Grand Tutor, eighty-ish and unbought; in 168 he tried to wipe the inner court out in one morning and died with his cap-strings undone.
When gentlemen meet they talk of filial duty and brotherly care and the service of a ruler — and you set me to sweeping a room? A man who will not sweep his own room has no business asking after all under Heaven.Chen Fan in youth, answering a father's friend who found his lodging untidy; Hou Han shu, Hereditary Biography of Chen Fan
Appears in
Relations
- Dou Wu colleagues — The two old men picked a boy emperor in 168 so that they could govern him, and died within a day of one another over a plan they took too long to run.
- Zhang Rang enemies — His scheme for the autumn of 168 was to clear the inner court in a morning; the ring he failed to destroy held the throne for twenty years after him.
- Li Ying colleagues — He would not leave the empire by a letter of resignation, and the men he was trying to save had already been broken by the prohibitions twice over.
Myth vs record
An old man killed in a palace squabble he could not have won, for the sake of eunuchs he merely disliked.
He was Grand Tutor and had been refusing the inner court since before the prohibitions: the record keeps his memorials on the eunuchs' grants and their kin, and his refusal to serve through a resignation letter is the rule he died on. The coup of the eighth month of 168 was lost to delay, not to innocence — the plan leaked, the eunuchs swore the guard to the emperor instead of the regent, and bought the officers at the gates with titles the regent could not give. Chen Fan led men at a gate with a sword he had never used.