Shi Hu

Biography

Family Background and Early Life

Shi Hu's grandfather was Shi Yexie and his father was Shi Koumi. Shi Le's father Shi Zhouhezhu raised Shi Hu as if he were his own son. When Shi Hu was seven, a physiognomist reportedly said that he had an unusual appearance and powerful bone structure and would rise to extraordinary rank.

During the Yongxing era, 304–306, Shi Hu became separated from Shi Le. In the tenth month of 311, the first year of the Jiaping era, the Western Jin general Liu Kun, hoping to ally with Shi Le against Han, returned Shi Le's mother Lady Wang and Shi Hu to him. Shi Hu was then seventeen.

Shi Hu was cruel by temperament. As a youth he enjoyed shooting people with a pellet bow, roamed without restraint, and even killed for amusement. Shi Le once intended to execute him, but Lady Wang stopped him, saying that fast oxen often broke carts while still calves and that some patience was needed. At eighteen Shi Hu became somewhat more restrained, paid closer attention to his conduct, behaved respectfully, and showed deference to scholars.

He was seven chi and five cun tall, strong and agile, highly skilled in riding and archery, and regarded as exceptionally brave. Generals, aides, and relatives alike feared him. Shi Le valued him greatly, appointed him General Who Conquers the Caitiffs, and arranged his marriage to the younger sister of General Guo Rong. Shi Hu, however, favored his concubine Zheng Yingtao and successively killed two wives, Ladies Guo and Cui. Any officer whose courage or strategy approached his own was liable to be eliminated. After taking cities, he frequently buried or executed men and women without distinguishing the guilty from the innocent, leaving few survivors. Shi Le repeatedly reprimanded and admonished him, but Shi Hu did not change. He nevertheless commanded troops with strict discipline and little administrative complexity; no one dared violate his orders, and his campaigns were repeatedly successful. Shi Le therefore trusted him increasingly and gave him independent command.

Campaigning across the Realm

In the second month of 313, Shi Le left Gepi and sent Shi Hu with two thousand cavalry toward Shouchun. His troops encountered Jin transport vessels and rushed to seize them, but Ji Zhan defeated them. In the twelfth month, after the Battle of Xiangguo, Shi Le sent Shi Hu to Zhuyang to form an alliance with Duan Jilujan, where the two became sworn brothers.

In the fourth month of 314, Shi Le sent Shi Hu against Ye. The city collapsed and Liu Yan fled to Linqiu, while refugees living around the Three Terraces surrendered. Shi Le first appointed Tao Bao Administrator of Wei Commandery, but soon replaced him with Shi Hu as commander of Ye.

In the fourth month of 316, Shi Hu attacked Liu Yan at Linqiu. Duan Pidi, Inspector of Youzhou, sent his younger brother Duan Wenyang to relieve Liu. Shi Hu captured Linqiu; Liu Yan fled into Duan Wenyang's army, while Shi Hu captured Liu Yan's younger brother Liu Qi and withdrew.

In 319 Shi Hu attacked Chen Chuan, a leader of the Qihuo forces, at Pengguan. Shi Le sent him with fifty thousand troops as reinforcement, and the armies fought at Junyi. Zu Ti was defeated and withdrew to Liang. Shi Hu moved five thousand households from Chen Chuan's following to Xiangguo. That same year Shi Le sent him to Shuofang, where he inflicted a severe defeat on the Xianbei leader Riliuyan, beheading twenty thousand and capturing more than thirty thousand. In the eleventh month, Shi Le appointed him chief assistant to the Chanyu and supervisor of the imperial guards; he was soon also named General of Agile Cavalry, Palace Attendant, and authorized to establish his own office, and was enfeoffed as Duke of Zhongshan.

In the second month of 320, Shi Hu besieged Yanci and attacked Shao Xu, capturing eleven outlying camps. Shao personally led a sortie, but Shi Hu ambushed him and cut off his retreat, taking him prisoner. In the eighth month Shi Le sent Shi Hu with forty thousand infantry and cavalry against the rebel general Xu Kan. Xu offered his wife as a hostage and requested surrender.

In the third month of 321, Shi Hu attacked Duan Pidi, the Eastern Jin Inspector of Youzhou, at Yanci, while Kong Chang captured the cities of Youzhou. Shi Hu took Duan Pidi and Duan Wenyang prisoner, and Shi Le later had them killed.

In the second month of 322, after Shi Le designated Shi Hong as heir, he sent Shi Hu with forty thousand elite troops against Xu Kan. In the seventh month Shi Hu captured Mount Tai and took Xu Kan prisoner, sending him to Xiangguo for execution. In the eighth month Shi Hu led forty thousand infantry and cavalry against General Who Pacifies the East Cao Ni. Most commanderies and counties of Qingzhou surrendered. Shi Hu surrounded Guanggu, where Cao surrendered and was sent to Xiangguo for execution. Shi Hu buried alive thirty thousand surrendered soldiers. After the remonstrance of Qingzhou Inspector Liu Zheng, he left more than seven hundred men and women to Liu Zheng for the defense of Qingzhou.

In 325 Shi Hu led forty thousand infantry and cavalry through Chenggao Pass and fought Liu Yue west of the Luo River. Liu was defeated and withdrew into Shiliang. Shi Hu besieged the city. Liu Yao personally led both land and river forces to its relief. Shi Hu advanced with thirty thousand cavalry but was defeated by the Former Zhao general Liu Hei. In the sixth month he nevertheless captured Shiliang and took Liu Yue and more than eighty of his officers prisoner, while burying alive nine thousand of Liu's soldiers. He then attacked Wang Teng in Bingzhou, captured and killed him, and buried seven thousand soldiers alive. Si, Yu, Xu, and Yan provinces thereby came under Later Zhao, whose border with Eastern Jin followed the Huai River.

In the tenth month of 326, acting on Cheng Xia's advice, Shi Le began constructing palaces at Ye and ordered Crown Prince Shi Hong to garrison the city with ten thousand imperial troops. Shi Hu, believing his own merit to be great, did not want to leave Ye, but Shi Le ordered his household to move out, causing Shi Hu to resent Cheng Xia. That same year Shi Hu attacked Tuoba Hena, Prince of Dai, and fought north of the Juzhu mountain pass. Tuoba Hena was defeated and moved his capital.

In the seventh month of 328, Shi Hu led forty thousand troops west through Zhi Pass into Former Zhao's Hedong. More than fifty counties submitted, and he advanced against Puban. Liu Yao brought elite land and river forces to the relief. Shi Hu became fearful and withdrew, and Liu Yao pursued. In the eighth month, at Gaohou, Shi Hu suffered a major defeat. His adopted son Shi Zhan, father of Ran Min, was killed, and bodies reportedly covered the road for more than two hundred li. Shi Hu fled to Chaoge.

