Yang Guozhong

Biography

Family Background and Early Life

Yang Guozhong’s year of birth is unknown. He was a native of Yongle in Puzhou and belonged to the same clan as Consort Yang. The Old Book of Tang says that Zhang Yizhi, a favorite of Empress Wu, was his maternal uncle. The New Book of Tang goes further and calls him “a descendant of Zhang Yizhi,” interpreted in the source as his son. In his commentary on the Zizhi Tongjian, Hu Sansheng cites Zheng Shen’s Tianbao Gushi for a story that Yang was born to Zhang Yizhi and a maid named Pinzhu, though Hu himself regarded this as rumor. In 750 Yang petitioned to rehabilitate Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong and asked that their descendants receive posthumous favors, a circumstance the source notes as possible indirect evidence of connection with the Zhang family.

As a young man Yang lived dissolutely, drank and gambled, borrowed frequently, neglected productive livelihood, and was despised by his relatives. The New Book of Tang says: “fond of drink and gambling，often begged and borrowed from others，of dissolute conduct，not reckoned among his kin.” At thirty he went to western Sichuan and joined the army. He worked in military agriculture and performed well enough to merit advancement, but military commissioner Zhang You disliked his character and had him beaten; Yang nevertheless received the post of commandant of Xindu County for his agricultural service. After his term ended he became even poorer and depended on the wealthy Xianyu Zhongtong, later transferring to commandant of Fufeng without achieving greater success.

Rise in Chang'an

In 745 Yang’s clan relative Yang Yuhuan became Noble Consort, and her three elder sisters—the Ladies of Korea, Guo, and Qin—also gained increasing favor. Zhangqiu Jianqiong, military commissioner of Jiannan, was at odds with Chancellor Li Linfu and hoped to cultivate the Yang family for support. He initially sent Xianyu Zhongtong to Chang'an, but Xianyu recommended Yang Guozhong. Impressed by Yang’s tall appearance and fluent speech, Zhangqiu employed him as an administrative judge, sent him to the capital with tribute, and provided valuable goods from Sichuan worth a million in the source’s reckoning.

After reaching Chang'an, Yang distributed the goods among the Yang sisters and said they were gifts from Zhangqiu Jianqiong. The sisters frequently praised both men before Xuanzong and introduced Yang to the emperor. Xuanzong found him skilled at the board game chupu and adept at calculation and appointed him a military administrative assistant of the Right Jinwu Guard and an adjudicator of the imperial stables. This allowed Yang to enter the inner palace with officials on imperial service. Xuanzong once praised him as possessing “the talent of a finance official,” and Yang gradually gained favor.

Once established in the capital, Yang carefully catered to Xuanzong while also attaching himself to Li Linfu. Li Linfu was then using major judicial cases, including the Wei Jian affair, to weaken the heir apparent. Seeing Yang’s access to the emperor, Li made him an instrument of prosecution and investigation. Yang employed harsh methods, with arrests continuing year after year and more than a hundred clans said to have been falsely implicated and executed. By anticipating Li Linfu’s intentions and construing charges broadly against anyone who could threaten the heir apparent, he won Li’s trust and gained extensive experience in political struggle.

Control of State Finance

In 748 Yang became acting Vice Director of Finance and concurrently Attendant Censor, supervising water and land transport, the Court of the Imperial Granaries, and various revenue and disbursement commissions. Within a year he held fifteen commissions and was transferred to Supervising Secretary and Vice Censor-in-chief while taking direct charge of finance. In the second month of 749 he proposed selling accumulated grain in the provinces for light goods to send to the capital and converting public granary reserves, poll taxes, and land taxes throughout the empire into textiles, filling the imperial Left Treasury. The next year Xuanzong summoned high officials to inspect the treasury. Delighted by the mountains of goods and money, he gave Yang purple robes and a gold fish-pouch and also had him act for the head of the Court of the Imperial Treasury.

