Biography
Family Background and Early Years Yang Yao was originally named Yang Tai and was born into a tenant-laboring family at Zhujiagang in Longyang County, Dingzhou, present-day Xinxing Township of Hanshou County, Hunan. His father, whose personal name is not given, worked for more than ten years as a hired laborer for a wealthy local household headed by Gao, performing hard manual labor. Gao later arranged his marriage, after which the family built a thatched dwelling and settled. Yang attended a village school for two years as a child but left because of poverty and joined his father as a hired hand on merchant vessels traveling Dongting Lake. According to *Anecdotes of Zhong Xiang and Yang Yao*, Yang heard merchants aboard ship discuss the outlaws of Liangshan Marsh led by Song Jiang and lamented that few who accepted amnesty came to good ends. The source says this helped stimulate his rebellious consciousness. Yang was the youngest among the uprising leaders. In local speech the youngest was called *yao*, so he became known as Yang Yao. This name later became his standard historical designation, while his original personal name Tai was less commonly used. ### Joining Zhong Xiang's Uprising and Taking Command In the second month of 1130, the fourth year of the Jianyan era, the Dingzhou religious leader Zhong Xiang launched an uprising under the slogan “equalize noble and base, equalize rich and poor,” proclaimed himself King of Chu, and rapidly seized most prefectures and counties along Dongting Lake. Yang joined the rebels and, because of his courage and ability to handle difficult affairs, won Zhong's confidence. Zhong reportedly told those around him that Yang possessed courage and strategy, could handle complicated tasks, and would one day be the man to carry on his aims. In the third month, Kong Yanzhou led troops against Zhong's main stockade. Kong first sent soldiers pretending to join Zhong's religious community. Yang recognized them as spies and advised caution, but Zhong rejected the warning on the grounds that all who entered the faith were brothers. Kong's troops then broke the stockade and killed Zhong, Zhong's wife Lady Yi, and eldest son Zhong Ziang. Amid the fighting Yang rescued Zhong's younger son Zhong Ziyi, carried him along a small path to Longyang, and contacted dozens of leaders including Xia Cheng, Yang Qin, Yang Guang, and Zhou Lun. They gathered more than eighty thousand fighters and raised the rebel banner again. Fortified camps were established around the lake, timber was cut for ships, earthen defenses were built, and the movement recovered its strength. ### Repeated Victories over Government Forces and Establishment of a Regime In the first month of 1131, the first year of Shaoxing, Cheng Changyu, pacification commissioner for Ding-Li and prefect of Dingzhou, led troops against the rebels. Yang's forces defeated him at Dingkou, east of present-day Changde where the Yuan River enters Dongting Lake. They later defeated Cheng's naval forces at Xiazhijiang and captured government paddle-wheel ships and the supervising craftsman Gao Xuan. Using Gao's technical skills, Yang had large paddle-wheel vessels built at the various lake strongholds. The warships stood two or three stories high and could carry nearly one thousand men. Wheels fitted inside the hull were powered by foot treadles to drive the ship rapidly. Striking beams more than ten *zhang* long carried heavy stones and could be operated by winches to smash approaching enemy ships. Relying on these vessels, the rebels extended their influence to prefectures and counties around the lake. In the fourth month of 1133, the third year of Shaoxing, rebel forces from the Dongting Lake counties selected Yang as overall leader. He took the title “Great Sage Heavenly King” and used it as an era designation. He made Zhong Xiang's younger son Zhong Ziyi Crown Prince, appointed Huang Cheng military adviser and Left Vice Director of the Department of State Affairs, and Yang Qin Defender-in-chief of the cavalry. A main stronghold was established at Baotai Mountain, present-day Baotai Village in Weidihu Township, Hanshou County, with more than seventy water fortresses placed at passes and strategic points. The Southern Song court successively sent forces under Li Gang, Zhe Yanzhi, Wang Yu, and others, all of which were defeated. ### Control around Dongting and Final Defeat Yang's zone of control extended east beyond