In the twelfth month Shi Le personally led a large army to relieve Luoyang and ordered Shi Hu to occupy Shimen. On the fifth day, Shi Hu led thirty thousand infantry westward from the north of the city against the Former Zhao center, while Shi Kan and Shi Cong led eight thousand elite cavalry northward from the west against the Former Zhao vanguard. Fierce fighting took place at Xiyang Gate. Shi Le put on armor, came out through Changhe Gate, and struck from another direction. Former Zhao was decisively defeated, with more than fifty thousand beheaded and Liu Yao captured.

In the eighth month of 329, Liu Yin, Prince of Nanyang of Former Zhao, led tens of thousands to Chang'an. Later Zhao sent Shi Hu with twenty thousand cavalry. In the ninth month, Shi Hu defeated Former Zhao at Yiqu, pursued the retreating army, captured Shanggui, and seized Crown Prince Liu Xi, Prince Liu Yin, and more than three thousand officials and military officers, all of whom were killed. More than nine thousand Former Zhao civil and military officials, refugees from east of the passes, and elite families from Qin and Yong were moved to Xiangguo. Shi Hu also buried alive more than five thousand Tuge at Luoyang. He then attacked the Jimuqie branch of the Qiang in Hexi, captured tens of thousands, and pacified Qinzhou and Longxi. The Di leader Pu Hong, later Fu Hong, and the Qiang leader Yao Yizhong both submitted. Shi Hu recommended Fu Hong to supervise military affairs of the Six Yi and made Yao Yizhong Left Commander of the Six Yi, moving the residents of 150,000 Di and Qiang villages to Si and Ji provinces.

Ambition for the Throne

In the second month of 330, Shi Le styled himself Great Heavenly King of Zhao, appointed Shi Hong crown prince, and made Shi Hu Grand Commandant and Director of the Department of State Affairs while elevating him to princely rank. Shi Hu was furious. He complained privately to his eldest son Shi Sui that since Shi Le had established his capital at Xiangguo, Shi Le had remained with folded hands while Shi Hu personally faced arrows and stones, led assaults, captured Liu Yue in the south, drove back the Suotou in the north, pacified Qi and Lu in the east, and settled Qin and Yong in the west. He claimed that he had conquered thirteen provinces and made Zhao's power possible, and therefore deserved the title Grand Chanyu rather than the “yellow-mouthed child born of a slave woman.” He declared that after Shi Le's death he would not allow Shi Hong's line to survive.

In the fourth month of 332, Right Vice Director Cheng Xia urged Shi Le to eliminate Shi Hu, but Shi Le refused. Shi Le began allowing Crown Prince Shi Hong to examine memorials from the Department of State Affairs, further angering Shi Hu.

In the sixth month Shi Le became gravely ill. Shi Hu entered the inner palace as guard, forged commands, and prevented ministers and relatives from entering. In the seventh month Shi Le issued a dying instruction that Shi Hong and his brothers should support one another, warning that the Sima clan's mutual slaughter was an example not to repeat. He also told Shi Hu to reflect deeply on the precedents of the Duke of Zhou and Huo Guang and not give later generations grounds for criticism.

Seizing Power

Shi Le died on the twenty-first day of the seventh month. Shi Hu seized Crown Prince Shi Hong and brought him before the hall, executed Grand Master of Splendid Happiness Cheng Xia and Secretariat Director Xu Guang by handing them to the Court of Judicial Review, and summoned Shi Sui with troops to guard the palace. Civil and military officials scattered. Shi Hong was terrified and said he was too weak to rule, offering the throne to Shi Hu. Shi Hu replied that the normal rite was for the crown prince to succeed on the ruler's death. When Shi Hong wept and persisted in refusing, Shi Hu angrily said that if he could not bear the burden the people of the realm would naturally act according to principle, and there was no need to discuss such a matter in advance. Shi Hong therefore took the throne. At night, Shi Hu secretly buried Shi Le's corpse in a mountain valley and interred an empty coffin at Gaoping Mausoleum.

In the eighth month Shi Hong appointed Shi Hu Chancellor, Prince of Wei, and Grand Chanyu, bestowed the Nine Bestowments, and assigned thirteen commanderies including Wei as his fief, placing all major and minor state affairs under him. Shi Hu made his wife Lady Zheng Princess of Wei and his son Shi Sui heir of Wei; his other sons Shi Xuan, Shi Tao, Shi Zun, Shi Jian, and Shi Bao were enfeoffed respectively as princes of Hejian, Le'an, Qi, Dai, and Leping. Officials inherited from Shi Le were moved into inactive posts, while Shi Hu's own staff and relatives filled key offices.

In the ninth month Shi Hu deposed and killed Empress Dowager Liu and honored Shi Hong's mother Lady Cheng as empress dowager. In the tenth month Shi Sheng, Prince of Hedong and commander in Guanzhong, and Shi Lang, based at Luoyang, rose against Shi Hu. Leaving Shi Sui to hold Xiangguo, Shi Hu personally led seventy thousand infantry and cavalry against Jinyong, captured the city, and executed Shi Lang. He then marched on Chang'an. His vanguard general Shi Ting was defeated and killed at Tong Pass by Shi Sheng's general Guo Quan, forcing Shi Hu back to Mianchi. Xianbei forces allied with Shi Hu and turned on Shi Sheng. Shi Sheng abandoned Chang'an and hid at Jitou Mountain, where his own followers killed him and surrendered. Shi Hu then sent General Ma Qiu against Pu Hong, who submitted with twenty thousand households.

In the tenth month of 334, the first year of the Yanxi era, Shi Hong presented the imperial seals and requested to abdicate in Shi Hu's favor, but Shi refused. In the eleventh month Shi Hu styled himself Regent Heavenly King of Zhao and demoted Shi Hong to Prince of Haiyang. Soon afterward he killed Shi Hong, Empress Dowager Cheng, and Shi Hong's brothers Shi Hong and Shi Hui. Most descendants of Shi Le's clan were thereby exterminated.

Rule

In 335 Shi Hu moved the capital to Ye. He had the Nine Dragons, stone statues, bronze camels, Feilian figures, and other objects transported from Luoyang to decorate the palaces. In the fourth month of 337 he styled himself Great Heavenly King of Zhao.

His reign was marked by immense construction and extreme luxury. Three li west of Ye he built Sangzi Park and erected luxurious palaces along the Zhang River. Along the two-hundred-li road from Xiangguo to Ye he constructed a traveling palace every forty li. He ordered that all girls and women between thirteen and twenty years of age, married or unmarried, be ready for selection into the palace. Sources state that when powerful men coveted beautiful wives among the common people they coerced them, leading many women to suicide. In 345 alone, officials in the commanderies and counties openly seized more than nine thousand attractive married women, and men who resisted the seizure of their wives were killed.

