Emperor Gaozu of Han

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Emperor Gaozu of Han (256 or 247 – 1 June 195 BC), personal name Liu Bang, was the founder and first emperor of the Han dynasty. Liu Bang was among the few dynastic founders to have been born in a peasant family. He initially entered the Qin dynasty bureaucracy as a minor law enforcement officer in his hometown in Pei County, within the conquered state of Chu. During the political chaos following the death of Qin Shi Huang, who had been the first emperor in Chinese history, Liu Bang renounced his civil service position and became a rebel leader, taking up arms against the Qin dynasty. He outmaneuvered rival rebel leader Xiang Yu to invade the Qin heartland and forced the surrender of the Qin ruler Ziying in 206 BC. After the fall of the Qin dynasty, Xiang Yu, as the de facto chief of the rebels, divided the former Qin Empire into the Eighteen Kingdoms, with Liu Bang forced to accept control of the poor and remote region of Bashu (present-day Sichuan, Chongqing, and southern Shaanxi), and...

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