Talk:Liu Bei

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[edit] Liu Bei is forever known "Hero to the People"

Known for his vitue and his desire to restore order for the Han Dynasty, Liu Bei could've made China into a land of justice and righteous rule if he didn't fade away into the heveans from the Battle of Yi Ling. Liu Bei, to me, will always remind many people of what it takes to be vituous when so much chaos is around in the lands of China.

What's with the propaganda? There's three of these edits in the talk page now...See my discussion at the end. Aran|heru|nar 07:10, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Liu Bei's passing

I believe he could've done more for China even with all odds standing against him and when the chances are so slim that there would be no tomorrow for him, his brother, his generals, and the people that believed in him.

--Sho Luo 20:58, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)From Bigboss

There is conflict between the Liu Bei article and the Three Kingdoms article. The latter acknowledges Guan and Zhang as Liu's sworn brothers while he former dismisses the brotherhood as fictional.

Additionally, I am glad the article itself does not credit Liu Bei with any sort of virtue, as outside of fiction he is no more virtuous or noble than Cao Cao, a much villified historical figure.

These people need to read more official history rather than some fantasy novel, or else soon we'll be moving Guan Yu to Guan Yu (mythology). Aran|heru|nar 07:09, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Liu Bei the patron of shoemakers

Can anyone provide a source for this claim? i've never heard of it before, but i'm rather ignorant. --Plastictv 16:53, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Ok i've found some info on this one, will add in more to the article. :) --Plastictv 23:59, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Shoes that resemble Liu Bei???

The last editor added this: "The most popular shoe which resembles Liu Bei is that of a white woolen slipper with a wolf head at the toes." i'm not sure how a pair of slippers could resemble Liu Bei, so i moved it here first. If you're the anonymous editor or if you know what he/she was talking about, please contribute. Cheers! :) --Plastictv 12:40, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Shoes that resemble Liu Bei's skills? Virtues? It's quite irrelevant to the content. Aran|heru|nar 07:07, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fact vs. Fiction

"His arms were said to be so long that they reach beneath his knees and his ears so huge that he could see them himself."

Should this be in Liu Bei in Romance of the Three Kingdoms section instead? Does not sound like historical fact. --theorb April 15, 2006

As odd as it might be, this did not come out of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but came from official histories (including Sanguo Zhi and Zizhi Tongjian). It is probably incredible, and yet isn't purely fictional. --Nlu (talk) 04:55, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Some people have longer arms and bigger ears than others. It happens. Cao Wei 20:59, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

I believe the huge ears represented his spirituality. I know in Buddhism that those who meditate alot, the lobes of their ears extend. Thusly why the Buddha's earlobes are so huge. His arms, well, either they could be that long (good advantage in battle), or perhaps symbolized something like he had great influence (his charisma?).filipino_dragon21
Official histories have a lot of fiction and metaphors that have to be interpreted differently. Sima Guang wrote a lot of BS, to speak frankly, but his histories are quite generally accepted. The huge ears should be a metaphor - you can't see them in his portrait, anyway: Image:Liu_Bei_Portrait_2.jpg (they're quite big, but not big enough for Liu Bei to see them). I don't think it symbolizes spirituality, though. Lu Bu used his "big ears" as an insult to him, and so did many others. Aran|heru|nar 07:04, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
By the way, filipino, long arms doesn't give an advantage in battle. It's a major disadvantage in close combat, because you can't bend your arms easily, and we all know Liu Bei uses swords, which are quite short compared with common weapons at that time. Imagine eating with a 1m long spoon. Aran|heru|nar 07:12, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hex Mark

Ok, shoot me. I've played Dynasty Warriors. I came to wiki to learn more about the Three Kingdoms after DW gave me a tantalizing amount of info. Anyway, in DW Liu Bei has a horse called the Hex Mark. Is this a real horse, something made up by RoTK, or something else entirely?

It's a real horse.

