Duke Cheng of Lu
Chinese noble
Duke Cheng of Lu (Chinese: 魯成公; pinyin: Lǔ Chéng Gōng; died 20 July 573 BC), personal name Ji Heigong, was a ruler of the Lu state. A son of Duke Xuan of Lu and Mu Jiang, he reigned for 18 years from 590 BC to 573 BC. He was described as a weak ruler under the influence of his mother.
In 573 BC, Duke Cheng died. His son Wu (午), who was three years old in East Asian reckoning, succeeded him the following year.
Reign
War with Qi
In 590 BC, the first year of Duke Cheng's reign, the political situation was that the major powers Jin and Chu were fighting for hegemony (though Jin was recently defeated by Chu at Bi in 597 BC), while Lu and its neighbor Qi were aligned to Jin and Chu, respectively. In order to prepare for a potential war against Qi and Chu, a new system was instituted such that each qiu (丘), an administrative unit roughly translatable to "district," must produce an armored soldier. Du Yu noted in his annotations of the Zuo Zhuan that according to the Rites of Zhou, each dian (甸), which contains four qius, should supply three armored soldiers, meaning that this new policy represents an increase in taxation and corvee. The Guliang Zhuan further criticizes that having individual qius provide armored soldiers was improper, as the supply of armored soldiers was an affair of the cities, while qius are agricultural units.
In spring 589 BC, Qi attacked Lu from the north, with Duke Qing of Qi personally leading an army, laying siege to Long (龍). Lupu Jiukui, a favorite of the Duke of Qi, scaled the walls of Lu, but was captured by the defending soldiers.
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