The empire was then prosperous and local governments possessed large reserves of grain and cloth. Yang catered to Xuanzong’s taste for grand display by concentrating wealth in the capital, creating the appearance of overflowing imperial stores. The Zizhi Tongjian says Xuanzong, seeing state finances so abundant, treated gold and silk like dirt and gave unlimited rewards to favored households. The source characterizes the policy as exhausting the source of revenue: local finances were drained and popular livelihoods worsened, while Yang’s standing with the emperor continued to rise.

Struggle with Li Linfu

In 752 Yang’s rivalry with Wang Hong intensified. Wang was Censor-in-chief and mayor of Jingzhao, enjoyed favor comparable to Yang’s, and held greater formal status. Yang resented his division of power. When Xing Zai’s conspiracy was uncovered, Yang used the case to frame Wang and his brother and brought about their execution. He then succeeded Wang as Censor-in-chief and mayor of Jingzhao and took over the commissions Wang had held.

Yang continued pursuing the Xing Zai case and induced testimony alleging private dealings between Li Linfu, the Wang brothers, and Abusi. Chen Xilie and Geshu Han supported Yang’s accusations. Xuanzong consequently became estranged from Li Linfu. Yang and Li formally broke and became political enemies. Li Linfu died in the eleventh month of the same year. Yang succeeded him as Right Chancellor and concurrently Minister of the Bureau of Civil Appointments, Grand Academician of the Jixian Institute, supervisor of national history, and holder of more than forty offices and commissions. He was enfeoffed as Duke of Wei.

Repeated Warfare and the Nanzhao Disasters

The source identifies Yang’s gravest policy failure as the repeated campaigns against Nanzhao. In the fourth month of 751 he recommended Xianyu Zhongtong to lead eighty thousand troops against Nanzhao. King Geluofeng of Nanzhao sent an envoy apologizing and asking to return what had been captured, but Xianyu refused and advanced to the Xi'er River. His army suffered a crushing defeat, with sixty thousand soldiers reported killed and Xianyu barely escaping. Yang concealed the scale of the disaster and continued to report military merit. Nanzhao thereafter aligned with the Tibetan Empire, whose ruler granted Geluofeng the title “Zanpuzhong,” and Yunnan ceased to remain under Tang control in the manner described by the source.

Yang then ordered mass recruitment in the two capitals and throughout the regions north and south of the Yellow River for another Nanzhao campaign. People had heard that the Yunnan region was filled with miasmic disease and that many died before reaching battle, so few volunteered. Yang sent censors along different routes to seize men and deliver them in chains to the army. Popular grief and resentment were intense, and the source describes the cries of families seeing soldiers off as filling the countryside. In 754 Yang again ordered Li Mi, an army marshal, to lead seventy thousand men against Nanzhao. After crossing the Lu River the force was defeated and Li Mi died in battle. Yang again concealed the defeat and reported victory. The two campaigns together were said to have cost nearly two hundred thousand lives.

Conflict with An Lushan and Death at Mawei

Yang Guozhong had poor relations with An Lushan. An enjoyed Xuanzong’s favor and commanded major frontier armies, while Yang repeatedly warned that he would rebel and collected evidence of alleged treason. An in turn used the demand to punish Yang as his stated justification for revolt. In the eleventh month of 755 the An Lushan Rebellion began, and rebel forces rapidly captured Luoyang.

In the sixth month of 756, Yang pressured Geshu Han, defender of Tong Pass, to leave the pass and fight. The government army was crushed at Lingbao, Tong Pass fell, and Chang'an was thrown into panic. Xuanzong decided to flee toward Sichuan. When the imperial party reached Mawei Station in present-day Xingping, Shaanxi, exhausted and hungry troops refused to advance. General Chen Xuanli said that the disintegration of the realm was Yang Guozhong’s fault and urged his death as an apology to the empire. Crown Prince Li Heng, together with eunuchs Li Fuguo and Gao Lishi, was described as helping stir the soldiers. Yang fled inside the western gate but was overtaken and hacked to death. His wife Pei Rou and sons Yang Xuan and Yang Xi were also killed. The troops then surrounded Xuanzong and demanded the death of Consort Yang. The emperor eventually ordered Gao Lishi to strangle her.

