King Zhaoxiang of Qin
King Zhaoxiang of Qin, also abbreviated as King Zhao of Qin, born Ying Ji, was a king of the state of Qin during the Eastern Zhou dynasty, reigning from 306 BC to 251 BC. He was the son of King Huiwen and the younger brother of King Wu.
King Zhaoxiang reigned as the king of Qin for 57 years, and was responsible for the state of Qin achieving strategic dominance over the other six major states. During his reign, Qin captured the Chu capital Ying in 278 BC, conquered the Xirong state of Yiqu in 272 BC, defeated a 450,000-strong Zhao army at Changping in 260 BC, and overthrew the Eastern Zhou dynasty in 256 BC. These aggressive territorial expansions and the strategic weakening of other rival states paved the path for Qin's eventual unification of China proper three decades later by his great-grandson Ying Zheng, later known as Qin Shi Huang.
Life
Ascension
Prince Ying Ji was born in 325 BC to one of King Huiwen's low-ranked concubines, Lady Mi. As a shu child, Prince Ji was given low priority in the royal line of succession, and as an underage child was not granted a fief because the state of Qin employed a system of meritocracy that demanded that even princes earn their own lands through national service. He was dispatched to the state of Yan at a young age to serve as a political hostage, a common diplomatic practice among vassal states throughout the Zhou dynasty.In 307 BC, Ying Ji's older half-brother, King Wu, unexpectedly died after breaking his shin bones while trying to show off his physical prowess by lifting a heavy bronze cauldron in the Zhou palace in Wangcheng. King Wu died young and childless, placing the state of Qin into a succession crisis as a number of princes were now eligible to claim the throne. At the time, Prince Ji was still a hostage in the state of Yan, and was generally considered unlikely to be a candidate. However, King Wuling of Zhao decided to take advantage of the situation and intervene in the domestic politics of his western neighbour. King Wuling ordered his chancellor of the Dai Commandery, Zhao Gu, to smuggle Prince Ji out of Yan into Zhao territory, before endorsing him to return to Qin and contest for the throne. Furthermore, Prince Ji's maternal uncle, Wei Ran, was a general in command of a significant Qin military forces, and helped in suppressing most of his nephew's political opponents. This enabled Prince Ji to successfully claim the throne and rise to be King Zhaoxiang of Qin at the age of 18.
Because King Zhaoxiang would not yet legally come of age until the age of 20, his mother, who was now known as Queen Dowager Xuan, became the regent. She was supported by her brothers Wei Ran and Mi Rong, as well as two other sons, Prince Yi and Prince Fu, the four of them collectively known as the "Four Nobles".
Reign
In his first year as ruler, King Zhaoxiang accepted the counsel of the Right Chancellor, Gan Mao, who advocated for the return of the Wusui region back to the state of Han. The plan was opposed by two other officials, Xiang Shou and Gongsun Shi, who both despised Gan Mao greatly and proceeded to slander him repeatedly. This led Gan Mao to flee Qin in fear of his life and defect to the state of Qi.In 305 BC, two of King Zhaoxiang's older half-brothers, Prince Zhuang and Prince Yong, conspired to carry out a coup with Queen Huiwen and Queen Wu as well as a dozen other lords and court officials who were against King Zhaoxiang's ascension. The rebellion was quickly crushed by Wei Ran, who slaughtered all of the conspirators except Queen Wu, who was exiled back to Wei. With the annihilation of the dissidents, King Zhaoxiang's hold on the throne was secured. In the same year, King Zhaoxiang had his coming-of-age ceremony, and began to personally attend to state affairs.
War against Chu
In 304 BC, King Zhaoxiang met with King Huai of Chu in Huangqi to negotiate an alliance, ceding Shangyong as a gesture of goodwill. In 303 BC, the states of Qi, Wei and Han broke their previous alliance with Chu and invaded Chu, forcing Chu to send its crown prince, Xiong Heng, to Qin as a hostage in exchange for Qin assistance. King Zhaoxiang sent troops to attack Wei and Han, capturing Puban, Yangchun and Fengling from Wei, and re-capturing Wusui from Han. In 302 BC, King Zhaoxiang met with King Xiang of Wei and Crown Prince Yin of Han in Linjin, and agreed to return the seized lands in exchange for the two states renouncing their previous anti-Qin alliance. At the same time, the Chu crown prince secretly fled from Qin back to Chu.In 301 BC, the four states of Qin, Han, Wei and Qi allied together to attack Chu, defeating the Chu army at Zhongqiu and killing the Chu general Tang Mei. In 300 BC, King Zhaoxiang sent his uncle Mi Rong to capture Xiangcheng, killing 30,000 enemy soldiers and the Chu general Jing Que in the process.