Shi Hu loved hunting. Because obesity made riding difficult, he used a hunting carriage pushed by twenty men, with a rotating mechanism under the seat so that he could turn toward game. He converted large stretches of fertile land north of the Yellow River into imperial hunting preserves and sent censors to supervise them. Anyone other than himself who hunted there could be executed for “offending the beasts.” Officials exploited this law to oppress commoners: when a household possessed a beautiful woman or fine cattle and horses and refused an official's demand, the owner could be falsely accused of the offense and sentenced to death.

Shi Hu also listened to the monk Wu Jin, who claimed that the vitality of the Hu was declining while that of the Jin people was reviving and that Jin people had to be subjected to harsh labor to suppress it. More than 160,000 men and women and 100,000 carts were therefore requisitioned from the commanderies around Ye to build Hualin Park east of the city, with walls extending for tens of li.

Familial Slaughter and Final Years

After his eldest son Shi Sui was made crown prince, Shi Sui resented Shi Hu's favor toward Shi Xuan and Shi Tao and secretly plotted to kill Shi Xuan and then his father. When Shi Hu learned of the plot, he executed Li Yan and more than thirty members of Li's family and confined Shi Sui in the Eastern Palace. Shi Sui remained defiant. In anger, Shi Hu ordered Shi Sui, his wife, and household killed and placed in the same coffin, and executed more than two hundred followers.

After Shi Sui's death, Shi Xuan became crown prince and his mother Consort Du became Heavenly King's Empress. Shi Hu simultaneously gave Shi Tao authority over military and civil affairs, trying to balance the two brothers but instead provoking another round of conflict. Shi Xuan resented his father's favor toward Shi Tao and sent men to cut off Shi Tao's hands and feet, stab out his eyes, and disembowel him. Shi Xuan also planned to kill his father at Shi Tao's funeral and seize the throne.

When Shi Hu heard of Shi Tao's death, he lost consciousness for a long time. Informants later told him that Shi Xuan was responsible. Shi Hu lured and seized Shi Xuan, ordered an iron ring driven through his jaw, and had food poured into a large wooden trough so he had to eat like a pig or dog. Shi Xuan was also forced to lick the blood on the sword used to kill Shi Tao. Finally, north of Ye, a pile of firewood and a wooden post with a pulley were erected. Hao Zhi and Liu Ba, eunuchs favored by Shi Tao, pulled Shi Xuan up by the tongue and hair, hoisted him with the pulley, and set the pyre on fire. After Shi Xuan was burned to ashes, Shi Hu ordered the ashes scattered in different places.

On the first day of the first month of 349, the first year of the Taining era, Shi Hu formally assumed the imperial title. On the jisi day of the fourth month, May 26, he died of illness in Jinhua Hall. He received the posthumous title Emperor Wu and the temple name Taizu and was buried in Xianyuan Mausoleum. His sons then fought for the throne, Later Zhao descended into civil war, and the state collapsed two years later.