Yueyang, west to Ding and Li, present-day Changde and Lixian, north to Gong'an, and south to the Changsha border. It covered nineteen counties in seven prefectures and was said to include two hundred thousand followers. The rebel region implemented policies described as “farming on land and fighting on water” and “combining soldiers and farmers,” remitted grain and cash taxes, and promoted production. Southern Song and the puppet Qi repeatedly sent envoys offering surrender terms, but Yang had them beheaded and thrown into the river. In the second month of 1135, the fifth year of Shaoxing, Emperor Gaozong appointed Right Vice Director Zhang Jun as supervising commander and transferred Yue Fei from the anti-Jin front to become military commissioner for the Jinghu North and South and Xiangyang Prefecture routes, ordering him to suppress the rebels. Yue combined political inducement with military attack. He first sent the surrendered Yang Hua into rebel stockades to incite defections, then induced leaders such as Huang Zuo and Yang Qin to surrender. In early June, following Yang Qin's advice, Yue opened sluices to release water, felled timber to block channels, and spread weeds over the water, depriving the paddle-wheel ships of mobility. On the second day of the sixth month, Yang Qin surrendered with three thousand men and warships. Liu Heng, Jin Cong, Liu Shen, Huang Zuo, and other stronghold leaders followed, causing most of the rebel army to collapse. On the eleventh day, the main Baotai Mountain stronghold was captured. Yang led a breakout, fought hard but lost, was captured by Yue Fei's officer Niu Gao, and immediately killed. Xia Cheng's strongly defended camp was also taken. The Zhong Xiang-Yang Yao uprising was thereby suppressed.
Yang Yao was the youngest of the chiefs of Zhong Xiang's rising, and because the youngest is called yao in the local speech, he was known as Yang Yao. In the third month of 1131, after Zhong Xiang's death, Yang Yao joined with Xia Cheng of Longyang, Ying Xuan and several dozen other chiefs and raised the flag again, mustering eighty thousand men, cutting timber for boats and piling earth for stockades, so that stockades stood thick about the lake and sails crowded on the water and the peasant army's power revived.
In the sixth month of that year the Southern Song made Cheng Changyu commissioner of Ding and Li to suppress them; he was intercepted and escaped with his life alone. In the first month of 1132 the rebels beat Cheng Changyu again and took the government's paddle-wheel ships and the master shipwright Gao Xuan, whom they employed, building such vessels in every stockade. The ships were two decks high and fitted with wheels that churned the water so that they went swiftly; each carried a striking pole over ten zhang long with a great stone at the top and a rope below, so that when an enemy ship came near the rope was pulled and the stone flew to smash it; and they had wooden crows, fish spears and crossbow bolts besides, so that the government ships could not close with them. Paddling their wheeled ships about the lake, the rebels reached into the prefectures and counties around it, and the court was the more alarmed.
The court made Li Gang commander of a four-pronged attack. To meet the need of the struggle Yang Yao was acclaimed by the rebel forces of the counties as their chief in the fourth month of the following year, calling himself the Great Sage Heavenly King and using the title to reckon the years, setting up Zhong Xiang's youngest son Zhong Ziyi as heir and making Huang Cheng his strategist and grand commandant. His headquarters were at Baotai mountain, with more than seventy water stockades at the passes and defiles, and Li Gang's four-pronged attack was broken. Gaozong sent a Hanlin academician in his place and the sweep grew wider. Carrying out Zhong Xiang's principle of equal rank and equal wealth, Yang Yao practised the policy of farming on land and fighting on water with soldiers and peasants combined, remitting taxes in the districts he held and developing production, so that the people supported him; his power reached east beyond Yueyang, west to Ding and Li, north to Gongan and south to the borders of Changsha, sweeping seven prefectures and nineteen counties about Lake Dongting with two hundred thousand followers. The Southern Song and the puppet Qi sent envoys more than once to win him over, and he beheaded them and sank them in the river.
