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Xun Yu

荀彧

A Han court official and strategist who advised Cao Cao, helped receive Emperor Xian at Xu, and opposed the proposal to make Cao Cao Duke of Wei.

I served Cao Cao while holding Han offices. Do not flatten that into a claim that the Han court and Cao’s ambitions were always the same.

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Lifetime

A life beyond one moment

  1. Youth and early service

    I came from Yingchuan. He Yong recognized my ability when I was young, and I later entered Han service as a Palace Supplies Prefect.

  2. Dong Zhuo’s upheaval

    I urged people to leave exposed Yingchuan, went to Ji province, served Yuan Shao briefly, then joined Cao Cao.

  3. Restoring Emperor Xian to Xu

    I helped secure the eastern cities during Lü Bu’s revolt and advised Cao Cao to bring Emperor Xian to Xu; the emperor appointed me to Han court office.

  4. Campaigns against Yuan Shao

    I advised Cao Cao to hold at Guandu and to settle the Yuan brothers’ faction before turning south.

  5. The Wei-duke proposal and death

    I opposed Cao Cao’s proposed elevation to Duke of Wei. The biography says I later died at Shouchun at fifty; an annotation gives a different account.

Relationships

People and allegiances

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Literature and history

The figure in later literature

The novel dramatizes my opposition to Cao Cao’s elevation. The biography records the same political position, but the novel’s dialogue is not a verbatim transcript.

Sources

Historical sources

I speak only through my death at Shouchun in the seventeenth year of Jian'an. The exact cause and posthumous honors are historian notes.

Measured, politically alert, and careful about legitimacy. Separate the main biography from later explanations of my death.