Shi Hu, styled Jilong, was a native of Wuxiang in Shangdang, a Jie, and a cousin's son of Shi Le, the founder of the Later Zhao; his grandfather was named Puxie and his father Koumi, who had seven sons of whom Shi Hu was the fourth, and as Shi Le's father had taken him as a son in his childhood he was sometimes called Shi Le's younger brother. At six or seven a physiognomist said that the boy's countenance was strange with strong bones and that his honour would be beyond words. In the Yongxing years he was separated from Shi Le, and in 311 Liu Kun sent Shi Le's mother, Lady Wang, and Shi Hu to Gebei, Shi Hu being then seventeen. Cruel by nature and fond of hunting and wandering without restraint, he was above all a master of the pellet-bow and shot at men with it, so that the army held him a plague; and when Shi Le told his mother that he would kill him, she answered that a swift ox, while still a calf, will often smash the cart, and that he should bear with him a little. At eighteen he restrained himself, being seven feet five inches tall, nimble with bow and horse and the bravest of his time, so that officers and kinsmen alike feared him and Shi Le prized him and made him general who chastises the caitiffs. He killed two wives in succession, Guo and Cui; he put to death at once any man in the army whose courage or counsel came near his own; and in taking cities he made no distinction of good and evil, burying officers and people alive, so that few were left. Shi Le often reproved and exhorted him, but he went his own way; yet he commanded without petty fuss so that none dared offend, and his plans and attacks were irresistible, so that Shi Le trusted him more and more and gave him full command of campaigns. Against the Eastern Jin he relieved Liu Yan, took Linqiu, and captured Liu Yan's brother Liu Qi; when Zu Ti came to the rescue he drew off, and when later they fought Zu Ti was beaten and fell back on Liangguo, Shi Le sending Tao Bao to Pengguan so that Zu Ti withdrew to Huainan, while Shi Hu moved fifty thousand households of Chen Chuan elsewhere. Attacking Shao Xu he took eleven outlying camps, and when Shao Xu came out against him he ambushed cavalry across his retreat and took him, bidding him call on his own garrison to surrender, which he would not; and he then ordered that for the future no officer taken in war should be killed at will but brought to him alive. Duandi Pi, Duan Wenyang and Shao Xu were all taken and afterwards killed by Shi Le. When Shi Hong was made heir, Shi Hu was sent with forty thousand picked troops against Xu Kan, who would not come out; and Shi Hu ringed him with long walls until Shi Le had him sewn in a sack and thrown from a hundred-foot tower. Cao Yi surrendered the city and was sent to Xiangguo and killed, Shi Hu burying thirty thousand of the surrendered troops alive, and though he would have killed all Cao Yi's people, the prefect of Qingzhou, Liu Zheng, asking how the people were to be governed if none were left, he spared some seven hundred and put them under Liu Zheng at Guanggu. Against the Former Zhao he fought Liu Yue west of the Luo, wounded him with a stray arrow and shut him up in Shiliang, encircling it with ramparts so that no one could pass out and his men killed their horses to eat; Liu Yao came in person to relieve him and Shi Hu met him with thirty thousand horse, but the Zhao general Liu Hei broke Shi Hu's officer Shi Cong at Batepo, and in the sixth month Shi Hu took Shiliang and sent Liu Yue and eighty of his officers with three thousand Di and Qiang prisoners to Xiangguo, burying nine thousand of Liu Yue's men alive. Attacking Puban, he fled before Liu Yao, who pursued him and left two hundred li of corpses and took more than a hundred million in stores, Shi Hu fleeing to Zhaoge. In the eleventh month Shi Le himself marched to the relief of Luoyang against the advice of his officers, sending Shi Hu to hold Shimen while he brought forty thousand men, and broke the Former Zhao army; Liu Yin fled to Shangluo with Shi Hu pursuing over a thousand li of corpses. Shanggui was taken, and at Luoyang he buried five thousand of the Tuhe division alive, and defeating the Jumuqie of the Hexi Qiang took tens of thousands of prisoners, so that Qinzhou and Yongzhou submitted, Shi Hu memorialising for Fu Hong to inspect the military affairs of the six barbarians and Yao Yizhong to be their left commandant, and moving a hundred and fifty thousand villages of Di and Qiang into Si and Ji. In the second month of 330, when the ministers urged Shi Le to take the imperial title, he styled himself Great King of Zhao and made his wife Liu empress and Shi Hong heir; and Shi Hu, enraged, told the Prince of Qi, Shi Sui, that his master had sat at ease in Xiangguo while he himself faced arrows and stones, that in twenty years he had taken Liu Yue in the south, driven back the Suo in the north, pacified Qi and Lu in the east and Qin and Yong in the west, taking thirteen prefectures, that the work was his and the title of great shanyu should be his, yet it had been given to a child of a slave woman, so that he could neither eat nor sleep, and that when his master died he would not leave him a descendant alive. Cheng Xia urged Shi Le to remove Shi Hu and was not listened to; and when Shi Le set the heir to judge the memorials Shi Hu grew more sullen. In the sixth month Shi Le lay ill and Shi Hu entered the palace as guard, forging edicts so that no minister or kinsman might enter, and none outside knew of his illness; and in the seventh month he died, his testament bidding his sons support one another and citing the Sima family's mutual slaughter as their warning, and charging Shi Hu to remember the examples of the Duke of Zhou and Huo Guang. Shi Hu summoned Shi Sui with troops to guard the palace, and the officials fled; Shi Hong, in terror, offered him the throne and was told that on a ruler's death the heir succeeds by rule, and being pressed with tears was asked angrily whether, if he could not bear the charge, the world would not settle it in due course without his speaking of it beforehand. Shi Hong took the throne and proclaimed an amnesty, while Shi Hu buried Shi Le's body secretly in a valley by night so that none knew the place and buried an empty coffin at Gaoping ling; the posthumous name was Ming and the temple name Gaozu. Shi Cong, a Han adopted into the Shi family, and the prefect Peng Biao sent to the Jin to submit, and before the Jin relief under Qiao Qiu could come they were destroyed by Shi Hu. Shi Le's officers were given empty posts and Shi Hu's own people filled the court; the heir's palace became the Chongxun palace, where the empress dowager Liu and the rest were lodged, and the pick of Shi Le's palace women, carriages and treasures was carried to the chancellery. Shi Sheng and Shi Lang of Luoyang rose against him, Shi Sheng styling himself inspector of Qinzhou and sending to the Jin, and Fu Hong, chief of the Di, styling himself inspector of Yongzhou and leaning to the west. Shi Hu broke Jinjong, took Shi Lang and cut off his feet before beheading him, and marched on Changan with the Prince of Liang as his vanguard; Shi Sheng came against him with twenty thousand Xianbei of the She division, and both Guo Quan and Shi Ting fell, Shi Hu fleeing to Mianchi over three hundred li of corpses, while the Xianbei, secretly in concert with him, turned on Shi Sheng, who, not knowing that Shi Ting was dead, fled alone to Changan; and Shi Sheng then abandoned Changan for Mount Jitou, where his general Jiang Ying held out until Shi Hu killed him and Shi Sheng's own men killed Shi Sheng, Guo Quan fleeing to Longyou. Shi Hu moved more than a hundred thousand households of the gentry and of the Di and Qiang from Qin and Yong to the east of the passes and made Fu Hong general of the soaring dragon and commandant of the refugees; and in the fourth month the great families of Shanggui killed Guo Quan and surrendered, and thirty thousand households of Qinzhou were moved to Qing and Bing. Chen Liangfu of Changan fled to the Black Qiang and attacked with the king of the Northern Qiang, and Shi Hu, defeating them, drove Bo Judà to Mount Malan, while Guo Ao, pursuing, was beaten by the Qiang; and Shi Hu sent an envoy to put Guo Ao to death and imprisoned the Prince of Qin for complaint. Shi Hong, weeping, told the empress dowager that the late emperor's flesh and blood would indeed not survive, and when the Secretariat proposed the forms of the Tang and Yu abdications Shi Hu answered that Shi Hong was benighted, had been rude in mourning, and should be deposed rather than spoken of as abdicating. He deposed him accordingly. Yao Yizhong would not come to congratulate him and only came on repeated summons, telling him sternly that he had always heard the king called a hero of the age, and asking how, having taken the orphan by the arm in trust, he came to seize his throne, and Shi Hu answering that he had no such wish, but that the Prince of Haiyang was young and might not manage the family affairs; and though angry he did not punish him for his honesty. Because a prophecy said that a Son of Heaven should come from the north-east, he made a progress to Xindu and back to fulfil it. He had the heir judge the memorials, reserving only the sacrifices, the appointment of officers, campaigns and executions to himself. He was fond of building, and when a tower fell he killed the workmen; the palace promoted its favourites and took bribes, and those advanced came out of its doors. In the third month he made a southern progress as far as the Yangzi, and in the ninth month moved the capital to Ye with a general amnesty, decreeing that all the peoples might follow their religions, whereby Buddhism flourished. In the eleventh month of 336 he built the Taiwu hall at Xiangguo and the eastern and western palaces at Ye, finished in the twelfth month; the terrace of the Taiwu hall was two fathoms eight feet high, sixty-five paces long and seventy-five wide, built of veined stone, with a cellar beneath holding five hundred guards. Behind the Xianyang hall he built nine palaces and lodged in them the daughters of the people, more than ten thousand of them wearing pearls and silk, teaching them astrology and the arts of horse and foot; and a thousand women riders attended his carriage in purple kerchiefs, brocade trousers, belts of gold and silver inlay and boots of five-coloured weaving, carrying feathered insignia and playing music, while a pound of gold bought but two pecks of millet and the people cried out, and he never ceased from war and the levies were heavy. He had Zhang Mi bring the