Attaching Himself to Li Linfu: The Cases of Yang Shenjin and Wang Hong, and the Name Guozhong

Once established in Chang'an, Yang Guozhong waited carefully on the emperor and pandered to his tastes while courting the powerful chancellor Li Linfu. Li Linfu at first thought him of small ability but, because he was of the imperial consort's clan, treated him well. At that time Yang Shenjin, wishing to please Li Linfu, brought in Wang Hong as assistant censor-in-chief and joined in building a great case to undermine the heir apparent; but when the emperor's mind did not turn, Yang Shenjin began to avoid business and guard against trouble, and so fell out with Wang Hong. Wang Hong then went over to Yang Guozhong and memorialized falsely against Yang Shenjin, destroying him and his brothers, "whereupon his power leaned upon all within and without and the ministers and nobles held their breath." Ji Wen again devised for Yang Guozhong a plan to seize the governing power, and Yang Guozhong used it and presently held concurrently the vice-ministership of war; and the governor of the capital region, Xiao Jiong, and the assistant censor-in-chief, Song Hun, both close to Li Linfu, were falsely accused by Yang Guozhong and driven out, nor could Li Linfu save them, so that the two became enemies. Wang Hong, as censor-in-chief and concurrent governor of the capital region, was in favour equal to Yang Guozhong's but of higher rank and standing, and Yang Guozhong, jealous of a sharing of power, took the occasion of the exposure of the affair of Xing Zai to destroy Wang Hong and his brother. The course of that case was tortuous: on the yi-you day of the fourth month the emperor held court and handed the accusation to Wang Hong in person to make the arrests; Wang Hong, suspecting his brother Wang Han to be at Xing Zai's, first sent men to call him, and only at dusk ordered Jia Jilin and others to arrest Xing Zai. Xing Zai lived in the Jincheng ward, and when Jia Jilin's men came to the gate Xing Zai with several dozen partisans, bow and blade in hand, fought their way out; Wang Hong and Yang Guozhong came up with troops, Xing Zai's partisans crying out not to harm the grand lady, while a follower of Yang Guozhong whispered to him that the rebels had a watchword and could not be fought. Xing Zai fought and fled as far as the south-western corner of the imperial city, where it happened that Gao Lishi brought up four hundred flying-dragon guards, struck at Xing Zai and took his partisans, all of whom were captured. Yang Guozhong reported the matter to the emperor and said that Wang Hong must have been in the plot; the emperor held that Wang Hong was too deeply trusted to have joined in treason, and Li Linfu also spoke for him. The emperor therefore specially pardoned Wang Han and let the matter drop, but meant Wang Hong to memorialize confessing his fault, and had Yang Guozhong hint it to him; Wang Hong could not bear it and the emperor was angry. It happened that Chen Xilie spoke strongly that Wang Hong's treason deserved death, and on the wu-zi day Chen Xilie and Yang Guozhong were ordered to try the case, Yang Guozhong being made concurrent governor of the capital region. Thereupon the affairs of Ren Haichuan and Wei Hui were all exposed and the case completed: Wang Hong was ordered to take his own life, Wang Han was beaten to death in the court hall, and Wang Hong's sons Wang Zhun and Wang Cheng were banished to Lingnan and presently killed; the officers confiscated his mansion and could not finish the inventory in several days, and none of his retainers dared look at his gate, only the investigating judge Pei Mian collecting his body and burying it. Because he succeeded Wang Hong as censor-in-chief and acting governor of the capital region, Yang Guozhong was granted the name Guozhong. He afterwards pursued the case of Xing Zai to the utmost, having it implicate Li Linfu in secret dealings with the Wang brothers and with Abusi, and Chen Xilie and Geshu Han, going along with Yang Guozhong, made the evidence good, so that the emperor grew cold toward Li Linfu. In the eleventh month of that year Li Linfu died, and Yang Guozhong took his place as president of the right, holding concurrently the ministries, the Jixian academy, the Taiqing and Taiwei palaces, the direction of the treasury, the military governorship of Jiannan, the inspection of Shannan west, and the offices of revenue, labour service and minting for the two capitals as before; from assistant censor to chancellor he held "more than forty commissions in all," and with the treasury and the three selections of the board of personnel also in his charge, "so heavy was the press of business that even a single character under his hand was more than he could manage, and all was left to the clerks, so that bribery was open."

