宋太祖

A Later Zhou commander whose troops made him emperor at Chenqiao in 960. He then did the thing no one before him had managed: he persuaded his own generals to retire on pensions, put civil officials in charge of the army, and ended a century of coups. The Song bought its stability with a permanent military weakness it never fixed.

He reunified most of the south by campaign and by purchase, expanded the examinations, and died suddenly in 976 in circumstances his brother benefited from.

His first wife, Lady He, died before the founding and was honored as Empress Xiaohui; the empresses of his reign and the five after it are gathered on the Early Northern Song silk.