Lê Uy Mục

Lê Uy Mục (* 1488 ; † 1509 ; real name: Lê Tuấn ) was the emperor of Vietnam in the Lê dynasty . He ruled from 1505 to 1509. His rule was characterized by tyranny and arbitrariness. His purges of state officials and aristocrats weakened the state lastingly. He was overthrown and killed in a rebellion in 1509. His successor was the Lê Tương Dực .

origin

Lê Uy Mục was the son of the emperor Lê Hiến Tông and an enslaved concubine of peasant origin. His mother died shortly after he was born. He was raised by another concubine of his father, Nguyen Kinh . At the request of his father he was initially passed over to the throne, but his brother Lê Túc Tông ruled for less than seven months and died under circumstances that were not recorded. Lê Uy Mục and the families of his mother and foster mother disapproved of the privilege given to his younger brother.

Domination

Lê Uy Mục became monarch of the Dai-Viet state at the age of seventeen through the death of his brother. Three months after coming to power, he began to have political opponents killed at court. He started with his father's queen mother, from whom he feared resistance. Lê Uy Mục brought mainly low-class allies of his mother families and eunuchs to the court and tried to displace the nobility and Confucian scholarship through them. He also formed a new unit to secure his palace instead of the previous palace guard.

He is said to be cruel, sadism and lust for murder. His soldiers plundered his subjects. According to contemporary reports, he himself murdered several concubines while intoxicated.

Because of his despotic governance, resistance to his rule in the country grew. For fear of being deposed, he arrested 26 princes of the court, his half-brothers, uncles and cousins ​​in 1509. When a rebellion broke out against him under the leadership of a brother of the murdered king's brother, he had the prisoners murdered. However, the rebels managed to defeat the emperor in the capital and take him prisoner. He was executed by poison. His body was shot from a cannon. Another prince of the dynasty and participant in the rebellion succeeded him and ascended the throne as Lê Tương Dực .

Lê Uy Mục was popularly nicknamed devilish ruler . His rule and that of his successor are seen as a period of decline for the Lê dynasty and the imperial state.

Individual evidence

1. ^ ^{A b c d} K. W. Taylor: A History of the Vietnamese. Cambridge, 2013. pp. 224-228.
2. ^ William J. Duiker, Bruce Lockhart: Historical Dictionary of Vietnam. Lanham, 2006, pp. 211f