The Treasury, the Selection of Officials, and the Concealment of Disaster

During his control of the finances the realm was rich and the commanderies and counties had grain and silk by the tens of thousands, and he therefore advised that since in antiquity twenty-seven years of ploughing left nine years of food and the present age was one of great peace, the grain lying unsold in the provinces should be turned into light goods to enrich the capital, and all the charitable granaries of the empire together with the household tax and land tax be converted into cloth and silk to fill the emperor's privy store. The next year the emperor had the officials view the left treasury, saw goods and coin piled like hills, was delighted, gave gifts to his ministers in gradations and bestowed on Yang Guozhong the purple robe and golden fish and the direction of the grand treasury. Because the state's revenue was abundant the emperor "looked on gold and silk as dung," rewarding his favourites without limit; this was in truth a policy of draining the pond to catch the fish, emptying the local finances while the people's livelihood grew daily more wretched, yet Yang Guozhong was the more favoured for it. In appointments he changed the system outright: in the first month of 753 he assembled the president of the left, Chen Xilie, the supervising secretaries and the heads of the departments in the hall of the Secretariat and called out the names and offices of the selected men, finishing in one day, saying that "with the president of the left and the supervising secretaries all present, the Chancellery has already been passed"; the discrepancies of qualification were many and none dared speak, and thereafter the Chancellery no longer reviewed appointments and the vice-ministers only handled the tests of judgment, while the vice-ministers Wei Jiansu and Zhang Yi ran about the courtyard like heads of office. The governor of the capital region, Xianyu Zhongtong, further had the selected men petition for a stele at the gate of the Secretariat praising Yang Guozhong's "merit" in appointments; the emperor had Xianyu Zhongtong compose the text and himself altered a few characters, and Xianyu Zhongtong filled the letters with gold. He also covered up disaster: in 753 Guanzhong suffered flood and severe famine, and when the emperor feared that the heavy rain would injure the crops Yang Guozhong presented only the good grain, saying that "though the rain is heavy it does not hurt the crops," which the emperor believed; and when the governor of Fufeng, Fang Guan, reported the flood in his commandery, Yang Guozhong in anger sent censors to interrogate him, after which no one dared report flood or drought, "all first divining Yang Guozhong's mind before daring to speak."

