Mayi

Mayi, 馬邑, was a walled town and the seat of a commandery on the northern frontier of China.^[1] The road from Mayi to Taiyuan ran south over the Gouzhu pass.^[2] The town was at once a key point of the northern defences and an important centre of trade.^[3] The Göktürks met it in both roles. It was a target of their raids, and it was the market to which the Sui lured one of their own.

Before the Göktürks

The Han king Xin had his capital at Mayi.^[4] The Xiongnu besieged the town, and Xin went over to them. The Xiongnu then marched on south over Gouzhu to Taiyuan and Jinyang.^[4] The campaign ended at Baideng in 200 BC.^[4] In 133 BC the Han had a man of Mayi pretend to sell the town to the chanyu Junchen, who wanted its wealth. The Han laid more than three hundred thousand men in ambush around the town.^[4] The chanyu turned back more than a hundred li short of it. From then on the Xiongnu broke off the marriage peace with the Han.^[4] In the twelfth month of 553 the Northern Qi settled the Rouran ruler Anluochen on the Mayi river. The Göktürks had driven him south.^[5]

Under the Zhou and the Sui

The Zhou destroyed the Qi in 577. The Qi prince Gao Shaoyi held out at Mayi until a Zhou army drove him north to the Göktürks with three thousand men.^[6] The Zhou Shu says only that he fled from Mayi to Taspar Khan, who made him emperor of Qi.^[7]

Under the Sui, Mayi became the bait in a plot.^[8] Pei Ju, the official in charge of the northern peoples, sent word to Shishu Huxi, one of the hu at the court of Shibi Khan. The emperor, he said, had brought out precious goods at Mayi and wished to trade with the frontier peoples.^[8] Shishu Huxi raced there with his people and his herds, without telling Shibi. Pei Ju’s soldiers ambushed him below Mayi and killed him.^[8] Shibi understood what had happened and stopped coming to court.^[8] The Zizhi tongjian calls the lure a pretended mutual market.^[9]

In 615 Shibi lifted the siege of Yanmen. Two thousand Sui horsemen followed him as far as Mayi and took more than two thousand of the old and weak among his people.^[9] In 616 Shibi raided Mayi. The duke of Tang, Li Yuan, drove him off.^[10]

Between the Göktürks and the Tang

In the wars at the end of the Sui, Mayi was a town of warlords who leaned on the Göktürks.^[11] In 619 Shibi gave the Mayi rebel Liu Wuzhou more than five hundred riders. He sent Liu into Gouzhu.^[11] In the fourth month of 621 Ilig Khan attacked Yanmen together with the Mayi rebel Yuan Junzhang and was driven off.^[11] In 622 the Tang general Li Da’en reported famine among the Göktürks. He said that Mayi could be taken.^[11] The general who was to join him at Mayi came late. Ilig’s riders surrounded Li Da’en at Xincheng, and he fell with several thousand men.^[11]

By 623 Yuan Junzhang held Mayi with a Göktürk garrison.^[12] Liu Shirang, a Tang commander, was asked how to defend the frontier. He told the emperor that the Göktürks raided so often because Mayi served them as a halfway halt.^[12] The chronicle adds that many of the people of Mayi did not wish to belong to the Göktürks.^[12] In the sixth month of 623 Gao Manzheng, a commander at Mayi, fell on Yuan Junzhang by night. He killed Yuan’s son and two hundred men of the Göktürk garrison and brought the town over to the Tang.^[12]

Ilig came against Mayi with a great army and attacked the walls himself.^[12] He asked the Tang for a marriage while the siege went on. The emperor answered that the siege must be lifted first. The princess Yicheng urged Ilig to press it.^[12] When the food ran out, one of Gao Manzheng’s own officers killed him and surrendered the town to the Göktürks.^[12] Five days later the Göktürks asked again for a marriage alliance and handed Mayi back to the Tang.^[13] Yuan Junzhang withdrew to Heng’an.^[14]

In 629 the Tang minister of war Li Jing struck the Göktürks at Mayi. Ilig fled.^[15] In the first month of 630 Li Jing set out from Mayi with three thousand picked horsemen and camped on the Eyang ridge.^[16] From there he attacked Dingxiang by night. This attack opened the offensive that ended the eastern khaganate.^[16]