King You of Zhou (795–771 BC), personal name Ji Gongsheng, was a

king King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...

of the Chinese

Zhou dynasty The Zhou dynasty ( ) was a royal dynasty of China that existed for 789 years from until 256 BC, the longest span of any dynasty in Chinese history. During the Western Zhou period (771 BC), the royal house, surnamed Ji, had military ...

and the last from the

Western Zhou dynasty The Western Zhou ( zh, c=西周, p=Xīzhōu; 771 BC) was a period of Chinese history corresponding roughly to the first half of the Zhou dynasty. It began when King Wu of Zhou overthrew the Shang dynasty at the Battle of Muye and ended in 7 ...

. He reigned from 781 to 771 BC.

History

In 780 BC, a major earthquake struck

Guanzhong Guanzhong (, formerly romanization of Chinese, romanised as Kwanchung) region, also known as the Guanzhong Basin, Wei River Basin, or uncommonly as the Shaanzhong region, is a historical region of China corresponding to the crescentic graben str ...

. A soothsayer named Bo Yangfu () considered this an omen foretelling the destruction of the Zhou Dynasty. In 779 BC, a concubine named Bao Si entered the palace and came into the King You's favour. They had a son named Bofu. King You deposed and Crown Prince Yijiu. He made Bao Si the new queen and Bofu the new crown prince. Queen Shen's father, the Marquess of Shen, was furious at the deposition of his daughter and grandson Crown Prince Yijiu and mounted an attack on King You's palace with the

Quanrong The Quanrong () or Dog Rong were an ethnic group, classified by the ancient Chinese as " Qiang", active in the northwestern part of China during and after the Zhou dynasty (1046–221 BCE). Their language or languages are considered to have been ...

. King You called for his nobles using the previously abused beacons but none came. In the end, King You and Bofu were killed and Bao Si was captured. After King You died, nobles including the Marquess of Shen, the Marquess of Zeng () and supported the deposed Prince Yijiu as King Ping of Zhou to continue the Zhou Dynasty. As the national capital Haojing had suffered severe damage, and was located near the potentially dangerous Quanrong, in 771 BC, King Ping of Zhou moved the capital eastward to

Luoyang Luoyang ( zh, s=洛阳, t=洛陽, p=Luòyáng) is a city located in the confluence area of the Luo River and the Yellow River in the west of Henan province, China. Governed as a prefecture-level city, it borders the provincial capital of Zheng ...

, thus beginning the Eastern Zhou dynasty and ushering in the

Spring and Autumn period The Spring and Autumn period () was a period in History of China, Chinese history corresponding roughly to the first half of the Eastern Zhou (256 BCE), characterized by the gradual erosion of royal power as local lords nominally subject t ...

which would last for more than 300 years.

In literature

In the traditional Mao Commentary to the ''

Classic of Poetry The ''Classic of Poetry'', also ''Shijing'' or ''Shih-ching'', translated variously as the ''Book of Songs'', ''Book of Odes'', or simply known as the ''Odes'' or ''Poetry'' (; ''Shī''), is the oldest existing collection of Chinese poetry, co ...

'', the minor court hymn "Gather the Beans" () is said to be a criticism of King You for squandering feudal lords' respect and humiliating them. Even so, this interpretation is disputed. The ''

Records of the Grand Historian The ''Shiji'', also known as ''Records of the Grand Historian'' or ''The Grand Scribe's Records'', is a Chinese historical text that is the first of the Twenty-Four Histories of imperial China. It was written during the late 2nd and early 1st ce ...

'' states that Baosi did not laugh easily. After trying many methods and failing, King You tried to amuse his favorite queen by lighting warning beacons and fooling his nobles into thinking that the

nomads were about to attack. The nobles arrived at the castle only to find themselves laughed at by Baosi. Even after King You had impressed Baosi, he continued to abuse his use of warning beacons and lost the trust of the nobles. The earliest warning beacons appeared in the Han dynasty, and this story is considered to be fabricated. According the ''Xinian'', carried by the excavated

Tsinghua Bamboo Slips The Tsinghua Bamboo Strips () are a collection of Chinese texts dating to the Warring States period and written in ink on strips of bamboo, that were acquired in 2008 by Tsinghua University, China. The texts were obtained by illegal excavation, ...

, King You of Zhou attacked the Marquess of Shen, who allied with the Quanrong to defeat the royal army.

Family

Queens

* Queen Shen, of the Jiang clan of Shen (), a daughter of the Marquess of Shen; the mother of Crown Prince Yijiu

Concubines

* Bao Si, of the Du lineage of the Qi clan of Bao (791–771 BC), a daughter of Du Bo; married in 779 BC; the mother of Crown Prince Bofu

Sons

* Crown Prince Yijiu (; d. 720 BC), ruled as King Ping of Zhou from 770 to 720 BC * ''Crown Prince Bofu'' (779–771 BC)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:You of Zhou, King 790s BC births 770s BC deaths Kings of the Zhou dynasty 8th-century BC Chinese monarchs