Empress Feng (Wencheng)
Empress Feng (馮皇后, 冯宁) (442–490), formally Empress Wenming (文明皇后, literally "the civil and understanding empress") was an empress of the Chinese/Xianbei dynasty Northern Wei. Her husband was Emperor Wencheng. After her husband's death in 465, she overthrew the autocratic regent Yifu Hun in 466 and became regent over her stepson Emperor Xianwen and remained as such until his adulthood. She subsequently had a falling-out with Emperor Xianwen (who had then become retired emperor) over his execution of her lover Li Yi (李奕), and she assassinated him and reassumed regency over his son Emperor Xiaowen in 476. While Emperor Xiaowen assumed imperial powers upon adulthood, he remained very deferential to her, and she was highly influential until her death in 490.
Read more about Empress Feng (Wencheng): As Empress, As Regent For Emperor Xianwen, Between Regencies, As Regent For Emperor Xiaowen
Famous quotes containing the word empress:
“We never really are the adults we pretend to be. We wear the mask and perhaps the clothes and posture of grown-ups, but inside our skin we are never as wise or as sure or as strong as we want to convince ourselves and others we are. We may fool all the rest of the people all of the time, but we never fool our parents. They can see behind the mask of adulthood. To her mommy and daddy, the empress never has on any clothes—and knows it.”
—Frank Pittman (20th century)