Patreon supporter only: The twenty-four generals of Yue Gang (月港)

Scenic photo of Yuegang Ancient Town, now a tourist attraction.

Several months ago I explored the story of Zhang Lian (張璉), self-appointed Flying Dragon Emperor, which provides us a rare and interesting case study of a Chinese-led rebellion during Jia Jing Da Wo Kou (嘉靖大倭寇), and how different it was compared to Japanese-style Wokou raids that happened contemporaneously. For this month we will be looking at Twenty-four generals of Yue Gang (月港, lit. 'Moon harbour'), who despite their fancy name were bona fide smugglers, but of a very different nature to typical Chinese collaborators of Wokou.

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Patreon supporter only: Zhang Lian (張璉), Flying Dragon Emperor

Flying Dragon Temple in Raoping County, Guangdong, built to venerate Zhang Lian.

I came across Zhang Lian's rebellion while researching and revising my blog posts about Wokou. A very interesting figure, Zhang Lian was not a Wokou but a mountain bandit through and through, although he was often conflated and lumped together with other Wokou, especially by later historians, in part due to the unfortunate timing of his rebellion (happened around the same time as Jia Jing Da Wo Kou), and in part due to the legends that arose after his death. In any case, Zhang Lian's rebellion (and many rebellions like it), is an interesting case study of the drastic difference in scale and behavior between Chinese-initiated outlawry and Japanese-initiated Wokou raids, which adds to the reason as to why Jia Jing Da Wo Kou should not be viewed as a Chinese phenomenon.

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