In 1135 the court made Zhang Jun overseer of the armies and recalled Yue Fei from the front against the Jin as commissioner of Jinghu and the Xiangyang circuit, launching the seventh campaign against the rebels. Yue Fei drew over Huang Cheng, Yang Qin and others; and by Yang Qin's plan he opened the sluices to let the water out, blocked the channels with felled timber and spread weeds on the surface, so that the wheeled ships lost their power. On the eleventh day of the sixth month the headquarters at Baotai mountain was stormed; Yang Yao would not surrender, broke out with his followers, was taken at Tian'edang and killed. After his death his story spread widely in Hanshou and about Lake Dongting and took on a local colour in folktale, and later records and studies have debated various points in the history of the rising.
Other accounts of Yang Yao's early years say that his name was Tai, that his family had lived at Longyang for generations, and that the villagers called him Yao because he was the youngest. His father worked as a servant for a rich man named Gao for more than ten years without slackening, and Gao found him a wife and built them a thatched house; after Gao's death the father rowed boats carrying goods about Lake Dongting, and some years later gave it up and became a tenant farmer. Yang Yao was quick as a child and studied two years with the village schoolmaster, then, too poor to continue, went with his father on the boats and washed and cleaned for a living. He used to hear merchants talk of the marshes where bandit bands gathered and the government troops dared not approach, and of how few of those who accepted amnesty came to a good end, and would sigh over it.
Once he had entered the movement Zhong Xiang thought much of him, saying to those about him that Yang Yao had courage and judgment and could bear heavy business, and that whoever carried on his purpose would be this man. When Kong Yanzhou sent men to join the movement as spies, Yang Yao advised that the newcomers were in rags and full of flattery and were likely no good, and begged the king to look into it; Zhong Xiang held that all who joined were brothers and need not be suspected, and Yang Yao answered that if spies got in, regret would come too late. After Kong Yanzhou destroyed Zhong Xiang, Yang Yao found Zhong Xiang's son hiding in a mountain path, carried him on his back and fled with him by side roads to Longyang to plan a new rising. He called Zhou Lun and Xia Cheng to council and gathered the elders in his hall, and as he recounted the past he wept and the elders wept with him; an old man named Gao offered his son for service, and the assembly made Yang Yao their leader.
Li Cheng of the puppet Qi sent a persuader to urge Yang Yao to join him in seizing territory and overthrowing the Song house, and Yang Yao rebuked him: that he had risen from the fields to cleanse the filth within and destroy the barbarians without, a purpose known to gods and men; that Li Cheng was a rebel who had knelt to the northern court and slaughtered the people, and that he had long gnashed his teeth at him — let him go back quickly and not sully his blade. Between 1130 and 1131 the leaders of the Hunan rebels, Zhou Lun and others, gathered several hundred thousand men, withdrew to Longyang and built water stockades among the winding channels and steep islands of Lake Dongting, holding the land and facing the water, mooring their boats along the banks and fortifying themselves closely; when the Southern Song fleet attacked, it was beaten by the rebels at Xiazhi river.
In the later years of the rising, however, Yang Yao and Zhong Ziyi, son of Zhong Xiang, and the other leaders drifted away from the principle of equal rank and equal wealth: their food, clothing and lodging grew extravagantly luxurious, their beds inlaid with gold and jade, while their soldiers and the people under them were wretched, so that at Yue Fei's coming they flocked to him. Yang Yao also used his troops cruelly, burning countless houses and temples and killing officials and scholars at will, calling the killing of the innocent the execution of the law; much damage was done about Lake Dongting and the people could not live, and it was only after Yue Fei pacified the region that it recovered by degrees. To the Southern Song court Yang Yao had become a third great scourge beside the Jin and the puppet Qi; after repeated failures, in 1135 the court sent Yue Fei's army, and Yue Fei, taking account of his loss of the people's support, combined siege with conciliation, so that within ten days Yang Yao's officers and men came over in crowds and Yang Yao himself was taken.
Yang Yao's rising lasted some six years in all, the largest internal disturbance of the early Southern Song. After it was put down most of the water stockades about Lake Dongting were dismantled and the rebels were taken into the government armies or sent back to farming; the Song History records the affair in the biography of Yue Fei and in the annals of Gaozong, with differences of fullness and emphasis between them.