Cai Shu Du or Shu Du of Cai (
Chinese: , given name Du (), was the first ruler of the
State of Cai.
Du was the fifth son of King
Wen of
Zhou and his wife Taisi (). He had ten brothers and eight half-brothers. His elder brothers were Kao (
Boyi Kao), Fa (King
Wu of
Zhou), Xian (
Guan Shu), and Dan (the
Duke of Zhou).
He was given the
fief
A fief (; la, feudum) was a central element in medieval contracts based on feudal law. It consisted of a form of property holding or other rights granted by an overlord to a vassal, who held it in fealty or "in fee" in return for a form of f ...
of Cai by King Wu after the overthrow of the last
Shang
The Shang dynasty (), also known as the Yin dynasty (), was a Chinese royal dynasty founded by Tang of Shang (Cheng Tang) that ruled in the Yellow River valley in the second millennium BC, traditionally succeeding the Xia dynasty and f ...
king,
Zhou. Du's realm centered on present-day
Shangcai
Shangcai County () is a county in the south of Henan province, China. It is under the administration of the prefecture-level city of Zhumadian.
Administrative divisions
As 2017, this county is divided to 4 subdistricts, 12 towns and 10 township ...
,
Henan
Henan (; or ; ; alternatively Honan) is a landlocked province of China, in the central part of the country. Henan is often referred to as Zhongyuan or Zhongzhou (), which literally means "central plain" or "midland", although the name is al ...
. He and his brothers
Guan Shu Xian and
Huo Shu Chu (霍叔處) were known as the
Three Guards, but when King Wu died and the Duke of Zhou assumed the regency for the young King
Cheng, they rebelled along with
Wu Geng. The Duke of Zhou was able to suppress the rebellion and Du was exiled, although Cheng eventually recreated the realm of Cai as a grant to Du's son
Zhong Hu.
References
{{end
11th-century BC Chinese monarchs
11th century BC in China
Zhou dynasty nobility
Cai (state)
Founding monarchs