Page 450 - Four Thousand Years Ago by Geoffrey Bibby

It was in this crisis, in this very year 1020 b.c., that the

Duke of Chou took the scene. He had not previously been noted
for any ambitions for power or military glory. On the contrary, he
was a philosopher of note, a man of powerful intellect and in­

tegrity. And—though many doubted it in the first years—he was
completely loyal to his nephew, the young king. He assumed the
regency in the original state of Chou, quelling by sheer force of

personality the spirit of defeatism that the presence once more of
an emperor in Shang had engendered. And assembling his
barons and their retainers and their chariots, he took the road

against Shang.
This time it was no lightning campaign. His brothers, the
two rebel dukes, had gained the adherence of many of the

nearer nobles, particularly former dependants of the Shang em­
perors, who by speedy submission to Wu had been confirmed
in their fiefs. But others of the dukes and barons were wavering
and could be won to one side or the other by diplomacy, threats,

or blandishments. In this Machiavellian game of winning ad­
herents, the Duke of Chou soon showed himself to be a natural

master, and gradually the Dukes of Shang found themselves
isolated and surrounded by hostile nobles.
After three years they were defeated in the field, and the
Duke of Chou entered the city of Shang in triumph. Duke Ts’ai

escaped beyond the borders of the Chou realm, but Duke Kuan
and the Shang king were captured and put to death.

The danger was past, and the dynasty of Chou again secure
upon the throne. But the duke was determined to prevent a
recurrence of the trouble. It was necessary to prevent Shang
from ever again becoming a focal point of rebellion. The mighty

city that the Emperor P’an Keng had built just three hundred
years before was evacuated of all its inhabitants and destroyed,

its great pise wall leveled to the ground. Its inhabitants were
settled at a new, unfortified town at Ch’ao Ke some thirty miles
to the south. Ch ao Ke became the new capital of a new state,
called Wei, which comprised but a portion of the former state of

Shang, and another brother of the duke, K’ang, was given the new
state in fief. Both the city and the state of Shang ceased to exist.

But the spirits of the former Shang emperors could not be so