The Women Before the Woman: Building a backstory for the rise and rule of Empress Wu (r. 690-705)

This talk will focus on the life of Empress Dowager Ling (d. 528) who ruled the Northern Wei Dynasty (386-534) from it’s capital city in Luoyang, doing so independently as a man would do. 

I argue that the Northern Wei Empress Dowager, as well as other women like her in early medieval China, helped to make it possible for Empress Wu to usurp the Tang dynasty (618-907) and found her own dynasty, the Zhou (690-705), some 150 years after the fall of the Northern Wei. 

By examining sources peripheral to imperial historiography - sources like epitaphs, inscriptions, and Buddhist texts - I tell a story of the expansion of political opportunities for Buddhist-affiliated women in early medieval times and provide critical context for understanding how Empress Wu - the only woman to rule China directly and in her own name - was able to access power in the ways that she did.  

About the speaker

Stephanie Balkwill is Associate Professor of Chinese Buddhism at the University of California, Los Angeles where she is also the Director of the Center for Buddhist Studies. She conducts research on the intellectual, political, and religious lives of women who lived in China during the 4th-6th centuries and she is the author of The Women Who Ruled China: Buddhism, Multiculturalism, and Governance in the 6th Century (UC Press, 2024). 

She is also the co-editor of Buddhist Statecraft in East Asia (Brill, 2022).

Attending the event

This event is free and open to all. 

• Organiser: Centre of Buddhist Studies
• The Ho Foundation Lecture Series in Chinese Buddhism is kindly sponsored by The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation

Image: The book cover of The Women Who Ruled China: Buddhism, Multiculturalism, and Governance in the Sixth Century, by the speaker