The Two Disasters in Nanzhao and the Evils of Forced Conscription

The gravest failure of his administration was the repeated campaigns against Nanzhao. In the fourth month of 751 Xianyu Zhongtong led eighty thousand men by two roads from Rongzhou and Suizhou to Quzhou and Jingzhou; and the king of Nanzhao, Geluofeng, sent envoys to apologize and ask to return what had been plundered and to withdraw from Yunnan, saying that the great army of Tibet was on his frontier and that if he were not permitted he would give his allegiance to Tibet and Yunnan would be lost to Tang. Xianyu Zhongtong would not allow it and imprisoned his envoys, advanced to the Erhai river and fought Geluofeng, and was heavily beaten, sixty thousand of his men being killed and himself barely escaping. Yang Guozhong covered up the defeat and reported his services as if won; and Geluofeng gathered the corpses of the slain into a mound for a monument and turned north to submit to Tibet — in the barbarian tongue a younger brother is called "zhong," so that Tibet made Geluofeng its "btsan po's zhong," called him emperor of the east and gave him a golden seal; and Geluofeng set up a stele at the gate of his capital saying that his family had served Tang for generations and received its enfeoffments, and that should later ages return to Tang they should point to the stele to show the Tang envoys, so that they might know that his rebellion was not of his own heart. Afterwards the court called up great levies of troops from the two capitals and from Henan and Hebei against Nanzhao, and men, hearing that Yunnan was full of pestilential air and that eight or nine in ten died before fighting, would not enlist, so that Yang Guozhong sent censors by the several roads to seize men and send them in chains to the camps. By the old rule commoners who had rank were exempt from service; and now, with the levies so heavy, Yang Guozhong memorialized that the highly ranked be taken first, so that the departing men were full of resentment and their parents and wives saw them off with weeping that resounded over the countryside. He also sent Song Yu, Zheng Ang and Wei Xuan each year as censors to press the commanderies and counties, whose officers, at their wits' end, would lure the poor and weak with a pretended offer of rations, bind them secretly in a room, dress them in wadded clothes and send them to the camps in irons, replacing deserters with the men who had brought them, so that "all men thought of rebellion." In 754 he sent the Jiannan rear commissioner Li Mi with more than a hundred thousand men against Nanzhao again: Geluofeng drew him deep in, shut his walls at Taihe city and would not fight, and Li Mi, his grain gone and seven or eight in ten of his men dead of pestilence and hunger, turned back, whereupon the barbarians pursued and Li Mi was taken and the whole army lost — the New Tang History recording that he was defeated and died at the Erhai river. Yang Guozhong again made a victory of the defeat and reported it as a triumph. In the two campaigns of Xianyu Zhongtong and Li Mi "two hundred thousand of the picked troops of China were poured out and not a shoe returned, and the empire held it a wrong"; and from that time Nanzhao attached itself to Tibet and Yunnan was no longer Tang's.

His Contest with An Lushan, the Quarrel over the Imperial Campaign, and the Loss of Tongguan

