head of the secretariat and he managed what was issued and received; loyal and reverent, gentle and wise, fit to be a model of understanding, and kind, respectful, trustworthy and generous in winning the people's hearts, he could be called a worthy minister of the state and a pattern to the court, and the emperor had meant to raise his office again and reward his merit in requital of an old servant when he suddenly died, to the emperor's deep grief. In the first month of 499 Emperor Xiaowen returned from Ye to Luoyang and passed Li Chong's grave; the attendants told him of it, and the emperor, then ill in bed, gazed at the tomb from afar and covered his face and wept for a long time, and afterwards issued an edict sacrificing to Li Chong with the grand sacrifice of ox, sheep and pig; and when he came back to the capital he would always speak of Li Chong's death whenever he met other officials, and tears would come at the first words. Long before, hearing that Li Chong was gravely ill, he had told the general of the right guard, Song Bian, that Li Chong held an important office and managed all affairs, was honest and frugal, and had long been relied upon; that it was precisely because he was kindly and wise, loyal and refined, that the emperor had entrusted him with the government and could campaign abroad without worry at home; and that his sudden grave illness and death grieved him beyond measure.

Major Activities

Political Reform

Li Chong was a central participant in Emperor Xiaowen's reforms. In 486 he created the Three Chiefs system, organizing five households into a neighborhood, five neighborhoods into a ward, and five wards into a community, each with a chief. It replaced clan-master supervision, verified household registers, and equalized taxes and labor service, benefiting both the state and ordinary people. He also participated in implementation of the equal-field system and in reform of the bureaucracy and five-rank nobility, playing a key role in the refinement of Northern Wei institutions.

Construction of Capitals

The source presents Li Chong as Northern Wei's principal designer of capital construction. The Mingtang, Circular Mound, imperial ancestral temple, and Taiji Hall at Pingcheng were all designed by him. After the move to Luoyang he helped determine the city's base layout, designed the ancestral temple, and oversaw palace construction, making a major contribution to the new capital.

Assisting the Move to Luoyang

In 493 Li Chong accompanied Emperor Xiaowen on the southern campaign and played an important role in the critical decision to move the capital. Although he initially remonstrated against continued marching, once Xiaowen disclosed the relocation plan he supported and participated in it actively, taking responsibility for building the new capital.

Recommending Talent

Li Chong was described as humble toward others, sympathetic to the poor and to families that had declined, and responsible for recommending many officials for promotion. In his final years, however, he attacked Li Biao, a man he had earlier promoted, after their interests diverged. His violent anger over the affair contributed directly to the illness from which he died.

How the Three Elders System Worked and What It Achieved

The Three Elders system that Li Chong created and carried through has been much discussed in later ages for its design and its effects. After it was put in force the population the Northern Wei held grew in its heyday to about double. Its first purpose was to take back the dependent households scattered among the powerful and register them again as households of the state, and on that basis to distribute land at the grassroots and keep taxation coming in regularly and labour service being called up. In local order its first task was judicial interpretation, the reconciling of disputes and the upholding of law: in earlier years some commoners, long adrift, had sold house and field and ended up homeless in other districts, and when the Three Elders were set up the old administrative bodies had been destroyed, so that in rebuilding order forgeries easily appeared and the local magnates preyed on the villages, and even with much evidence no basis could be found; here the value of the Three Elders showed itself, since they were mostly local magnates of great local standing who knew local conditions well and could act as a regulator. Second, the age being one of disorder, disputes over land ownership never ceased, especially after displaced men returned home, and the Three Elders could arbitrate and mediate such disputes, reducing conflict and keeping the locality stable; their duties covered the greater part of what maintained local order, and scholars generally assess their role in local governance favourably. Through the system the Northern Wei guided the people to work their own land and kept the displaced from turning bandit, and by checking households it brought out sheltered households and turned them into freeholders to widen the tax base; in securing revenue it also distinguished individual labour, encouraging those with more means of production to work and to open waste land so as to achieve comparative fairness, and roused the labour power held by local magnates into active production, so that men did their utmost and the land yielded its utmost, in pursuit of social, political and economic stability.