No way to know, since the only mention of the Dilu horse (Or Hex Mark if you like) was when Liu Bei lept with it over the Tan river but it's not confirmed if that event actually happened.
Pei Songzhi denied this in his Sanguo Zhi comments [1].--Skyfiler 16:46, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
As a friendly tip, don't believe anything DW told you. Half the info from DW are BS.
Hex Mark should be a fictional horse, or at least is a real horse fictionized. The source provided by Skyfiler has a mentioning of it:
"所乘马名的卢，骑的卢走，堕襄阳城西檀溪水中，溺不得出。备急曰：“的卢：今日厄矣，可努力！”的卢乃一踊三丈，遂得过", which translates into:
"(His) horse is named Dilu, (and he) went away riding Dilu. (He) fell at the stream water west of the Xiangyang city, (and) cannot get out. Bei said urgently: "Dilu, today is perilous, work hard!" Dilu then leaped three zhang (i.e. about 10 meters), (and Bei) thus passed the river."
This passage is somewhat similar with the one given in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but I don't see Pei Songzhi denying it..hmm, did I miss something? Aran|heru|nar 07:00, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A Hero of the People

If there is anyone, from the ROTK novel, who is fit for being the emperor of China, it would most definity be Liu Bei. From the events of Changban to the wars he participated in, Liu Bei may be the better man, but Cao Cao, Hero of Chaos, is the better military fighter. More or less, Liu Bei deserves credict for being as virtues as he can be regardless of others who are no better or worse at virtue than him. (Suggestion: Cao Cao, Sun Quan, Sun Jian, Sun Ce, and Yuan Shao) --Zhang Liao 03:52, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Liu Bei in history is a renowned hypocrite that is weak in anything else. The novel beautified him because Luo often see plays in Xuzhou and the people of Xuzhou particularly dislikes Cao Cao for his invasion - but in history Cao Cao is not just a Hero of chaos. Modern scholars argue that Cao Cao in his title "Hero of chaos" is more "Hero" than "chaos" - for example, in written history, when somebody says that he will be a "Hero of chaos", Cao Cao "laughed". In the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Luo changed it from "laughed" into "was tremendously happy" - which is very, very different, because laughing can be a sign of mocking, and, anyway, who would be happy that someone called him a thief?
For God's sake, about a million soldiers died because of Liu Bei arrogance in Yiling - and yes, that's even in the novel, no excuses. Aran|heru|nar 06:48, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Your arguments of Cao Cao and Liu Bei are very well viewed Aranherunar; however, I should be able to still plus myself from what I know from the novel. (Even though it is not 100% accurate) For Cao Cao, rather than see him as a Hero of Chaos, I see him as the man who saved China from its time in chaos thus he receives the title: Hero of Chaos. Liu Bei, on the other hand, receives his title "Hero to the People" due to his humane attitude that is seen in the novel. As you and I know, many people died when they followed him, but at the time, people wanted a hero or emperor that will do what is either right by bringing them peace or doing justice according to the people's eye without creating such a fright. As for the battle of Yiling, Liu Bei made the mistake that every human would make once his or her sworn brother or sister dies at the hands of your enemy or former ally. (Liu Bei's mistake at Yiling: Crossing the line between reckless aggression and righteous avengence.)

Moreover, you are right about Cao Cao and how he is viewed, but Liu Bei, without a doubt, was as the novel shows too humane and that lead him to great success. The ability to make people believe in your cause and bring the people together. The same can be said for Cao Cao only he used a different approach to the matter.--Zhang Liao 14:12, 9 September 2006 (UTC)