Yang Guozhong's relations with An Lushan were bad. In the first month of 754 An Lushan came to court, and Yang Guozhong said he was certain to rebel and claimed that if the emperor summoned him he would not come; but when the emperor sent for him An Lushan came at once, and on the geng-zi day, received at the Huaqing palace, he wept and said that he was a barbarian whom the emperor had raised to this height and whom Yang Guozhong hated, so that his death was but a matter of days; and the emperor pitied him, gave him gifts by the ten thousand and trusted him the more, so that Yang Guozhong's words no longer entered. The heir apparent also knew that An Lushan would rebel and told the emperor, who would not listen. When the emperor would have given An Lushan the title of joint manager of state affairs and had already had Zhang Ji draft the patent, Yang Guozhong remonstrated that An Lushan, though of military merit, could not read a character and could not be chancellor, and that if the patent were issued the four barbarian quarters would think lightly of Tang; and the emperor desisted, giving him instead the presidency of the left and one son the third rank and another the fourth. Yang Guozhong also had his retainers Jian Ang and He Ying seek out An Lushan's secret affairs and surround his mansion, taking Li Chao and An Dai and having the censor Zheng Ang strangle them in the censorate; and he memorialized to banish Ji Wen to Hepu to provoke An Lushan and make him waver, hoping thereby to win credit with the emperor, who never awoke to it. So An Lushan, in fear, rose in arms in the name of destroying Yang Guozhong. When the rebellion came the emperor summoned his chancellors to consider it, and Yang Guozhong, "with a complacent look," said that the only rebel was An Lushan and that his officers and men were unwilling, so that within ten days his head would be sent to the court; and the emperor believed it while the ministers looked at one another and turned pale. Afterwards, when the emperor proposed to campaign in person and issued a decree making the heir apparent regent, Yang Guozhong was greatly frightened and, withdrawing, told the three ladies Han, Guo and Qin that the heir apparent had long hated the arrogance of their house, and that if he once had the empire they and their sisters would die within a day; and they wept together and had the three ladies persuade the consort, who took earth in her mouth and begged the emperor to stop, so that the personal campaign was dropped. When the trouble first broke out he had already "made himself commander of Jiannan and planted his confidants in Liang and Yi as a plan for his own safety"; and now, when the emperor asked his chancellors, Yang Guozhong said that flight to Shu was convenient, and the emperor agreed. In the loss of Tongguan his responsibility was direct: Geshu Han held Tongguan and would not come out, so that the rebels could not advance, and the general situation was turning in Tang's favour; but Yang Guozhong, suspecting Geshu Han of plotting against him, urged the campaign from within, telling the emperor that the rebels were unprepared and that Geshu Han's delay would lose the chance, which the emperor believed, sending palace envoys one after another until their backs were in sight of one another; and Geshu Han, unable to help it, beat his breast and wept and led his troops out of the pass. The government army fought Cui Qianyou at the western plain of Lingbao, where he had taken the strong ground, the mountains close on the south and the river barred on the north, in a defile seventy li long; the government troops laughed to see the rebels so few, and when the lines met the rebels lowered their banners as if to flee, so that the government troops relaxed and made no preparation, and in a moment the ambush sprang up and the rebels, from the heights, dropped timber and stone, killing great numbers, while the road was so narrow that the soldiers were packed like bundles and could not use their spears; and when the day passed noon and a fierce east wind rose, Cui Qianyou had several dozen straw carts stop the felt-covered wagons in front and set them alight, so that the smoke and flame blinded the government troops, who killed one another in confusion, and at dusk, their arrows gone, they found no rebels in the smoke; and Cui Qianyou sent picked Tongluo cavalry round by the southern hills to strike their rear, so that front and rear were thrown into disorder and they were utterly beaten, some throwing away their armour and hiding in the valleys, others crowding one another into the river and drowning, the uproar shaking heaven and earth; the rear saw the front broken and broke too, and the troops north of the river, seeing it, also broke, so that in an instant both banks were empty. Geshu Han alone with a hundred-odd riders under him fled west over the Shouyang hills and entered the pass, outside which three ditches had been dug, each twenty feet wide and ten deep, into which men and horses fell until in a moment they were full, the rest trampling over them; and of the soldiers only some eight thousand got inside the pass. The next day Cui Qianyou attacked and took Tongguan, whereupon the defence commissioners of Hedong, Huayin, Fengyi and Shangluo all abandoned their commanderies and fled and the garrison troops everywhere dispersed; and Geshu Han, reaching Tongguan, was seized by his own officer Huoba Guiren with several dozen riders and surrendered to the rebels, so that the gate was lost and the capital was in terror.

Major Activities

Political Activities

Yang’s political career began through attachment to Li Linfu. When Li used major judicial prosecutions to undermine the heir apparent, Yang acted as an aggressive investigator, and the source attributes the false implication and execution of more than a hundred clans to these campaigns. In 752 he used the Xing Zai case to destroy Wang Hong and his brother and then implicated Li Linfu, contributing to the latter’s loss of imperial favor. After Li’s death Yang became Right Chancellor and concentrated power. He excluded opponents and demoted officials of talent who would not serve him, though the source also notes that he sought out unusual talent and promoted some neglected men.

Fiscal Measures

While managing state finance, Yang proposed converting accumulated local grain into light goods for shipment to the capital and turning public granary reserves, poll taxes, and land taxes into textiles for the imperial treasury. This filled the Left Treasury and delighted Xuanzong, but the source characterizes it as a policy of extraction that concentrated local wealth at the center and weakened provincial finances. He also changed the exemption system for households with military merit, making such households subject to selection for service first; the source says this harmed soldiers’ morale.

Campaigns against Nanzhao

Yang’s two Nanzhao campaigns both ended in disaster. Xianyu Zhongtong led eighty thousand men in 751 and was defeated at the Xi'er River, with sixty thousand deaths reported. In 754 Li Mi led seventy thousand and lost the whole force. Yang concealed both defeats and submitted reports of victory. Censors were sent to seize unwilling men for military service, producing widespread grief. The defeats inflicted severe losses on Tang power and contributed to Nanzhao’s alignment with the Tibetan Empire and loss of control in the southwest.