The Plan of Luoyang and Its Later Influence

Under Li Chong's planning, Luoyang changed the scattered layout and unclear centre of the Cao-Wei city that had made traffic difficult. Redesigned, its palace complex kept the long rectangle of Han and Wei, with palace, walled city and outer city ordered from within outward, north and south, and this laid out a manner that opened a new fashion, changing the Han tradition of "court before market" in which residential quarters and the imperial precinct were separate and markets were set down here and there for convenience of living, while nurseries and temples were scattered among them. The whole city was laid out symmetrically on a central axis with the palace at the middle, expressing the supremacy of imperial power; beyond the outer wall lay many villages administered as li and other units, which kept order around the capital and pulled along the economy of the neighbourhood. Later capitals of successive dynasties borrowed from the features of Luoyang, which became a representative of the ancient Chinese capital; Li Chong's part in its building was beyond question, and his architectural skill and powers of coordination showed him a master builder of his age.

Personal Relations

• Great-grandfather: Li Gao, Emperor Wuzhao of Western Liang
• Father: Li Bao, Northern Wei General Who Guards the North and Duke Xuan of Dunhuang
• Eldest brother: Li Cheng, Northern Wei General of the Dragon Cavalry, Administrator of Xingyang, and Marquis Mu of Guzang
• Brother: Li Mao, Grand Master for Splendid Happiness and Duke Gong of Dunhuang
• Brother: Li Fu, General Who Guards Afar, Administrator of Yingchuan, and Marquis Hui of Xiangwu
• Brother: Li Zuo, General Who Assists the State, Inspector of Jing Province, and Baron Zhao of Jingyang
• Brother: Li Gongye, died young
• Wife: Lady Zheng of Xingyang, daughter of Zheng Dexuan
• Eldest son: Li Yanshi, Northern Wei holder of the imperial tally, commander of military affairs of Guang Province, General of the Left, Inspector of Guang Province, and Founding Marquis of Qingyuan County
• Second son: Li Xiuzuan, Attendant to the Crown Prince
• Third son: Li Yankao, external military staff officer of the Defender-in-chief
• Eldest daughter: Li Changfei, married Zheng Daozhao of Xingyang
• Second daughter: Li Zhongyu, married Zheng Hongjian of Xingyang
• Third daughter: Li Lingfei, married Lu Daoyu of Fanyang
• Fourth daughter: Li Yuanhua, married Yuan Xie, Prince Wuxuan of Pengcheng
• Fifth daughter: Li Zhifei, married Cui Xu of Qinghe
• Sixth daughter: Li Zhihua, married Yuan Jihai of Henan
• Li Cheng: eldest brother who raised Li Chong and praised him as “his ability is extraordinary, and he is fit to be entrusted with the household”
• Empress Dowager Feng: appreciated Li Chong, adopted his Three Chiefs proposal, and showered him with favor
• Emperor Xiaowen: trusted Li Chong, often addressed him as “Secretariat Director” rather than by name, and entrusted him with major reforms
• Yuan Xun: crown prince for whom Li Chong served as Junior Preceptor
• Yuan Xi: Prince of Xianyang for whom Li Chong served as tutor
• Li Biao: a man promoted by Li Chong; after their interests diverged, Li Chong joined other nobles in attacking him and became so enraged over the matter that he fell ill and died

Historical Assessment

Northern and Southern Dynasties / Contemporary

• Li Cheng: “CiErhis ability is extraordinary, and he is fit to be entrusted with the household。” (Book of Wei, “Biography of Li Chong”)
• Empress Dowager Feng on the Three Chiefs proposal: “LiSan Zhang，ZeKeYou Chang Zhun，FuYou Heng Fen；Bao Yin ZhiHuKeChu，Jiao Xing Zhi RenKeZhi。” (Book of Wei, “Biography of Li Chong”)
• Contemporary assessment: “WuBuFuQiMing Duan ShenMiErGui Xin Yan。” (Book of Wei, “Biography of Li Chong”)

Sui and Tang Periods

• The Li clan of Longxi regarded Li Chong as founder of the Pushe branch. His descendants remained prominent in the Tang; his sixth-generation descendants included Li Yuanheng, magistrate of Anyi, and Li Changting, a companion to a Tang prince.

Song and Yuan Periods

• Sima Guang's Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance records Li Chong's career and credits the Three Chiefs system with contributing to Northern Wei's growth in state strength.

Modern Period

• Modern scholars, as summarized in the source, generally regard Li Chong as a core figure in Emperor Xiaowen's Northern Wei reforms and consider the Three Chiefs system important to social stability and economic development.
• Works including Tian Yuqing's studies of Northern Wei discuss Li Chong's contribution to political reform in detail.