Liu Bei

Who was Liu Bei?

Liu Bei, courtesy name Xuande, was a warlord in the late Eastern Han dynasty who founded the state of Shu Han in the Three Kingdoms period and became its first ruler. Despite having a later start than his rivals and lacking both the material resources and social status they commanded, Liu Bei overcame his many defeats to carve out his own realm, which at its peak spanned present-day Sichuan, Chongqing, Guizhou, Hunan, parts of Hubei, and parts of Gansu.

Culturally, due to the popularity of the historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong, Liu Bei is widely known as an ideal benevolent, humane ruler who cared for his people and selected good advisers for his government. His fictional counterpart in the novel was a salutary example of a ruler who adhered to the Confucian set of moral values, such as loyalty and compassion. Historically, Liu Bei was a brilliant politician and leader whose skill was a remarkable demonstration of a Legalist. His political philosophy can best be described by the Chinese idiom "Confucian in appearance but Legalist in substance", a style of governing which had become the norm after the founding of the Han dynasty.