| Lü Meng | |
|---|---|
| General of Sun Quan | |
| Born | 178 |
| Died | 220 |
| Names | |
| Simplified Chinese | 吕蒙 |
| Traditional Chinese | 呂蒙 |
| Pinyin | Lǚ Méng |
| Wade-Giles | Lü Meng |
| Style name | Ziming (子明) |
| Other names |
|
Lü Meng (178 – 220)[1] was a military general serving under the warlord Sun Quan during the late Han Dynasty period of Chinese history. He served as the commanding general in the invasion of Jing Province (covering present-day Hubei and Hunan) that led to the death of Guan Yu.
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Lü Meng was born in Fupo, Runan Commandery (southeast of present-day Funan County, Anhui) in 178. His family migrated south of the Yangtze River when Lü Meng was young, and he lived with his brother-in-law Deng Dang (鄧當), who served under Sun Ce. When Lü Meng was 15 or 16, he would often follow Deng Dang in his expeditions against the Shanyue secretly against Deng's wishes. When Deng Dang told Lü Meng's mother about this, she was furious, but Lü Meng said: "It is difficult to survive in poverty; if we can prove ourselves through hard work, then wealth would come eventually. How can we get the tiger's cub if we don't enter the tiger's den?" Lü Meng's mother was so touched at his words that she forgave him and did not punish him.
At the time, an official despised Lü Meng for his age, and often insulted him with words like: "What can he do? His behaviour would only feed himself to the tigers." Eventually, Lü Meng could not control his anger and he killed the official. Lü Meng then turned himself in to Yuan Xiong (袁雄), who pleaded with Sun Ce to spare his life. Sun Ce granted Lü Meng an audience with him, and he was very impressed with Lü, so he acquitted Lü of his crimes and appointed him as a general.
A few years later, Deng Dang died, and Zhang Zhao recommended Lü Meng to take his place. When Sun Quan succeeded Sun Ce, he planned to merge smaller troops into larger garrisons. When Lü Meng heard of this, he collected funds to decorate his troops with brilliant armour. When Sun Quan came to review his troops, he was very impressed by Lü Meng's troops and added more soldiers under Lü's command, thus saving Lü's men from being merged into another general's command.
In the spring of 208, Lü Meng was tasked to be the navy commandant when Sun Quan set out to battle his nemesis Huang Zu again in the Battle of Jiangxia. During the war, Ling Tong and Dong Xi brought down Huang Zu's two super-sized capital war ships. Then Lü Meng's regiment crushed Huang Zu's navy, and Lü personally killed the enemy admiral Chen Jiu (陳就), while Ling Tong breached the castle wall. After the battle, Sun Quan deemed Lü Meng's contribution as the most significant, as Chen Jiu's death ensured Sun Quan's victory, Ling Tong's contribution as second, for Ling destroyed Huang's capital ships and took over the city, and Dong Xi the third, as he broke the connection between the two capital ships, and destroyed them. From this point on, Lü Meng had been moving up the ranks.
That same year, Lü Meng participated in the Battle of Red Cliffs, where an alliance between Sun Quan and Liu Bei defeated the forces of Cao Cao. Cao Cao perfunctorily retreated to the north, and left Cao Ren and Xu Huang at Jiangling in Nan Commandery (南郡), Yue Jin in Xiangyang, and Man Chong at Dangyang. When Sun Quan's forces invaded Nan Commandery, Gan Ning was sent to attack Yiling, but his forces were surrounded by a detachment of Cao Ren's forces. When Sun Quan's army received the news, most thought that they did not have enough men to spare to save Gan Ning, but Lü Meng insisted on saving him. He presented a plan to leave Ling Tong behind to defend against the main forces of Cao Ren while the forces of Lü Meng, Zhou Yu, and Cheng Pu went to rescue Gan Ning, predicting accurately that Ling Tong will surely hold out until the three return. Lü Meng also convinced Zhou Yu to spare 300 men to block the enemy retreat route with giant logs. When the rescue forces arrived in Yiling, they killed half of the enemy's men, causing Cao Ren's army to retreat at night. However, their way of retreat was blocked by logs previously set up by Zhou Yu, so they all had to dismount and run to safety. Zhou Yu's pursuing army arrived at the blockade, and got themselves 300 horses abandoned by Cao Ren's army. The morale of Zhou Yu's army improved greatly after, and soon they routed Cao Ren and captured Nanjun. Lü Meng was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant General (偏將軍).
