Liu Bang (Emperor Gaozu of Han)

Liu Bang rose from a farming family and a minor post in the Qin civil service to found the Han dynasty and become its first emperor. After the Qin state collapsed he outlasted his great rival Xiang Yu in a four-year civil war and reigned as emperor from 202 BC until his death in 195 BC. He is usually called Emperor Gaozu of Han, after the title of his biography in the Records of the Grand Historian.

Liu Bang was born in Pei County, in the former state of Chu, in either 256 or 247 BC; the sources do not agree. Accounts of his youth describe a generous, outspoken and easy-going man who avoided study and work and was often in trouble. Friends in the county office, Xiao He and Cao Shen, later his chief ministers, helped him become a local sheriff under the Qin dynasty. He married Lü Zhi, daughter of a wealthy newcomer to the county.

Ordered to escort labourers to the tomb being built for Qin Shi Huang, Liu lost some prisoners on the way, an offence punishable by death under Qin law. He freed the rest and took to the hills as an outlaw. When revolt against the Qin broke out in 209 BC, the people of Pei killed their magistrate and made Liu their leader, the Duke of Pei. He joined the rebel coalition that had revived the kingdom of Chu, whose king promised the rule of the Qin heartland, Guanzhong, to whoever entered it first. Liu won that race. At the turn of 207 and 206 BC the last Qin ruler, Ziying, surrendered to him at the capital, Xianyang. Liu forbade looting and replaced the harsh Qin laws with a few simple rules, winning local support.

Xiang Yu, the most powerful rebel general, resented being beaten to the capital. At a famous banquet at Hongmen he was persuaded not to have Liu killed; he then sacked Xianyang and divided the empire into eighteen kingdoms, sending Liu to the remote south-west as King of Han. Within the year Liu broke out, seized Guanzhong and began the Chu–Han Contention, which lasted from 206 to 202 BC. He suffered a crushing defeat at Pengcheng, where by the traditional account more than 200,000 of his men died, and his parents and wife were taken hostage. But with able commanders such as Han Xin and strategists such as Zhang Liang, he gradually wore down his opponent. A truce in 203 BC divided China along the Hong Canal, but Liu soon broke it. In 202 BC Xiang Yu was surrounded at Gaixia and took his own life.

Liu proclaimed the Han dynasty in 202 BC and soon settled his capital at Chang'an in Guanzhong. He demobilised his armies, granted long tax exemptions, freed people who had sold themselves into slavery during the wars and lowered taxes and labour service. Though once scornful of scholars, he came to value Confucian advice on ruling by virtue rather than punishment. He distrusted the kings he had appointed from outside his own family: Han Xin and Peng Yue were executed on charges of treason, and others who rebelled were defeated and killed.

In 200 BC Liu led an army against the Xiongnu, the nomadic power to the north, and was surrounded at Baideng, escaping only after bribing the wife of their leader, Modu. Afterwards he adopted the heqin policy, sending princesses as brides and paying yearly gifts to the Xiongnu in exchange for peace. While putting down the rebellion of Ying Bu in 195 BC he was wounded by a stray arrow. His health failed, he refused further treatment, and he died at Chang'an on 1 June 195 BC. His son Liu Ying succeeded him.

Our 200 BCE map shows the newly founded Han state holding most of China, with the Xiongnu confederation to the north; the 300 BCE map shows China before the Qin unification.