Barbarians at the Gates? The Tang Frontier Military and the An Lushan
Rebellion
Jonathan Karam Skaff
Edwin Pulleyblank has argued that during the mid-Tang
there was a sharp division between civilians and a "barbarized" frontier
military. He believes that when the Tang emperor Xuanzong placed non-Chinese
in charge of the frontier commands in 747, this "more than anything else...set
the stage for the [An Lushan] rebellion."
This paper uses alternative sources, such as reports of tomb
excavations and funerary epitaphs, to present a more nuanced view of the
frontier military in the first half of the eighth century. It shows that
the army was composed of Chinese and non-Chinese of heterogeneous origins
with the non-Chinese assimilated to varying degrees into Chinese culture.
When the rebellion broke out, loyalist and rebel forces included a mixture
of Chinese and non-Chinese troops.
Lacking evidence of a sharp division between Chinese
and non-Chinese, we need to look at institutional failures for the cause
of the rebellion. By the middle of the eighth century, it was becoming
common to assign multiple commands to Military Commissioners. At the time
of the rebellion An Lushan controlled three contiguous regions in the northeast,
which gave him the potential to challenge the court. Another problem was
that rules of avoidance were ignored. During the Tang higher ranking officers
were restricted to four years of duty in one place, but An Lushan had control
over two of his commands for more than a decade, allowing him to create
a personal satrapy. Finally, the censorial system was allowed to deteriorate,
denying the court the ability to monitor the frontier army.