The Fragile Throne: Li Conghou’s Precarious Ascension

In late November 933, Li Conghou received startling news—his elder brother, the Prince of Qin and supreme military commander, had been branded a rebel after a failed uprising. With his brother’s downfall, Li Conghou unexpectedly found himself ascending the throne of the Later Tang Dynasty. Yet his coronation was far from triumphant. From the outset, his reign was shackled by the manipulations of powerful courtiers and military factions.

Li Conghou’s first act as emperor was to lavish rewards upon the imperial guards, a desperate bid to secure their loyalty. However, his reign was doomed from the start. Without a strong power base in Luoyang, he was at the mercy of ambitious officials like Zhu Hongzhao, who swiftly removed Li Conghou’s trusted aide, Song Lingxun, from court. The emperor’s displeasure was irrelevant—he lacked the means to resist.

The Puppet Emperor and the Court’s Machinations

The court quickly became a battleground of shifting alliances. Key appointments were made to placate powerful factions:

– Chancellor Feng Dao was elevated to Minister of Works.
– Kang Yicheng, commander of the imperial guards, was promoted to oversee the Six Armies.
– Zhu Hongzhao and Feng Bin, the influential privy councilors, were granted additional titles to consolidate their authority.

These moves were less about governance and more about survival. The court’s decisions were dictated by factional rivalries rather than imperial will. Meanwhile, Li Conghou’s attempts to assert control were repeatedly undermined.

The Gathering Storm: Li Congke’s Rebellion

By early 934, tensions erupted when Li Congke, Li Conghou’s adoptive brother and a seasoned military commander, was reassigned to Hedong—a move widely seen as a death sentence in disguise. Recognizing the threat, Li Congke rebelled, issuing a proclamation denouncing Zhu Hongzhao and Feng Bin as usurpers who had manipulated the succession.

The imperial response was disastrous. Troops sent to suppress Li Congke defected en masse, swayed by his emotional appeal from the walls of Fengxiang:

“I followed our late emperor in battle since youth, covered in wounds. Now, the court trusts traitors who persecute kin—what crime have I committed?”

The defection of key officers like Yang Siquan and Yin Hui sealed the court’s fate. As soldiers abandoned their posts, Li Congke marched eastward, his ranks swelling with deserters.

The Collapse of Loyalty: Betrayal and Desperation

By March 934, the rebellion reached a tipping point:

– Kang Yicheng, tasked with defending Luoyang, secretly planned to defect.
– Zhu Hongzhao and Feng Bin, realizing their doom, committed suicide.
– Li Conghou, abandoned by his guards, fled northward, only to be betrayed by his own retinue.

The emperor’s final moments were pitiable. Cornered in Weizhou, he was poisoned—then strangled when he resisted—by officials who saw his death as inevitable.

The Aftermath: Li Congke’s Bitter Victory

Li Congke’s triumph was short-lived. His promises of lavish rewards to his troops backfired when the treasury proved empty. Forced to extort wealth from citizens, his reign began with widespread suffering. The soldiers, disillusioned, mocked him as “the Iron Emperor”—a ruler who broke his word.

Meanwhile, Shi Jingtang, a rival warlord spared by Li Congke’s miscalculation, would later exploit this instability to carve out his own empire—with consequences that reshaped Chinese history.

Legacy of a Broken Dynasty

The fall of Li Conghou and the rise of Li Congke underscored a brutal truth of the Five Dynasties period: “He who commands the strongest army wears the crown.” The Later Tang’s collapse was not just a dynastic shift—it was a preview of the chaos that would culminate in the rise of the Song Dynasty.

In the end, Li Conghou’s tragic reign was a fleeting episode in an era where loyalty was fleeting, power was transient, and survival was the only law.