Northern Chancellery

The Northern Chancellery is one of the two bodies responsible for Liao’s military affairs, alongside the Southern Chancellery. In the rebellion against YeLu HongJi, its chancellor accompanies the emperor on a hunting expedition and becomes both a senior military commander and a conspicuous defender of the throne. Its troops help turn the tide of battle, while the chancellor’s final charge underscores the human cost of loyalty to the emperor.

Place in Liao’s Government

Liao’s military affairs are divided between the Northern and Southern Chancellery. During YeLu HongJi’s hunting trip, the Lord of the Northern Chancellery travels with the emperor, while the Lord of the Southern Chancellery remains in the capital. That arrangement leaves the Northern Chancellery’s leadership close to the throne when news arrives that the capital has fallen into rebel hands.

The crisis grows out of a succession history that makes military command inseparable from dynastic legitimacy. YeLu ZhongYuan, the emperor’s uncle, had once been positioned to succeed his brother YeLu ZongZhen, but supported ZongZhen instead. After YeLu HongJi inherited the throne, he granted ZhongYuan exceptional rank and command of the entire army, while ZhongYuan’s son, YeLu NieLuGu, received the Southern Chancellery and the title Prince of Chu. When the Prince of Chu rebels and proclaims his father emperor, the Northern Chancellery’s presence with YeLu HongJi gives the besieged ruler an experienced senior commander, but not an easy answer to the rebels’ competing claim.

The Rebellion and the Field Army

At first, the Northern Chancellery chancellor counsels YeLu HongJi not to assume that his uncle supports the rebellion. He suggests that ZhongYuan may instead have deployed troops to suppress his son, and the emperor admits that he hopes this is true. A later report—that the Prince of Chu has proclaimed ZhongYuan emperor—confirms the gravity of the threat. YeLu HongJi’s force is badly outnumbered, and the rebels’ appeal to the succession dispute threatens to unsettle loyalties as well as armies.

In battle, the Northern Chancellery’s forces operate within a larger command structure, using cavalry and battlefield signals rather than individual combat. When the rebels advance on the stockade, YeLu HongJi’s army first repels their front line with a volley of arrows. At the emperor’s order, the Northern Chancellery chancellor leads thirty thousand cavalry in a flanking attack. The rebels fall into confusion and retreat, giving the imperial army a victory in that engagement. The chancellor’s role shows the practical force of his office: he can translate the emperor’s command into a coordinated movement by a large body of troops.

The victory does not end the fighting. Rebel forces return, and the battlefield’s scale makes personal martial skill insufficient to determine its outcome. The imperial army suffers heavy losses and withdraws. Later, as the Prince of Chu presses YeLu HongJi to surrender, the Northern Chancellery chancellor offers to lead three thousand soldiers in a desperate downhill assault. The charge forces the enemy back for a short distance, but the three thousand are surrounded and killed. The chancellor, after fighting on, dies by suicide rather than be captured. YeLu HongJi, his ministers, and Xiao Feng witness the outcome from the hillside and mourn their inability to save him.

Loyalty and Narrative Significance

The Northern Chancellery’s chancellor is presented as loyal to YeLu HongJi, who has treated him generously. His declaration that he is willing to die in the emperor’s service turns the office’s political allegiance into a personal sacrifice. The contrast between the thirty-thousand-strong flanking maneuver and the doomed three-thousand-man charge also marks a shift: at first, institutional command helps preserve the imperial position; later, loyalty can only delay defeat at terrible cost.

The institution’s importance lies in the distance between formal command and secure political power. The emperor has the Northern Chancellery’s commander and troops with him, yet the rebellion’s dynastic claim and superior numbers keep his position precarious. The chancellor’s actions embody service to the reigning ruler, while the war reveals that administrative rank and military strength cannot by themselves settle the question of legitimate succession.