bells, pillars, bronze figures, camels and gryphons of Luoyang to Ye on four-wheeled carts; one bell fell into the Yellow River, and three hundred divers with bamboo hawsers and a hundred oxen raised it, a ship of ten thousand bushels carrying it; and he was so pleased that he remitted two years of punishments and gave the officials grain and silk and the people a degree of rank. On Jie Fei's advice he cast stones into the Yellow River south of Ye to build a viaduct, spending millions upon millions, and it was never built; the labourers starving, the work stopped; and he had officials lead the people into the hills for stone. Cheng Gongduan set a lamp on a pole ten fathoms high with lights above and men below, and Shi Hu, having tried it, was pleased. In the first month of 337 he took the title Great King of Zhao after the manner of Shang and Zhou, taking the throne in the southern suburb with an amnesty and making his queen Zheng empress. His heir Shi Sui was brave and beloved; and Shi Hu would say to his ministers that the Sima had destroyed one another and so he had gained the throne, and that he would never kill Shi Sui. But Shi Sui became cruel and luxurious, hunting late or going by night to the houses of his officers to take their wives and daughters; he would dress his fairer concubines, cut off their heads, wash them and set them on dishes to be handed round among his guests, and boil their flesh to be tasted with them; and nuns of comely person he would violate and kill, boiling their flesh with beef and mutton and giving it to his attendants to taste. Shi Xuan and Shi Tao were also favoured, and Shi Sui hated them; and since Shi Hu's temper was uncertain, so that whether Shi Sui reported a matter or not he was abused and beaten many times a month, Shi Sui asked Li Yan and others whether they would join him in killing his father, and they lay on the ground without answer. In the seventh month he feigned illness and rode with five hundred officers to Li Yan's house to drink, telling them he would kill the Prince of Hejian and behead any who would not follow; but his men scattered, Li Yan kneeling and remonstrating, and he returned drunk. His mother Zheng sent to reprove him and he killed the messenger; and when the monk Fotudeng warned Shi Hu not to visit the Eastern Palace and he turned back, he cried out that as ruler of the world he might not trust his own son, and sent a favourite woman to look at him, whom Shi Sui called to him and stabbed. Shi Hu, in fury, questioned Li Yan, who told him all, killed thirty of them, imprisoned Shi Sui and then pardoned him and summoned him to the Taiwu hall, where Shi Sui neither apologised nor lingered; bidden to salute the empress, he walked out without turning his head, and Shi Hu in a rage reduced him to commoner, killed him that night with his consort Zhang and twenty-six men and women in one coffin, and put to death more than two hundred of his household officers. In the first month of 338 Murong Huang sent an officer to ask the date of the campaign, and Shi Hu, about to attack Duan Liao, enrolled thirty thousand picked men as dragon-soaring attendants; and when Duan Liao fled to the mountains and sent his son to submit with a memorial and horses, Shi Hu entered the Lingzhi palace, rewarded his officers and moved more than twenty thousand households of Duan into Si, Yong, Yan and Yu, promoting the able and virtuous among the gentry. In the fifth month, because Murong Huang had not joined him against Duan Liao but had kept the plunder for himself, he prepared to attack him, sending envoys to win over the various peoples: Cui Tao and others of the Former Yan came over, the settlers of Jiyang killed their prefect and submitted, and Xianyu Qu of Yingqiu offered to surrender; but Sun Xing roused the officials and people of Wuning to seize Xianyu Qu and put him to death and shut the gates, and Sun Yong of Chaoxian led the people against the Zhao, killing the strongman Wang Qing who would have gone over, and pardoning several hundred of his fellows and holding the city with them. Murong Huang with two thousand horse pursued and broke the Zhao army, cutting off thirty thousand heads, and the Zhao troops fled in disorder. Shi Min told Shi Hu that Fu Hong was a man of heroic temper, obeyed to the death by his soldiers, with sons of uncommon ability and fifty thousand good troops near the capital, and should be secretly destroyed; and Shi Hu answered that he relied on him to take Wu and Shu. He set Wang Dian with ten thousand men to open waste land by the sea and ordered a thousand warships built in Qingzhou against the Former Yan. When the provincial officers asked that the prefects be punished for the condition of the roads he said that the fault was his own and that to punish others for it was not to acknowledge guilt, and that the inspector should have spoken plainly to correct him and must not slander the innocent; and he reduced the inspector to commoner rank. He sent the dukes Shi Shegui and Shi Rigui with troops to Changan, and on their accusation that the general Shi Guang was buying men's loyalty with an eye to rebellion he recalled and killed him. Murong Huang with his officers met Duan Liao, who secretly plotted with the Former Yan to overthrow the Zhao; and Murong Ke with seven thousand picked horse laid an ambush at Miyun mountain and broke Ma Qiu at Sanzangkou with six or seven in ten killed, Ma Qiu escaping on foot while Yang Yu was taken; and Shi Hu, hearing of the defeat, stripped Ma Qiu of rank. Yue Wan as general of holding the pass was given a thousand men to hold Fancheng, and when the Zhao army came the officers would have fled; he told them that they were charged to hold off the enemy at the risk of their lives and that one man behind walls was worth a hundred, and that whoever spoke of flight would be beheaded, so that they steadied; and he led them in person through arrows and stones, and Zhang Ju's attack failed after ten days and he withdrew, Shi Hu then moving the people of western Liaoning south of Jizhou because the frontier was exposed. He attacked the northern frontiers of Jingzhou and Yangzhou and sent twenty thousand horse against Zhucheng, where Mao Bao sought help of Yu Liang, who thought the city strong and sent none, and the city fell with six thousand dead, Mao Bao and Fan Jun drowning as they fled; Kui An occupied Huting and raided Jiangxia, where Huang Chong and the prefect of Yiyang surrendered, and then besieged Shicheng until Li Yang, the prefect of Jingling, broke him with five thousand killed, when he withdrew plundering. In the ninth month Shi Hu ordered that of the seven prefectures of Si, Ji, Qing, Xu, You, Bing and Yong three men in five and two in four be taken, with the old troops of Ye making five hundred thousand, a thousand ships to carry eleven million bushels of grain from the Yellow River to the sea and to Le'an, and more than ten thousand households of western Liaoning, Beiping and Yuyang moved to Yan, Yu and Yong; all horses were confiscated on pain of being cut in two at the waist, and forty thousand were taken, and a great review was held at Wanyang to prepare the attack on the Former Yan. He set Shi Tao and Shi Xuan to judge the memorials on alternate days with full power of reward and punishment and no report to himself, against the remonstrance of Shen Zhong; and Shen Bian, being quick and eloquent, was favoured by him and cherished by Shi Xuan and given the secrets, so that since he himself attended to nothing and the two princes drank and hunted, all promotion and all life and death passed through Shen Bian. He had Zhang Li pursue Shi Bin with three hundred strokes and dismissal and the killing of a dozen of his followers. When Ma Shen came with tribute from Zhang Jun and his memorial was cold and proud, Shi Hu would have beheaded him, and was dissuaded by Shi Pu, who said that the enemy to be destroyed first was the Jin and that Hexi was of no account, and that to kill the envoy would compel a campaign that would divide their forces and prolong the life of Jiankang. In the twelfth month of 342 he built more than forty towers and terraces at Ye and palaces at Luoyang and Changan, with more than four hundred thousand men at the work; and he would have built a gallery road from Ye to Xiangguo, ordering the four prefectures south of the Yellow River to prepare for the southern campaign and Bing and the rest for the western and Qing, Ji and You for the eastern, taking two men in three and three in five, so that the provincial armies numbered five hundred thousand and the boatmen a hundred and seventy thousand, a third of them drowned or devoured by tigers and wolves. With the nobles and prefects plundering, men gathered bands and set up their own officers, and when these were discovered and killed several thousand families were implicated. He hunted without limit, going out at dawn and returning at night, and often walked abroad in disguise to inspect the works; and when the attendant Wei Xiao remonstrated that he trifled with the weightiest seat in the world and went lightly into danger, and that the levies were raised out of season and the sighing of the people filled the roads, he gave him grain and silk and built the more, walking his rounds unmoved. Zhang Li, to please Shi Xuan, advised reducing the retinues of the princes, and Shi Xuan had him memorialise that the four dukes should have a hundred and ninety-seven officers and two hundred guards each, and all below them a third of that, with the fifty thousand men remaining assigned to the Eastern Palace, so that all the princes hated him. When Qingzhou reported that the stone tiger north of Pingling city had moved by night to the south-east leaving the tracks of a thousand wolves and foxes, Shi Hu rejoiced that the stone tiger was himself, going from north-west to south-east by Heaven's will to pacify the south, and ordered all the provincial armies to assemble the next year that he might lead the six hosts himself; and the ministers congratulated him. He ordered that every five conscripts should furnish a cart, two oxen, fifteen bushels of rice and ten lengths of silk on pain of death, so that the people sold their children. When the archers failed to hit a goose, and the armies had gathered to more than a million, the astronomer Zhao Lan told him secretly that the white goose resting in the courtyard portended the emptiness of the palace and that he should not march south; and he believed him, reviewed the army at the Xuanwu tower and desisted. In the eleventh month he built a bridge over the Yellow River at Lingchang, quarrying stone for the piers, but the