Empress Wang (Xiao Cha)

Empress Wang (Xiao Cha)

Empress Wang (王皇后, personal name unknown) (died 563), formally Empress Jing (靜皇后, literally "the meek empress"), was a (disputed) empress of the Chinese dynasty Liang Dynasty. As her husband Emperor Xuan of Western Liang (Xiao Cha) controlled little territory and relied heavily on the military support of Western Wei and its successor state Northern Zhou, many traditional historians did not consider him and his successor true emperors of Liang, and therefore did not consider her a true Liang empress.

It is not known when she married Xiao Cha, but it is known that she was his wife, not his concubine, and that while he carried the title Prince of Yueyang, she was the Princess of Yueyang. It is not known whether she was the mother of any of Xiao Cha's five known sons, although she was not the mother of his eventual heir Xiao Kui, whose mother was Xiao Cha's concubine Consort Cao. In 549, when Liang was in a state of disarray after the capital Jiankang had fallen to the rebel general Hou Jing, Xiao Cha, then with his headquarters at Xiangyang (襄陽, in modern Xiangfan, Hubei), feared an attack from his uncle Xiao Yi the Prince of Xiangdong, and therefore became a Western Wei vassal. In order to show his loyalty, he sent Princess Wang and his heir apparent Xiao Liao (蕭嶚) to Western Wei as hostages. At some point, Western Wei allowed her to return to Xiao Cha.

In 555, after Western Wei forces had defeated and killed Xiao Yi, Western Wei created Xiao Cha the emperor of Liang (as Emperor Xuan). He created Princess Wang empress. In 562, after Emperor Xuan died and was succeeded by Xiao Kui (who had been created crown prince because Xiao Liao died before Emperor Xuan's ascension) as Emperor Ming, Emperor Ming honored her as empress dowager. She died in 563.