Family Background
Yan Zhitui's ancestors were originally from Linyi in modern-day Shandong Province. After the fall of the Jin Dynasty's capital city of Chang'an, the Yan family migrated south below the Yangtze River in the year 317. At the Eastern Jin's new capital of Jiankang (modern-day Nanjing) the Yan family became prominent amongst the elite families. The Yan family provided many officials that served the governments of the Eastern Jin Dynasty and the succeeding Liang Dynasty in southern China. There was one dissident of the Yan family, though; upon the transition of the Southern Qi to Liang regimes in the year 502, Yan Zhitui's grandfather refused to serve the Liang court out of continuing loyalty to the Southern Qi. When Emperor Wu of Liang assumed the throne and control over southern China, Zhitui's grandfather starved himself to death in an act of piety towards the dynasty he once served. Despite this act of devotion from his grandfather, Zhitui's father decided to serve Emperor Wu and the new Liang Dynasty.
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