Cao Cao then stationed Xie Qi (謝奇) in Huancheng (皖城; present-day Huaining, Anhui) to harass Sun Quan's boundaries. Lü Meng first requested Xie Qi to surrender, and then attacked when Xie refused. Xie Qi was defeated and retreated, but his subordinates Sun Zicai (孫子才) and Song Hao (宋豪) came to Lü Meng and surrendered with their families. Later, Lü Meng followed Sun Quan to Ruxu (濡須), and proposed to build a dock to make boarding and landings more convenient. With this, Sun Quan's army defended their positions against Cao Cao's approaching forces, who retreated after several attempts to overcome Sun Quan's army.
When Cao Cao retreated from Xiaoyao Ford, he stationed Zhu Guang (朱光) in Lujiang, and commanded him to develop the lands for agricultural use. Lü Meng warned Sun Quan that if the enemy food stockage in Lujiang should increase, their numbers would increase, so Sun Quan personally led a campaign to attack Lujiang. Before the battle, the generals suggested that they replenish their weapons before clashing with the enemy, but Lü Meng held a different opinion: he felt that by the time the equipments were replenished, the enemy would surely have reinforced and prepared their defenses; also, he warned that in a few days the river would return to low tide, which would make the retreat back to their ships difficult. Sun Quan agreed with Lü Meng, and had his army surround the city in the morning with Lü Meng as the vanguard. With Lü Meng himself beating the war drums, the spirited soldiers captured the city at about lunchtime. Lü Meng was appointed Grand Administrator of Lujiang for his contributions to the battle.
In Jiangbiao Zhuan (江表傳), it was said that Lü Meng focused entirely on martial skills until he was admonished by Sun Quan. Lü Meng used to say that military matters take away his time and he had no time to read, but Sun Quan stated that he himself had to tend to matters both big and small in his land, even so, he had the time to read and enhance himself. Lü Meng was enlightened, and started to take up scholarly pursuits with another general, Jiang Qin. Soon his breadth of knowledge became so broad that even some elder Confucians could not match him, and Sun Quan was so impressed at Lü Meng's improvements that he often used Lü Meng as a role model for his other generals.
When Lu Su took over Zhou Yu's position, he went to visit Lü Meng. Originally Lu Su viewed Lü Meng in contempt, thinking that he was a mere military man, but when Lü Meng discussed his five strategies against Guan Yu, defender of Jing Province, Lu Su was surprised. He commented, "I had previously said that you only had skills for war, but today I see you are both knowledgeable and wise, and no longer the Meng under Wu." To this, Lü Meng replied, "When you meet someone you have not met for three days, you should see him with a new eye." The two then became close friends, and Lu Su paid a visit to Lü Meng's mother as well.
This incident gave birth to the Chinese idioms "Meng under Wu" (吳下阿蒙), meaning "the clueless"; and "to see with a new eye" (刮目相看), meaning "to re-evaluate a character".
In 214, Sun Quan ordered Lü Meng and Ling Tong to take the three commanderies of southern Jing Province. With subordinate generals Xianyu Dan (鮮于丹), Xu Zhong (徐忠), and Sun Gui (孫規), Lü Meng's army of 20,000 marched to southern Jing Province. The commanderies of Changsha and Guiyang (桂陽) immediately surrendered, but the remaining Lingling (零陵) refused to submit. Liu Bei, who controlled Jing Province at the time, returned from Sichuan to Jing Province once he received news of Sun Quan's advance. Liu Bei ordered Guan Yu to take the three commanderies of southern Jing Province with 30,000 men. In response, Sun Quan had Lu Su stationed in Baqiu (巴丘) with 10,000 men to defend against Guan Yu, and ordered Lü Meng to abandon Lingling and join with Lu Su.
