Historical Chinese figure Daji (妲己), who is often described in literature as a malevolent spirit, was actually a female general who helped her husband, King Zhou (紂王) of the Shang Dynasty, in battle, a researcher said.
Historical texts generally describe Daji as King Zhou’s favorite concubine, and in novels and legends she is depicted as a malevolent fox spirit who was responsible for the downfall of the dynasty, said Hwang Ming-chorng (黃銘崇), a research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of History and Philology.
However, research has shown that the queens of the Shang Dynasty wore armor and were required to follow the king onto the battlefield, he said.
Photo courtesy of the Institute of History and Philology
The museum commissioned graphic artist Chi You (蚩尤) to paint a likeness of Daji based on its records and artifacts about her to display as part of its permanent collection, he said.
“It’s a very formidable image. She is holding a shield with a zoomorphic pattern, and a bronze battle ax, and her face has the same characteristics seen in bronze masks from the era,” he said.
Huang, who is also director of the museum, said that women in the Shang Dynasty held high social status, and those of nobility were especially active in the royal court’s affairs.
Photo courtesy of the Tamsui Historical Museum
“Take Lady Hao (婦好) [the queen during the reign of King Wu Ding (武丁)], for example. She had to preside over ceremonies, participate in politics and even lead troops into battle,” he said.
Documents showed that Lady Hao was responsible for surrounding and capturing enemy forces, after Wu Ding and other generals drove them back, he said, adding that she would bring captured prisoners to Yinshang, which is now Anyang in China’s Henan Province.
“Queens during the Shang Dynasty all led troops into battle, so it stands to reason that Daji would have done so as well,” he said.
During the final battle of Shang, before the rise of the Zhou Dynasty, Daji and King Zhou escaped under the protection of the remaining Shang troops to the Deer Terrace Pavilion, where they committed self-immolation, he said.
“Confucians in later dynasties attempted to rewrite history by blaming the fall of the Shang on Daji, accusing her of meddling in politics,” he said.
Citing as an example Queen Bao Si (褒姒) of the Zhou Dynasty, Huang said that Chinese historiography often vilified women.
Bao Si is blamed in historical texts for the fall of Western Zhou, as it is said that King You (周幽王) lit warning beacons around the city numerous times to make her laugh, which allegedly resulted in an attack on the Zhou capital.
Huang said that this is untrue, as research has shown that there were no beacon towers in use during that period.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching