Chinese eunuchs ran the imperial palace for two thousand years, from Zhao Gao to Zheng He and Wei Zhongxian.
In 207 BC, a palace official led a deer into the throne room and called it a horse. Anyone who disagreed was punished.
For two thousand years, the people who really ran the Chinese palace were often eunuchs: they improved paper, sailed to Africa with a treasure fleet, ran a secret police, and put emperors on the throne.
Chapters
0:00 Zhao Gao: calling a deer a horse
0:49 What was a eunuch, and why emperors trusted them
1:21 Cai Lun and paper
2:09 The Ten Attendants and the fall of the Han
3:00 Gao Lishi: the loyal one
3:40 Late Tang: eunuchs who made emperors
4:14 Zheng He and the treasure fleet
5:08 The Eastern Depot: eunuch secret police
5:44 Wang Zhen and the Tumu disaster
6:11 Liu Jin: the standing emperor
6:39 Wei Zhongxian: Nine Thousand Years
7:08 The last eunuchs
Sources: Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji), Book of the Later Han, Old and New Books of Tang, Zizhi Tongjian, History of Ming, Qing-era records. Some details (Zhao Gao’s status, Li Bai and the boots, Liu Jin’s treasure totals) are debated and marked that way in the video.
Which eunuch would you trust the most? Tell us in the comments.
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