KUANG-WU TI

born c. 5 BC died AD 57, Lo-yang, China Pinyin Guang Wu Di (posthumous name, or shih), personal name (hsing-ming) Liu Hsiu, temple name (miao-hao) (tung-han) Shih-tsu Chinese emperor (reigned AD 2557) who restored the Han dynasty after the usurpation of Wang Mang, a former Han minister who established the Hsin dynasty (AD 925). Kuang-wu's restored Han dynasty is sometimes referred to as the Later Han, or the Eastern Han (AD 25220). Kuang-wu ti (Shining Martial Emperor) was a member of the imperial Liu family and a supposed descendant of Kao-tsu (reigned 206195 BC), the founder of the Han dynasty. In AD 22, when the radical reform measures of Wang Mang made his Hsin dynasty unpopular, Kuang-wu raised an army. Supported by the powerful Liu clan and other rich landowner families, he defeated Wang Mang in 23. Two years later he moved the capital to Lo-yang, in eastern Chinahence the name Eastern Hanand proclaimed himself emperor. The subsequent 10 years of Kuang-wu's reign were spent in consolidating his rule and subduing the numerous domestic rebellions that had arisen, including the Red Eyebrows revolt. He also suppressed the nomadic tribesmen of China's northern borders and returned imperial rule to the outlying areas of South China. Having restored peace to the empire, Kuang-wu became so weary of fighting that he forbade the mention of the word war in his presence. The Later Han was never as powerful as the Former Han. In the wars that led to the founding of the Later Han dynasty, many of the vast, tax-exempt landed estates had been destroyed, thus eliminating one of the major problems that had plagued the last years of the Former Han. Nevertheless, Kuang-wu had risen to power with the support of a few aristocratic families, and he continued to depend on their military assistance. As a result, those families gradually increased their own holdings at the expense of the central government, and the dynasty grew to resemble a federation of great clans.