He rushed to the toilet, fell into the latrine pit, and drowned in the filth. He duly ate the porridge and had the witch doctor executed, but soon after the duke began to suffer from discomfort in his bowels and felt bloated. Relieved and confident again, the duke ordered his subordinates to use some of the freshly harvested wheat to make him porridge, and called for the witch doctor to observe that he had survived the harvest and that the prediction had been wrong. The witch doctor didn’t ease the king’s anxiety, however, and on hearing about the dream said only: “You will not live to eat this year’s new wheat.” The duke soon fell seriously ill, and even the most famous physicians in the land couldn’t cure him.īut though he was sick, when the wheat harvest season arrived, the duke still lived. The duke was so afraid that he invited a witch doctor to his court to seek advice. The rule of Ji Ju (姬据), who was head of the State of Jin during the Spring and Autumn Period (770 – 476 BCE) and known as Duke Jing of Jin, was unremarkable, but he is remembered for his bizarre and mysterious death in a toilet.Īccording to The Commentary of Zuo (《左传》), a narrative history covering the period from 722 to 468 BCE, the duke once had a nightmare about a ghost who blamed him for the death of his descendants. No records show whether Meng managed to lift the ding. The king died of his injuries not long after.Ĭourt officials blamed Meng, as the other participant in the contest, for the king’s demise, and he was sentenced to death along with his entire family. The king and Meng decided to lift one of Yu’s nine ding: the “龙文赤鼎 (lóng wén chì dǐng, red ding with dragon patterns).” But as Ying began his attempt to lift the mighty vessel, his strength gave out, the ding slipped from his hands and landed on his leg, crushing it. Since then, the ding became an important symbol of imperial power in Chinese culture, and lifting the ding held great symbolic significance to King Wu. Yu is said to have had nine giant ding cast, each to represent a certain region under his rule. This was no ordinary cooking pot, however it was apparently cast on the orders of Yu the Great, the legendary king who supposedly initiated the Xia dynasty (c.2070 – 1600 BCE). The object they were to lift was a huge three-legged bronze cooking vessel known as a 鼎 (dǐng). In around 307 BCE, Ying challenged his friend Meng Yue (孟说) to a lifting contest. One of his favorite pastimes was competing against others in tests of strength, and he promoted many other burly men to high ranking positions in his administration. Ying Dang (嬴荡), a warlord who ruled the State of Qin during the Warring States period (475 – 221 BCE) and was known as King Wu of Qin, succumbed as a result of overconfidence in his own strength when trying to lift a giant bronze pot.Īccording to descriptions in the Records of the Grand Historian (《史记》), a history text by Han dynasty (206 BCE – 220 CE) scholar Sima Qian (司马迁), Ying was an extremely strong man and was even more proud of the fact. But some met their demise in scarcely believable circumstances, whether struck down by lightning or murdered for making a casual joke: Here, TWOC introduces the most extraordinary deaths suffered by rulers throughout China’s imperial history: King Wu of Qin crushed by a bronze pot The average length of a reign for imperial rulers was only around five years, with illness, assassinations, and rebellions constantly threatening a miserable end. In fact, less than 50 percent of emperors lived to be over the age of 50, and only 30 made it to 60 years old. Though it was customary to wish emperors “万岁 (wànsuì, long living or ‘ten thousand years’),” most rulers of China’s territory didn’t enjoy longevity. From Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor who founded the Qin dynasty (221 – 206 BCE), to Puyi, the last emperor of the Qing dynasty (1616 – 1911), Chinese history counted over 400 emperors in total, and many more kings, dukes, and warlords besides yet few of them lived to old age or enjoyed a natural death. Being in charge of an empire is a risky job, just ask China’s ancient rulers.

Rulers of china