Conflict with An Lushan

The personal conflict between Yang and An Lushan was one important immediate factor identified in the source for the An Lushan Rebellion. Yang repeatedly warned that An would revolt, increasing hostility, while An used opposition to Yang as a justification for raising troops. In 755 An rebelled under the slogan of “punishing Guozhong and clearing the emperor’s side.” After the rebellion began, Yang pressed Geshu Han to leave Tong Pass, leading to the defeat at Lingbao, loss of the pass, and abandonment of Chang'an.

Travels and Public Display

Yang spent many years in Sichuan in his early career before moving to the capital. Later, whenever Xuanzong and Consort Yang traveled to Huaqing Palace, the Yang sisters gathered first at Yang’s residence and competed in decorating their carriages and horses. Yang rode ahead displaying the insignia of the Jiannan military commissioner. The five households wore distinct colors; when their retinues joined, the source compares the display to patterned clouds. Jewelry and shoes were scattered along the road and perfume was said to be detectable tens of li away, presenting an image of extreme luxury.

The Course of the Mawwei Incident, His Household Display, and Later Judgement

When the emperor resolved to flee to Shu, Yang Guozhong, meeting the officials, "choked and could not master himself"; and the investigating censor Gao Shi asked to lead the sons of the officials and a levy of bold men, a hundred thousand in all, to hold the passes, which the others thought impossible. The next day at dawn the emperor went out by the Yanqiu gate, the officials not knowing of it and still going to court, only the three guards' skirmishers standing on duty, so that the sound of the water-clock could still be heard; and Yang Guozhong with Wei Jiansu, Gao Lishi and the heir apparent with the princes, several hundred in all, escorted the emperor. The great general of the right dragon martial guards, Chen Xuanli, plotted to kill Yang Guozhong and did not succeed; and as they came to Mawwei the officers and men were weary and without food, and Chen Xuanli, fearing mutiny, called the generals and asked whether the disorder of the Son of Heaven and the loss of the altars of state, which had left the living with their brains on the ground, were not the doing of Yang Guozhong, and whether they should destroy him to answer to the empire; and they answered that they had long thought of it and that to do it and die would be their wish. So Chen Xuanli stirred the officers and men with the claim that the rebellion came wholly from Yang Guozhong and that killing him would end it, and the heir apparent Li Heng with the eunuch Li Fuguo and Gao Lishi also stirred up the soldiers. Yang Guozhong fled within the western gate and was overtaken by the soldiers and cut to death with their blades, and his wife Pei Rou and his sons Yang Xuan and Yang Xi were killed as well; after which the soldiers surrounded the emperor and demanded the death of the consort, and the emperor had no choice but to order Gao Lishi to strangle her. As to his household display, Yang Guozhong once said of himself that he was "of a poor house, raised to this by the women's quarters, and did not know where he would end; but thinking that he could never win a fine name, he might as well enjoy himself to the full," and his conduct matched his words: when the lady of Guo was newly widowed he gave her much wealth and their relations did not cease; and whenever the emperor and the consort went to the Huaqing palace the carriages of the five Yang households all followed, each house one troop and each troop one colour, so that when the five troops joined they were "bright as ten thousand flowers, the valleys and streams turned to brocade," with Yang Guozhong leading with the banner and staff of the military governor of Jiannan, and hairpins and slippers dropped, strings of pearls and gems strewn on the road, the scent reaching several tens of li — luxury at its extreme. When the three ladies were to follow the imperial progress to the Huaqing palace they first assembled at Yang Guozhong's mansion, the carriages, horses and attendants filling several wards, the brocade and pearls too bright for the eye; and his mansion, though a subject's, vied with the capital in splendour.

