Wang Mang
Source: Wikipedia
Born
45 BC
Died
6 October AD 23
Ancestral home
Yuancheng, Wei Commandery (Occupies parts of present day Hebei and Henan)
Also known as
Shijianguo Emperor
Book mentions
6
Roles:
emperor warlord
Factions:
Wang Mang Xin Dynasty (primary)
Appears in 6 chapters:
  • Chapter 1 — Three Heroes Swear Brotherhood In The Peach Garden; One Victory Shatters The Rebels In Battlegrounds.
    Usurper between the Former and Latter Han; named in the opening frame setting up the dynasty's recurring instability.
  • Chapter 6 — Burning The Capital, Dong Zhuo Commits An Atrocity; Hiding The Imperial Hereditary Seal, Sun Jian Breaks Faith.
    Wang Mang; cited in the same historical-recap paragraph.
  • Chapter 30 — Shunning Advice, Yuan Shao Loses Leaders and Granaries; Using Strategy, Cao Cao Scores Victory At Guandu.
    The usurper Yuan Shao ranks Cao Cao beneath - 'worse than Wang Mang and Dong Zhuo' - in the parley of insults before Guandu.
  • Chapter 37 — Sima Hui Recommends A Scholar To Liu Bei; Liu Bei Pays Three Visits To The Sleeping Dragon Ridge.
    The pivot of Cui Zhouping's cycle - Wang Mang's rebellion turned two centuries of order back to chaos.
  • Chapter 43 — Zhuge Liang Disputes With The Southern Scholars; Lu Su Denounces The Majority Opinion.
    The tyrant whom the ode-writing Yang Xiong stooped to serve - Zhuge Liang's warning about mean scholars.
  • Chapter 56 — Cao Cao Feasts In The Bronze Bird Tower; Zhuge Liang Provokes Zhou Yu A Third Time.
    The poem's counter-example to Duke Zhou: had Wang Mang died while still famed for deference to the learned, his treachery would never have been known - judge no one before the end.