Trieu Anh Te

The old chronicles say

His father sent him to the Han capital to serve in the palace guard; more than ten years later Trieu Ho died, and he came home to take the throne. The first thing the Shiji records of him is that he at once hid away the seal of Emperor Vu from the reign before: the seal bearing Trieu Da's imperial title was still there, and the new king chose to hide it. While still at Truong An he had married a daughter of the Cu clan, a woman of Ham Dan, who bore him Hung; on taking the throne, he asked leave to make the Cu woman his queen, and Hung his heir.¹

The Shiji has no praise for him. It records that he still liked to kill people at will and gave free rein to his own desires, and that, afraid that going to court would mean being bound by Han law like the lords inside the Han realm, he likewise pleaded illness and did not go, sending only another son, Thu Cong, to serve in the guard. Besides his son by the Cu woman, he had an eldest son by his Viet wife, whom Lu Gia would later set up as king.¹

How later ages remembered

Later Vietnamese historians put part of the root of the Trieu disaster on him. Ngo Si Lien, in his comment in the Complete Annals, brings the principles of the Spring and Autumn Annals to judge ruler and minister alike: a ruler who does not know them will surely bear the name of chief of evildoers, a minister who does not know them will surely fall into the crime of seizing the throne and murdering his king — Minh Vuong, Ai Vuong and Lu Gia were such men. Le Tung, in the general essay printed at the front of the Complete Annals, names him outright: the disaster of Ai Vuong, though it came from Lu Gia, was truly opened by Minh Vuong's doting favour for Queen Cu.²³