Personal Relations

• Consort Yang — clan cousin whose favor helped Yang’s rise
• Yang Xun — father, posthumously granted Minister of Military Affairs because of Yang’s favor
• Zhang Yizhi — described in one tradition as his maternal uncle; favorite of Empress Wu
• Pei Rou — wife, described as a performer from Sichuan
• Yang Xuan — eldest son, head of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices; killed in the Mawei Mutiny
• Yang Xiao — second son, Deputy Director of the Palace Administration; killed by Prince Li Yu of Hanzhong
• Yang Fu — third son, head of the Court of State Ceremonial and imperial son-in-law; married Princess Wanchun and was captured and killed by An Lushan
• Yang Xi — youngest son; killed in the Mawei Mutiny
• Ladies of Guo, Korea, and Qin — elder sisters of Consort Yang and close associates of Yang Guozhong
• Emperor Xuanzong of Tang — favored Yang and bestowed the name Guozhong
• Li Linfu — political rival; initially ally and later enemy
• An Lushan — political enemy; their conflict contributed to the outbreak of the An Lushan Rebellion in the source’s account
• Geshu Han — colleague who supported Yang’s accusations against Li Linfu and was later forced into a disastrous battle
• Chen Xilie — colleague who supported Yang
• Wang Hong — political rival framed and killed through Yang’s actions
• Xianyu Zhongtong — early patron in Sichuan, later recommended by Yang to lead the disastrous Nanzhao campaign
• Zhangqiu Jianqiong — patron and military commissioner of Jiannan who sent Yang to the capital
• Ji Wen — political associate who helped devise plans for seizing power
• Chen Xuanli — leading figure in the Mawei Mutiny that killed Yang
• Li Heng — heir apparent, described as involved behind the scenes in the Mawei Mutiny
• Li Fuguo and Gao Lishi — eunuchs described as participating in the mutiny’s planning

Historical Assessment

Tang / Contemporary

• Zhang Jiuling, observing people attaching themselves to Yang, reportedly said: “these beggars all warm themselves at the fire，when the fire dies they will freeze to death,” expressing contempt for those crowding around his temporary power.
• An Lushan rose under the slogan of “punishing Guozhong and clearing the emperor’s side.” Although this served as a pretext, it also reflects Yang’s contemporary reputation as a symbol of harmful government.
• During the Mawei Mutiny, Chen Xuanli blamed the collapse of the realm and imperial flight on Yang Guozhong’s exploitation of the people, representing the view attributed to the mutinous imperial troops.

Song and Yuan Periods

• The historians of the Old Book of Tang described Yang as cunning, adept at serving the powerful, skilled at accumulation, and devoted to flattery, criticizing his lack of learning and grasp of larger political principles.
• The New Book of Tang similarly emphasized that he held more than forty commissions, controlled finance, and concentrated on extraction to fill the imperial treasury.
• Sima Guang’s Zizhi Tongjian criticized Yang for using his kinship with the imperial consort to control finance, concentrating on extraction to fill the palace stores while failing to recognize that the political situation of the realm had already deteriorated.

Ming and Qing Periods

• Wang Fuzhi’s Du Tongjian Lun argued that Yang used revenue extraction to please the ruler and political danger to eliminate opponents, but also placed responsibility on Xuanzong for favoring him.
• Zhao Yi’s Nian'ershi Zhaji grouped Li Linfu’s treacherous politics and Yang’s rise through revenue extraction as products of Xuanzong’s failure to remove dangerous favorites.

Modern and Contemporary

• Cen Zhongmian’s history of the Sui and Tang noted that Yang was not entirely without ability and did possess fiscal skill, but emphasized that his talent was directed toward extraction and flattery.
• Huang Yongnian argued that the personal conflict between Yang and An Lushan was one direct trigger of the An Lushan Rebellion, while its deeper causes lay in Xuanzong’s late neglect of government and the rise of powerful regional military commands.
• Lü Simian wrote that Yang was treacherous and flattering but not wholly without useful talent; his failure was his inability to understand the larger political situation and his concentration on extraction, which made him the target of widespread hostility.