Death of Emperor Shenzong; heir apparent takes the throne
The Song shi basic annals record that on a wuxu day in the third lunar month of Yuanfeng 8 (AD 1085) the emperor (Shenzong, 神宗, whose annals these are) died in the Funing Hall (福寧殿) aged thirty-eight; the heir apparent took the imperial throne; the Empress Dowager was honoured as Grand Empress Dowager, the Empress as Empress Dowager and the Virtuous Consort née Zhu (朱氏) as Imperial Consort Dowager; and the Grand Empress Dowager was provisionally (權) to share in managing military and state affairs.
What this does and does not establish
The Song shi is a Yuan-compiled (1343-45) official history drawing on Song court records; the English is an AI working translation. The age is as the annals give it (by Chinese reckoning). An entry earlier the same month (given as context) names the heir apparent as Yong (傭), Prince of the Commandery of Yan'an (延安郡王), given the name Xu (煦); other chapters were not inspected for this record.
- Read through an AI working translation.
- Region
- East Asia
- Theme
- Politics and institutions
- Kind of record
- Placed in a year. A source places this in one year. It is listed under that year; no day precision is invented.
How it is dated
- Date reference
- 元豐 8 (元豐八年 as numbered by the annals), lunar month 3
- How we use it
- Year assigned from the lunar month under which the annals enter the item; the sexagenary day was not converted to a Julian day.
The date reference is this project’s reading of the source’s date. It may give an era name, a reign or a calendar in a normalised form rather than in the source’s own words; the dating notes say what the source prints.
Dating notes from the research record
Lunar month 3 of 元豐 8 = Julian 1085-03-28 to 1085-04-26, per Academia Sinica 兩千年中西曆轉換 year table(s) 元豐8.html (sha256 63cd96e3f09a…); the whole month lies in AD 1085.
File names and line numbers in these notes, and in the limits above, refer to the project’s retained copies of the cited sources. Names such as calendar_headers are the project’s calendar look-ups, and “the investigator” is the research step that prepared the record.
Sources and quoted text
Line and character numbers under “Location” refer to the project’s retained copy of the source. For database rows, “Edition” names the batch of rows that was fetched together.
Source 1 · Supports the statement
Song shi (History of Song), basic annals
Toghto (脫脫) et al., Yuan court historiographers
The credit or link shown here was corrected after an audit of the retained source.
Quoted text (Classical Chinese)
戊戌，上崩于福寧殿，年三十有八。皇太子即皇帝位，尊皇太后爲太皇太后，皇后爲皇太后，德妃朱氏爲皇太妃。太皇太后權同處分軍國事。AI working translation into English; not official or authoritative
On the wuxu day, the emperor died in the Funing Hall, aged thirty-eight. The heir apparent took the imperial throne; the Empress Dowager was honoured as Grand Empress Dowager, the Empress as Empress Dowager, and the Virtuous Consort née Zhu as Imperial Consort Dowager. The Grand Empress Dowager was provisionally to share in managing military and state affairs.
Source credit and reuse conditions recorded for this source: Source: Song shi, juan 16, zh.wikisource transcription (revision 2285107). English renderings are AI working translations, not published translations.
Exact source version
74904e5fb3ba910f7f65b05914201bbfc63146e9e283760b1a0850dc0b73b0a1Source 2 · Context for reading it
Song shi (History of Song), basic annals
Toghto (脫脫) et al., Yuan court historiographers
The credit or link shown here was corrected after an audit of the retained source.
Quoted text (Classical Chinese)
三月甲午朔，立延安郡王傭爲皇太子，賜名煦，AI working translation into English; not official or authoritative
Third month, jiawu, the first day of the month: Yong, Prince of the Commandery of Yan'an, was made heir apparent and given the name Xu,
Source credit and reuse conditions recorded for this source: Source: Song shi, juan 16, zh.wikisource transcription (revision 2285107). English renderings are AI working translations, not published translations.
Exact source version
74904e5fb3ba910f7f65b05914201bbfc63146e9e283760b1a0850dc0b73b0a1Checks and changes
Source checked 2026-11-04. An independent AI evidence review supports this bounded, attributed wording. That review does not guarantee historical truth. How records are checked
This is a corrected version of this record. During research, before this release, an earlier version was withdrawn after independent review and replaced by this one.
Revision s1p_1085_song_2_r2
Exact revision fingerprint
3a17b6cb126421ecd5b904ee6d25ba542a33a372503deb336270c62de148b5e9