When Lü Meng received the order to retreat, he ignored it and did not tell his men about it. He instructed Deng Xuanzhi (鄧玄之), a friend of Lingling's defender Hao Pu (郝普), to tell Hao that Liu Bei was in a dire battle with Xiahou Yuan in Hanzhong, Guan Yu just lost to Sun Gui in Nan Commandery, and neither could spare men to save Lingling. When Hao Pu heard this, he became afraid and quickly surrendered to Lü Meng. When Lü Meng laughingly revealed the truth to Hao Pu, that Liu Bei and Guan Yu were both free to reinforce Lingling, Hao Pu became wrecked with guilt. Lü Meng then left Sun Jiao to guard the three newly taken commanderies and moved his own men to reinforce Lu Su. In the end, Sun Quan and Liu Bei made peace with each other, and Lingling was returned to the command of Liu Bei.
After that, Sun Quan campaigned against Cao Cao in the Battle of Xiaoyao Ford, but were unsuccessful. During the retreat, Lü Meng and Ling Tong closely defended Sun Quan from Zhang Liao's attack, thus Sun Quan was able to escape from that battle. Later, Cao Cao invaded Ruxu again, but Lü Meng defended their positions as he did the last time in Ruxu and again Cao Cao was unable to take Ruxu. Thus, Lü Meng was named as the Left Protector of the Army (左護軍) and the General of Tiger Might (虎威將軍).
When Lu Su died, Lü Meng took over his command and became the chief strategist of Sun Quan's military. Unlike his predecessor, Lü Meng believed that the Sun-Liu alliance need not be maintained and proposed the invasion of Jing Province. Sun Quan had plans to invade Cao Cao's Xu Province instead, but Lü Meng dissuaded him, saying that although it would be easy to take Xu Province, it would be hard to defend Xu Province from being retaken by Cao Cao again. When Lü Meng arrived to his post at Lukou (陸口), he maintained superficially good relationships with the neighbouring Guan Yu.
In 219, Guan Yu attacked Cao Cao's fortress at Fancheng while leaving troops behind to defend against a possible attack from Lü Meng. Lü Meng then feigned illness and placed Lu Xun in command. Hearing this, Guan Yu then reduced his defenses, thinking that an attack from Lü Meng was unlikely. In the Battle of Fancheng, Guan Yu defeated the reinforcement force led by Yu Jin and accepted the surrender of several thousand men. To support his large army, Guan Yu took the nearby supply depot belonging to Sun Quan, which enraged the latter, who decided to launch a campaign on Jing Province. Originally, he was going to have Lü Meng share command with Sun Jiao, but Lü convinced him not to, saying, "If my lord feels that (Sun Jiao) is the right man, choose him. If my lord feels I am the right man, choose me." In the end, Sun Jiao was put under his command.
Lü Meng and his men invaded Jing Province under the disguise of merchant boats and captured the province by forcing its defenders Shi Ren and Mi Fang to surrender. Once settled in the province, he treated the populace with respect and care, to the point of giving medicine to the ailing and clothes to the cold. When Guan Yu's men heard of their families' safety, they became dispirited and many surrendered to Lü Meng. Guan Yu, having nowhere to return to, attempted to flee to Sichuan but was captured by Zhu Ran and Pan Zhang on the way. Guan Yu and his son Guan Ping were then executed by Sun Quan.
After Guan Yu's death, Lü Meng soon fell ill. The worried Sun Quan tried to summon able doctors and taoists to heal him, even promising a heavy sum in gold for the person who could cure Lü Meng. It was said that Sun Quan was so worried he drilled a hole to peek into Lü Meng's room. If he saw that Lü Meng was able to eat he would hold a banquet to celebrate; but if he saw Lü's health degenerating, Sun Quan could not sleep at night. Despite the efforts from Sun Quan, Lü Meng died at the age of 41. Before his death, he recommended Zhu Ran and Lu Xun to succeed him.
In Luo Guanzhong's historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms, after defeating Guan Yu and taking Jing Province, Sun Quan threw a feast to celebrate the victory and congratulate Lü Meng, chief commander and planner of the attack. During the feast, however, Lü Meng was possessed by Guan Yu's spirit and he seized Sun Quan. As others rushed forward to save their lord, the possessed Lü Meng swore revenge. In moments, Lü Meng collapsed onto the floor and died. The frightened Sun Quan then sent Guan Yu's severed head in a box to Cao Cao, meaning to sow a discord between Cao Cao and Liu Bei.
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