31. Extorting China
When Modu Chanyu trapped and surrounded China’s Emperor Gaozu, the latter bought his life with an appeasement treaty known as the Heqin. Modu and his Xiongnu Empire were recognized as China’s equals, and The Great Wall was accepted as the mutual border. China’s rulers sent the Xiongnu leaders Chinese princesses as brides and sought to buy them off with regular tribute payments, face-savingly referred to as “gifts”.
After Gaozu’s death, Modu sent a rude and mocking marriage proposal to his widow, the dowager empress. Incensed, the empress and court were all for declaring war, with generals urging the extermination of the Xiongnu. Eventually, calmer voices reminded everybody of Modu’s victory just a few years earlier, and that the Xiongnu army was more powerful than the Chinese. Reconsidering, the empress wrote back, humbly declining, and sent a gift of imperial carriages and horses.