Hero of Chaos is such a poor translation of the original term in chinese. Luan Shi Jian Xiong, the first two characters could be very loosely translated to "chaos". The last character could be loosely translated to "hero". But the key character in this word is Jian, which means conniving under a general connotation. When talking about Cao Cao, Jian also implies a degree of treachery, treachery as in Cao Cao usurped his liege and lord, the Han Emperor's power in all but name. Let's face it. Cao Cao killed a family of his kinsmen on a misunderstanding; he hogged the emperor's bow and arrow; he executed queens; he tricked Xu Shu away from Liu Bei. That's all pretty down and low. However, in Luo Guan Zhong's original "Popular Romance of San Guo Zhi", Cao Cao was shown to have many many "humane moments". When he bested Yuan Shao at Guandu against the odds, he burned all the letters his troops wrote to Yuan's side discussing defection. When he sacked Xia Pei, Cao Cao ordered his troop to not pillage the city. He even tried to recruit Chen Gong back. When Chen Gong would have none of that, Cao Cao made arrangements to take Chen's Family back to his place to live. The Mao edition, the most widely circulated edition and the edition upon which most translations are based and the edition most modernizations are based on, abridged much of Luo's characterization of a much less biased Cao Cao.

Hero of the People takes no root in any term Chinese historians coined on Liu Bei. However in parallel with Cao Cao's Jian Xiong is Liu Bei's Xiao Xiong. Xiao is a type of eagle. Eagles represent great ambition, which is the first layer of Xiao Xiong's meaning. Xiao Xiong also implies a degree of hyprocricy, cunning and Machiavellianism. The most famous example is Liu Bei tossing Adou after Zhao Yun saved it from Changban. Everyone knows about Guan Yu killing Yan Liang and Wen Chou. The interesting thing is that Liu Bei was serving under Yuan Shao at the time. To be able to talk his way out alive after his sworn brother decapitated Yuan Shao's two best generals shows Liu Bei at a Xiao Xiong's best, knowing fully well how to manipulate people around him.

But the very very essense of both Liu Bei and Cao Cao's success was simply their ability to recognize, attract, retain and use talent. Cao Cao would order his troops to stop shooting at Zhao Yun; Liu Bei would visit Zhuge Liang three times; Cao Cao would walk out of his camp uncompanied to greet Zhang He. Just like the last line of Cao Cao's Duan Ge Xing: "Zhou Gong Tu Pu, Tian Xia Gui Xin". --64.180.11.169 06:00, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

The actual Liu Bei was by far no hero. Reading into his historical actions and decisions, I've come to the personal belief that Liu Bei was not only opportunistic, but was also cowardly, two-faced and cared little for those who were of no use to him. Gamer Junkie 06:20, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

While I'd rather believe that Liu Bei in history was a virtuous and good ruler like in the novel, it's also true that he resorted to techniques used by other warlords (trickery, warfare, politics, etc.) to establish his kingdom. However, we should also keep in mind that even in history, for most of his early carrier he had few bases to back him up while facing pressure from rival warlords with larger territories and better trained armies. He was consistently outmatched and outnumbered before he founded Shu Han, yet he actually did it. This at least offers the possibility that he was quite popular with the people and his men, because otherwise, how else would he have gotten far enough to get control of Shu? As a leader he was able to inspire his subordinates to get him that far, or at least inspired great loyalty in his subordinates who in turn inspired everyone else to get him that far. I mean, there has to be SOME basis to the idea of his virtue if his MEN fought so hard that they actually FOUNDED Shu Han, right? Of course, nobody's denying that he lost it at Yi Ling...heck, it's even cited as poor management skills. XD —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.111.207.193 (talk) 04:25, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Liu Bei borrows Jingzhou

I am surprised that none of the wiki articles pertaining to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms mentions the Chinese allegory/proverb "Liu Bei borrows Jingzhou" which was due to his "borrowing" Jingzhou as a base and subsequent refusal to return Jingzhou to Sun Quan.

Could someone research this allegory and place it somewhere appropriate in these articles? Is this allegory of modern development or classical? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hence Jewish Anderstein (talk • contribs) 19:58, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Red Cliff image removed because that's not where the battle actually took place.

7hach (talk) 05:25, 22 April 2008 (UTC)