Due to this defeat, in 299 BC King Huai of Chu was forced to go to Wu Pass to negotiate terms with Qin, but along the way was abducted and taken to Xianyang instead. When he refused to cede the territory of the Wu Commandery and Qianzhong Commandery, he was detained as a hostage. King Zhaoxiang then proceeded to invade Chu the next year, capturing 16 cities and killing 50,000 Chu soldiers. King Huai of Chu did manage to escape in 297 BC, while Qin was distracted by a joint siege on Hangu Pass by Wei and Han, but he was recaptured while he was seeking asylum in Wei, after his bid for asylum in the state of Zhao failed. He died a year later in captivity, and Qin finally returned his corpse back to Chu.
The next king of Chu, King Qingxiang, was an even less competent ruler than his father. In 280 BC, Qin forces defeated the Chu army again, forcing them to cede Shangyong and Hanbei to Qin control. In 279 BC, Qin generals Bai Qi and Zhang Ruo launched amphibious assaults on Chu from two different fronts, capturing the cities of Deng, Yan and Xiling, during which Bai Qi flooded the city of Yan with a redirected river, drowning hundreds of thousands of people. This successful Qin campaign paved the way for Bai Qi's subsequent siege and capture of the Chu capital city of Ying in 278 BC, where Bai Qi burned the Chu ancestral mausoleums Yiling. The greatly weakened state of Chu was forced to relocate its capital to Chen. Qin then permanently annexed the vast lands around Dongting Lake, south of the Yangtze River near Anlu, where the new Nan Commandery was established.
War against Han and Wei
In 301 BC, Qin again attacked Han, led by King Zhaoxiang's uncle, Wei Ran, and occupied the city of Rang. The city was later given to Wei Ran, who was made chancellor six years later, as his fief. However, in 298 BC, Qin suffered a setback at Hangu Pass under a combined attack from a three-state alliance of Qi, Han and Wei, and was forced to concede the recently occupied Fengling and Wusui back to Wei and Han.In 293 BC, the states of Han, Wei and East Zhou allied together to attack Qin. King Zhaoxiang appointed the young Bai Qi as general, and defeated the two major states at Yique, killing 240,000 of the enemy and executing the enemy's supreme commander, Gongsun Xi. This was the most devastating blow Qin had delivered to the two eastern states to date. In 292 BC, Bai Qi again led the army and attacked Wei, capturing Weicheng and sacking Yuanqu. Then in 291 BC, Qin attacked Han again and seized the city of Wan and Ye. In 290 BC, King Zhaoxiang sent Sima Cuo, who captured Zhi from Wei and Deng from Han, before joining with Bai Qi to seize Yuanqu again. These successive victories forced Wei to concede 400 li of Hedong lands, and Han to concede 200 li of Wusui lands to Qin.
In 289 BC, King Zhaoxiang sent Bai Qi and Sima Cuo to attack Wei, capturing 61 villages around Zhi. However, in 288 BC, Qin was forced to back down when the five eastern states allied together and threatened to attack Qin again. It did not take long for Qin to strike back, capturing Xinyuan and Quyang from Wei in 287 BC, and the former Wei capital Anyi in 286 BC. In 283 BC, Qin allied with Zhao and attacked Wei again, capturing Ancheng with its vanguard reaching near the Wei capital Daliang.
In 276 BC, King Zhaoxiang once again sent Bai Qi to attack Wei. The following year in 275 BC, he sent his uncle Wei Ran to attack Daliang and killed 40,000 Han reinforcements sent to relieve the siege, forcing Wei to concede eight forts in Wencheng. Wei Ran attacked Wei again in 274 BC, capturing four cities and killing 40,000 men. In 273 BC, Wei and Zhao allied together to attack the Han city of Huayang. King Zhaoxiang sent troops to relieve the siege, killing 130,000 Wei soldiers outside Huayang and drowning 20,000 Zhao prisoners, forcing Wei to seek an armistice as well as to cede Nanyang. Qin attacked Wei again in 268 BC and captured Huaicheng.
In 266 BC, the Wei national Fan Ju fled to Qin after being persecuted and tortured by the Wei chancellor, Wei Qi, and vowed revenge upon his home state. He advised King Zhaoxiang about the strategy of "allying distant states while attacking nearby states". This advice impressed King Zhaoxiang so much that he appointed him as the chancellor of Qin. In 264 BC, King Zhaoxiang sent Bai Qi to attack Han, capturing nine cities including Xingcheng and killing 50,000 of the enemy, enabling Qin to blockade the routes around the southern Taihang Mountains. In 262 BC, Bai Qi attacked Han and captured Yewang, cutting off the Shangdang region from the Han mainland. King Huanhui of Han was fearful of the Qin military prowess and decided to concede Shangdang, but the local commanders refused to do so and instead surrendered the region to the state of Zhao. The struggle for control of Shangdang triggered direct conflicts between Qin and Zhao, then the two largest military powers among the warring states, leading to the devastating Battle of Changping.
In 256 BC, a Qin general named Jiu attacked Han, killing 40,000 soldiers and capturing Yangcheng and Fushu. Two years later in 254 BC, Jiu attacked Wei and captured Wucheng, forcing Wei to submit to Qin as a vassal state.