stones were swept away, five million man-days being spent in vain, and he killed the workmen and stopped. He levied a hundred and sixty thousand men from Yong, Luo, Qin and Bing to build the Weiyang palace at Changan. Fond of hunting, and too heavy in his later years to ride, he built a thousand hunting carriages and held contests; from Lingchang south to Yangdu in eastern Xingyang he made a hunting park under the inspection of censors, where any who harmed the game were put to death, and where if the people had fair daughters or good cattle and horses and the censors could not get them they accused them of harming the game, more than a hundred being executed. He levied two hundred and sixty thousand men to build the Luoyang palace and twenty thousand head of cattle for the pastures of Shuozhou. He added twenty-four grades of palace women, twelve for the Eastern Palace and nine for each of the seventy princedoms, and called in more than thirty thousand girls of the people in three grades, with nearly ten thousand more privately chosen by Shi Xuan and the princes; the counties seized more than nine thousand wives, killing their husbands, and with those who killed themselves more than three thousand died, and when the women reached Ye Shi Hu sorted them before the hall and made twelve of the envoys marquises for their zeal, so that the people of Jing, Chu, Yang and Xu were wasted by flight and revolt and more than fifty of their officers were imprisoned and killed. The grand master Lu Ming, remonstrating plainly while in attendance, was dragged to death by the dragon-soaring attendants. He had a thousand women riders as his escort, in purple kerchiefs, brocade trousers, inlaid belts and five-coloured boots, riding at the Xima terrace, where an edict on five-coloured paper turned in the mouth of a wooden phoenix as if flying. Yao Yizhong, plain and frugal and outspoken, was greatly valued, taking part in the great decisions, so that the ministers feared and honoured him; and when a commandant of his camp who was a kinsman of Shi Hu's favourite intruded on his troops, he seized him, told him that he oppressed the poor though his office was to check the wicked, and had him led out to death, sparing him only when he knocked his head on the ground till it bled and his attendants pleaded. He set Fu Hong with thirty thousand men at Le'an to make engines against the Former Yan, and Murong Huang made Murong Ba general of the pacification of the Di. In the fifth month of 346, when Yan Sheng, a eunuch of the palace, quarrelled with the president Zhu Gui and slandered him for not repairing the roads and for criticism of the government, Shi Hu imprisoned him; and Fu Hong remonstrated that with Xiangguo and the palace at Ye he had built palaces at Changan and Luoyang to no purpose, that he had made a thousand hunting carriages and parks of a thousand li for his game, that he had seized more than a hundred thousand women for his palace, and that he would now kill a president for the state of the roads; that if his virtue did not prevail and Heaven sent the long rains, seventy days of them, no million ghost-soldiers could clear the mud from the roads, and that he should end the corvée, abolish the parks, release the women and pardon Zhu Gui. Shi Hu, displeased but not punishing him, ended the works at Changan and Luoyang but put Zhu Gui to death, and decreed penalties for those who spoke of the government, permitting clerks to accuse their chiefs and slaves their masters, after which the ministers only looked at one another at audiences and dared not speak. When Shi Hu sent Ma Qiu against the Former Liang, Xie Ai, riding in a light carriage and a white cap and beating a drum, moved him to say angrily that a young scholar in such dress despised him, and sent three thousand black-lanced riders against him while those about Xie Ai panicked; and Xie Ai, refusing to mount, sat down, while Zhang Mao cut the Zhao retreat and the Zhao army fell back and was broken, its general killed. Later Liu Hun with twenty thousand men joined Ma Qiu, crossed the Yellow River and marched on Zhang Chonghua to Changzui; and Xie Ai, raising his banner before the army to swear them, found the wind turn the banner to the south-east, and Suo Xia said the wind was the command and the banner pointed at the enemy by Heaven's help; and on the third day of the eighth month Xie Ai attacked and broke Ma Qiu, who fled to Jincheng. Shi Hu, hearing it, sighed that he had pacified the nine provinces with a part of his army, yet with all nine provinces he was held at Fohan because they had the man there; and Xie Ai returned and subdued eleven thousand tribes of the rebel Sguzhen. Shi Hu held ten provinces and gathered gold and silk and foreign treasures beyond counting, yet thought it too little, and dug up the tombs of former ages for their precious things. He had Zhang Qun levy a hundred and sixty thousand men and a hundred thousand carts from the neighbouring commanderies to carry earth north of Ye for the Hualin park and a long wall several tens of li about; and when Shen Zhong, Shi Pu and Zhao Lan memorialised on the disorder of the heavens and the distress of the people, he raged that the park and wall might be finished in the morning and he die at night without regret, and a storm of wind and rain killed tens of thousands. In the ninth month he sent the crown prince Shi Xuan to pray at the mountains and rivers, and to hunt on the way. Shi Xuan rode in a great carriage with a canopy of feathers and the banners of a Son of Heaven, and eighteen thousand men of sixteen armies marched from the Jinming gate, while Shi Hu from the Lingxiao tower laughed that with sons like his nothing was to be feared unless heaven fell, and that he would but dandle his grandchildren. Everywhere Shi Xuan halted he had a ring drawn of a hundred li each way and the game driven in at evening to his quarters, the officers kneeling, the torches making it as day, and a hundred riders shooting into the ring while he watched from his carriage with his concubines until all the game was killed; and those of the guard through whose ground a beast escaped lost their horses and walked a day, or if they had no rank took a hundred strokes, so that more than ten thousand soldiers died of cold and hunger and three prefectures and fifteen commanderies were stripped. Shi Tao, following on the same route from Bing to Qin and Yong, did the like. Shi Xuan, resenting Shi Tao as his equal, hated him the more; and the eunuch Zhao Sheng, favoured by Shi Xuan and not by Shi Tao, secretly urged him to destroy him. Shi Hu, wishing to make Shi Tao heir but hesitating because Shi Xuan was the elder, said in anger when Shi Xuan disobeyed him that he repented not having made Shi Tao heir; and Shi Tao, the more arrogant, built a hall named Xuanguang with a beam nine fathoms long, at which Shi Xuan, taking it as an affront to his own name, killed the workmen and cut the beam; and Shi Tao in fury made it ten fathoms, and Shi Xuan told Yang Bei, Mou Cheng and Zhao Sheng that if they would kill him they should have his princedoms, and that the emperor would come to mourn and might be killed too. They killed Shi Tao, and Shi Hu, suspecting Shi Xuan, sent for him under a false report that his mother was dying, and had him seized; and the informer Shi Ke revealed the plot, and Zhao Sheng on questioning confessed all. Shi Hu in his grief licked the blood from the arrows that had killed Shi Tao; he imprisoned Shi Xuan in a storehouse with an iron ring through his jaw, feeding him in a trough like a pig or dog. A monk told him that to kill the second son for the death of the first would be to double the evil, and that if he forgave him his fortune might be prolonged, but that if he killed him Shi Xuan would become a comet sweeping the palace; and he would not hear it. He raised a pyre north of Ye and had Shi Tao's own eunuchs, Hao Zhi and Liu Ba, drag Shi Xuan up a ladder by the hair and tongue, the rope about his neck drawn up by a windlass, and Liu Ba cut off his hands and feet, put out his eyes and opened his belly as Shi Tao's had been; then fired the pyre, watching from the middle terrace with several thousand of the palace, and afterwards scattered the ashes at the crossways of the city gates, and killed Shi Xuan's wife and nine children. Shi Xuan's little son, a few years old and a favourite of his grandfather, he would have spared, but the ministers took him from his arms and killed him, the child clutching at his robe and screaming so that his girdle broke, and Shi Hu fell ill of grief. He reduced Shi Xuan's mother to commoner, killed three hundred of his household and fifty eunuchs, threw their bodies into the Zhang, turned his palace into a pigsty and sent more than ten thousand of his guards to the frontier at Liangzhou; and Zhao Lan, who had warned of trouble in the palace and said nothing after the murder, he put to death. In the ninth month he made Shi Shi heir and the consort Liu empress. In the following new year he took the imperial title with an amnesty and the era Taining, raising all his sons to princes; and when the deposed guards of the Eastern Palace mutinied at Liangzhou, he sent the Prince of Yan, Shi Bin, as generalissimo with the champion Yao Yizhong and the general of chariots Fu Hong, whose victory and destruction of the remnant gave Yao Yizhong the privilege of entering the court at a stride with sword and shoes, and the rank of Duke of Xiping, while Fu Hong was made general of chariots. Both had been named in his testament to assist the heir; but the empress Liu, dreading Shi Bin's regency, forged with Zhang Chi an order stripping him of office for want of loyalty. Shi Zun, coming from Youzhou and refused audience, wept and left, and Shi Hu, briefly better, asked whether he had come and was told he had gone, saying that he regretted not seeing him; and mounting the western tower, where two hundred of the dragon-soaring officers knelt before him asking that the Prince of Yan be brought to guard the palace and command the troops, or that an heir be named, he berated his attendants for not calling the Prince of Yan, and being told that he was ill with wine, bade them bring a carriage to fetch him and deliver the seals, but no one went, and he fell back dizzy. Zhang Chi had Shi Bin killed by a forged order, and the empress Liu named Zhang Chi grand guardian with command of all the armies and the Secretariat after the manner of Huo Guang under the Han; and the attendant Xu Tong, saying that disaster was at hand and that he would not live to forestall it, took poison, and shortly after Shi Hu died.

