Li Shi was the Tang official whom the court named in 845 to carry the title of khan to the Kirghiz.[1] He did not go. The emperor Wuzong died before he set out. His successor let the embassy lapse.[1]

The inspector of the frontier

The Xin Tang Shu names a Li Shi earlier in its account of the Uyghur remnant. The chief minister Li Deyu argued that the Uyghurs under Ögä should be fed and not attacked. The emperor then used Li Shi, an official of the Bureau of Military Affairs, to go to the frontier and report.[1] The text does not say that this is the man later named envoy.[1]

The envoy of 845

The Uyghurs had taken refuge with the Black Carts. The Kirghiz khan Are wished to attack them in the autumn when the horses were fat, and asked for Tang troops.[1] The court answered by sending Li Shi, then attendant-in-ordinary of the right, to invest the Kirghiz ruler as Zongying Xiongwu Chengming Khan.[1] The Zizhi tongjian dates his appointment to 4 June 845.[2] An edict giving the title followed soon after.[2]

The road was dangerous. A report from the military governor of Zhenwu put the Uyghur khan 300 li north of Tiande. The Uyghur chief Ormïzt, who had gone over to the Tang, feared that the khan would join other small tribes to catch Li Shi on the way.[3] Ormïzt proposed that Tang troops escort Li Shi to Tiande and wait there until a Kirghiz escort came. Li Shi would then travel on only under Kirghiz protection.[3] The military governor of Zhenwu was ready to do this.[3]

Li Deyu hoped that the Kirghiz khan, promised the appointment, would attack the Uyghurs in the autumn of 845.[3] No attack came.[4] This may be because Li Shi had not yet been sent out.[3] The reason for the delay is not clear. It probably lay in Tang fears of Uyghur interference.[5] Each side seems to have been waiting for what it wanted from the other. The Kirghiz would attack only after the appointment. The Tang would grant it only after the Uyghurs were gone.[5]

The embassy lapses

Wuzong died on 22 April 846. The embassy was still not sent.[5] It was not sent out in the time of mourning for the dead emperor.[6] Afterwards the advisers of the new emperor Xuanzong counselled against sending it, since the Kirghiz were a small tribe. The chief ministers and officials of the fourth rank and above debated the matter and agreed.[1] The matter was dropped. In 847 Li Ye carried a shorter title.[1] The embassies are told in Kirghiz Embassies to the Tang.

Other men of the name

A Li Shi of Hedong is named in the Xin Tang Shu among the commanders sent in 850 against the Tanguts, together with a Li Ye of Fengxiang.[7] The text does not say that he is the envoy.[7] A Li Shi who replaced Liu Mian as military governor of Hedong in November 843 appears in the modern account of these years. That account does not say whether he is the envoy.[8] Nothing else is recorded of the envoy’s life.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 217
  2. ^ a b Drompp 2005, p. 149
  3. ^ a b c d e Drompp 2005, p. 150
  4. ^ Drompp 2005, p. 150–151
  5. ^ a b c Drompp 2005, p. 151
  6. ^ Drompp 2005, p. 154
  7. ^ a b Xin Tangshu (New Book of Tang), juan 221
  8. ^ Drompp 2005, p. 143

Sources

Literature

  • Michael R. Drompp, Tang China and the Collapse of the Uighur Empire: A Documentary History (2005)

Related

What links here2

Persons
Emperor Wuzong of Tang · Li Deyu

Cite this article

Yavuz, Emre-E. “Li Shi (Tang envoy).” Turkic Atlas, revised 8 November 2026. https://turkicatlas.org/persons/li-shi-tang-envoy/

Last revised: 8 November 2026