Jianwen Emperor was the second emperor of the Ming Dynasty and the grandson of Zhu Yuanzhang.
According to Chinese ancient imperial succession rules, the second emperor was supposed to be Jianwen Emperor’s father who named Zhu Biao. But Zhu Biao died in 1393 before his father, which made Zhu Yuanzhang very sad and worried.
After Zhu Biao’s death, Zhu Yuanzhang had to re-designate a new successor to prevent the power struggle. But among the 26 sons of Zhu Yuanzhang, the most outstanding was Zhu Di.
However, Zhu Di was the fourth son of Zhu Yuanzhang, according to the rules of the handover of the throne, only the eldest son could become the successor of the throne. Therefore, Zhu Di couldn’t become the second emperor of the Ming Dynasty.
Then, Zhu Yuanzhang appointed Zhu Biao’s son, who named Zhu Yunwen, as his legal successor to avoid the power struggle among his sons. Which immediately showed the effect and effectively prevented the occurrence of the power struggle.
After Zhu Yuanzhang’s death, Jianwen Emperor became the second emperor of the Ming Dynasty, and the first urgent problem he had to solve was that how to strengthen his authority at the beginning of his inauguration.
Because of his uncles, commanding a large number of troops in the Ming Dynasty, which made Jianwen Emperor feel that his throne was being threatening.
Under such circumstances, Jianwen Emperor took the advice of his brain trust and began to implement the policy of weakening the power of several uncles. Among many uncles, Zhu Di was his most significant threat.
To avoid direct conflict, Jianwen Emperor chose to implement his policies from the weakest side. Zhu Di began to grow restless as the power-weakening plan progressed.
Faced with pressure from Jianwen Emperor, Zhu Di had been vowing that he would not betray the new emperor. Zhu Di even sent his three sons to the capital of the Ming Dynasty as hostages to dispel Jianwen Emperor’s worries, which did play a significant role in slowing down the implementation of Jianwen Emperor’s policies.
But the two sides didn’t trust each other initially, and each planted spies on the other side. In 1399, Jianwen Emperor’s military officers arrested two of Zhu Di’s men and found clear evidence that Zhu Di was preparing for rebellion.
After found the evidence that his uncle was preparing for rebellion, not until did he mobilize the army to eliminate his uncle, Zhu Di announced that he wanted to overthrow Jianwen Emperor so that he wouldn’t be wiped out by his nephew.
In general, Zhu Di was dissatisfied with Zhu Yuanzhang’s giving the throne to his nephew. At the same time, Jianwen Emperor stimulated Zhu Di by the policy of weakening the power, contributing to his uncle feel that if he did not rebel, he would not survive, and forced Zhu Di to rebel to overthrow Jianwen Emperor.