Major Activities

Military Campaigns

Shi Hu was one of the principal generals responsible for Later Zhao's territorial expansion. Beginning with the attack on Shouchun in 313, he successively captured Ye, Linqiu, Yanci, Mount Tai, Guanggu, and Shiliang and took enemy commanders including Shao Xu, Duan Pidi, Xu Kan, Cao Ni, and Liu Yue. Although Liu Yao defeated him at Puban in 328, he joined Shi Le later that year in the decisive victory at Luoyang that led to Liu Yao's capture. In 329 he defeated Liu Yin, took Shanggui, destroyed Former Zhao, and pacified the Qin and Long regions. His campaigns expanded Later Zhao over thirteen provinces and established the Huai River as its frontier with Eastern Jin.

Political Measures

During his rule Shi Hu continued the nine-rank system and ordered social ranks of elite families reassessed every three years, preserving aristocratic privilege in recruitment. He promoted Confucian learning, restored offices in the Imperial Academy, ordered commanderies and principalities to appoint Doctors of the Five Classics, and commissioned copies of Confucian texts. Mindful of the damage caused by eunuch power in the Eastern Han, he did not trust male eunuchs and instead assigned related palace duties to female officials. Eighteen ranks of female palace officials were established; palace women were taught astrology and mounted and foot archery, and female grand astrologers were stationed at the observatory to watch for omens.

Large-Scale Construction

After moving the capital to Ye, Shi Hu undertook extensive palace construction. He had ritual bells, Nine Dragon ornaments, stone statues, bronze camels, Feilian figures, and other objects transported from Luoyang. During transport one large bell sank in the Yellow River; Zhang Mi had more than three hundred divers attach ropes, used more than one hundred oxen and winches to raise it, and built a vessel with a capacity of ten thousand hu to move it across the river. Shi Hu built Sangzi Park west of Ye, constructed a traveling palace every forty li along the two-hundred-li road from Xiangguo to Ye, and requisitioned more than 160,000 people to build Hualin Park.

Tyranny and Harsh Laws

Shi Hu imposed heavy military and material levies across the realm: every five men had to provide one cart, two oxen, fifty hu of grain, and ten bolts of silk, and failure could be punished by death. Many families were forced to sell children for survival. Families with military exemptions still had to provide two men out of every five adult males, while households without exemptions had to send all able-bodied men into service. He turned fertile land north of the Yellow River into hunting preserves and made “offending the beasts” a capital crime. He also forcibly recruited women for the palace, causing many wives and daughters among the common people to take their own lives.

