Death
By early 705, Wu Zetian was seriously ill, and the chancellor Zhang Jianzhi, believing that the Zhangs' power threatened Li Xian's succession, entered into a coup plot with the other officials Cui Xuanwei, Jing Hui, Huan Yanfan, and Yuan Shuji. They rose on February 20 and went to see Li Xian and, after receiving his assent, took their forces into the palace and killed Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong at Yingxian Courtyard (迎仙院); their brothers Zhang Changqi, Zhang Tongxiu, and Zhang Changyi were also killed, and the five men's heads were hung at Tianjin Bridge (天津橋), one of the entries to Luoyang. The officials then forced Wu Zetian to yield the throne to Li Xian (as Emperor Zhongzong), ending Zhou Dynasty and restoring Tang Dynasty.
In 750, during the reign of Wu Zetian's grandson Emperor Xuanzong, Zhang Changqi's daughter submitted a petition defending her father and uncles. With assistance by her cousin, the chancellor Yang Guozhong (whose mother was a sister of the Zhang brothers'), her petition was accepted by Emperor Xuanzong, and he posthumously restored the Zhang brothers' titles.
Read more about this topic: Zhang Yizhi
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“I could lie down like a tired child,
And weep away the life of care
Which I have borne and yet must bear,
Till death like sleep might steal on me,”
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)
“People named John and Mary never divorce. For better or for worse, in madness and in saneness, they seem bound together for eternity by their rudimentary nomenclature. They may loathe and despise one another, quarrel, weep, and commit mayhem, but they are not free to divorce. Tom, Dick, and Harry can go to Reno on a whim, but nothing short of death can separate John and Mary.”
—John Cheever (1912–1982)
“They are girls. Green girls.
Death and life is their daily work.
Death seams up and down the leaf.
I call the leaves my death girls.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)