Protector General in the Western Regions, a frontiersman picked for his strength at throwing stones. He was ill in bed when his deputy raised an army in the emperor's name, and ended up riding at the head of it.
The Protector General lay long ill; his deputy forged the edict and marched the garrison colonies, and Gan Yanshou rose to stop an army already assembled and was pressed by his own second-in-command to ride at its head.The record of the forged edict of 36 BCE; Gan Yanshou is given no speech of his own here; Hanshu, juan 70, Biographies of Gan Yanshou and Chen Tang
Appears in
Relations
- Chen Tang colleagues — Protector General and deputy: Tang raised the columns over Gan's sickbed, and the two then accused themselves in writing and were ennobled together.
- Zhizhi Chanyu enemies — He commanded the six divisions that came to the water three li from the wall and took the city on the Talas.
Myth vs record
Gan Yanshou, the Protector General, planned and led the raid on Zhizhi Chanyu.
The record makes him the reluctant head of another man's scheme. He thought the blow was right but wanted to memorialise for it first; Chen Tang would not wait, said the court and the grandees would never see so far, and raised the troops while Gan lay long ill. Gan started out to stop a force already marching, was shouted down by his own deputy with a hand on his sword, and joined it, adding the picked horse and the agricultural officers. The marquisate he received was wrung out of a months-long deadlock over whether the two men were criminals or conquerors (Hanshu, juan 70).