In his reign Shi Hu continued the nine-grade system of official selection, his edict declaring that since Wei had established it, to be reviewed every three years, it had been the clear rule of the gentry and the mirror of human relations, and that the officers should review it again in order to raise the pure and sweep away the foul. In building up his power he campaigned east and west, took Ye and rebuilt it as a secure base, and took measures to strengthen agriculture and extend his territory; after taking the imperial title he promoted agriculture, organised garrison farming and stores, and so restored the farming of the north, which had been falling into ruin. He promoted Confucian learning, restoring the offices of the national academy and decreeing that every commandery set up doctors of the Five Classics, sending academy doctors to Luoyang to copy the classics and to collate them in the imperial library, and having the libationer Nie Xiong write a commentary on the Guliang commentary as a school text. In religion he honoured the monk Fotudeng as his national preceptor, dressing him in figured silk and carrying him in a carved carriage, with the crown prince and princes supporting him to the hall at audiences and the master of ceremonies calling him the Great Monk without naming him; and Fotudeng urged on him the Buddhist teaching of compassion and the abstention from killing, answering, when asked what the Buddhist law was, that it was not to kill, and telling him that an emperor who honoured the Buddha did so chiefly by not being cruel, rather than by giving all his wealth to the church. Other matters are recorded of him. A master of archery from boyhood who never missed, he grew so heavy in his later years that he could no longer hunt on horseback and invented the hunting carriage, like a palanquin carried by twenty men, on which a canopy turned and a swivel seat followed his aim as he shot at birds and beasts. He had a precious sword made five feet long and engraved in clerical script with the words "the Shi clan, emperors". Like his uncle Shi Le, greedy and without scruple, he held ten provinces with gold, pearls, foreign rarities and precious goods beyond counting, yet thought it too little and dug up the tombs of former rulers and sages for their treasures. He was given the posthumous name Martial Emperor and the temple name Taizu and buried at the Xianyuan ling; and when Murong Jun afterwards opened the tomb, dragged out the body, flogged and dishonoured it and threw it into the Zhang, the corpse was stopped by a bridge pillar and would not drift away, and when the chancellor of the Former Qin recovered and buried it men recalled the prophecy of the monk Ma Ru that his majesty should end beneath a single pillar, which was the bridge pillar. On the site of the Xianyuan ling Liu Bingguang has argued that when Murong Jun broke open the tomb and found no body he beat and smashed the place and left the door open ever after; and the clue to its position comes from the eleventh month of 369, when Murong Chui, driven out, fled by the southern hills to Ye and hid in the Xianyuan ling of Zhao before going west to the pass. Since he fled near the Taihang hills, the tomb should lie west of Ye and south of the Zhang, which points to the present Anfeng township of Anyang in Henan, and the old geography which places the Xianyuan ling west of the old city of Ye as the place of Shi Hu's empty burial confirms it.

Personal Relations

• Grandfather: Shi Yexie.
• Father: Shi Koumi.
• Adoptive grandfather / cousin-uncle: Shi Le, founding emperor of Later Zhao.
• Adoptive great-grandmother: Lady Wang, Shi Le's mother.
• Wives and consorts: Lady Guo, killed by Shi Hu; Lady Cui, killed by Shi Hu; Zheng Yingtao, later Empress Zheng and subsequently Dowager Consort of Donghai; Lady Du, Consort Du and mother of Shi Xuan.
• Sons: Shi Sui, crown prince executed by Shi Hu; Shi Xuan, crown prince executed by Shi Hu; Shi Tao, killed by Shi Xuan; Shi Zun and Shi Jian, both later emperors; Shi Bao, Shi Bin, Shi Hui, and others.
• Adopted son: Shi Zhan, father of Ran Min, killed in battle in 328.
• Shi Le: cousin-uncle and ruler. Shi Hu campaigned for him for more than twenty years. Shi Le's dying instruction ordered him to assist Shi Hong, but Shi Hu soon seized power.
• Shi Hong: son of Shi Le, installed as a puppet ruler by Shi Hu and later deposed and killed.
• Cheng Xia: senior official under Shi Le who advised eliminating Shi Hu; executed after Shi Le's death.
• Xu Guang: senior official under Shi Le; executed after Shi Le's death.
• Liu Yao: emperor of Former Zhao, repeatedly fought Shi Hu and was captured at Luoyang in 328.
• Liu Yin: Prince of Nanyang of Former Zhao, defeated and killed by Shi Hu in 329.
• Zu Ti: Eastern Jin general who repeatedly fought Shi Hu.
• Duan Pidi: Eastern Jin Inspector of Youzhou, captured by Shi Hu in 321.
• Shao Xu: Eastern Jin general, captured by Shi Hu in 320.

Historical Assessment

Contemporary

• The “Record of Shi Jilong” in the Book of Jin describes Shi Hu as “cruel by nature, fond of galloping and hunting, and unrestrained in roaming,” and states that when he captured cities and fortresses he did not distinguish good from evil but buried and executed men and women with few survivors.
• Shi Le praised his ability to command troops, saying that he governed them strictly without needless complication and that none dared disobey him, and that his directions in attacks led him wherever he went without defeat. Shi Le nevertheless repeatedly rebuked his cruelty.
• In his dying instructions, Shi Le told Shi Hu to “reflect deeply on the Duke of Zhou and Huo Guang and leave no grounds for later criticism,” indicating that he had become wary of Shi Hu's ambitions.

Northern and Southern Dynasties through Sui and Tang

• Cui Hong's Spring and Autumn Annals of the Sixteen Kingdoms records Shi Hu as forceful and fierce but devotes particular attention to his brutality.
• The Tang compilers of the Book of Jin placed him among the “Records” and described him as morally benighted and cruel from childhood.
• The Book of Jin also depicts him as carrying arrogance and luxury to extremes, imposing incessant labor service, and causing many common women to kill themselves after coercion by powerful men.

Song and Yuan Periods

• Sima Guang's Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance records Shi Hu in detail, portraying him as proud, arrogant, and boundlessly licentious and cruel, making him a classic example of a tyrant.
• Hu Sanxing, in his commentary on the Comprehensive Mirror, characterized Shi Hu as treating killing as amusement and condemned his rule.
• Zheng Qiao's Comprehensive Treatises classified Shi Hu among illegitimate rulers and described his cruelty as exceptionally severe.

Modern Period

• Lü Simian wrote that Shi Hu's brutality was not limited to a taste for killing and that his extravagance was among the worst of the Sixteen Kingdoms rulers.
• Wang Zhongluo regarded him as one of the unusually brutal rulers in Chinese history and argued that his rule accelerated Later Zhao's collapse.
• Tian Yuqing, in Politics of the Great Clans in Eastern Jin, discussed the brutality and disorder of Later Zhao under Shi Hu and considered his regime lacking in a stable basis of legitimacy.