The senior veteran of Cao Cao's frontier wars. The rains drowned the seven armies he brought to Fancheng; he surrendered, and lived to be ashamed of it.
Of the generals who held the frontier in those years, Yu Jin was reckoned the most resolute.Chen Shou's appraisal, Sanguozhi, Wei shu 17
Appears in
Three Kingdoms 8 · panel 3Three Kingdoms 8 · panel 6Three Kingdoms 8 · panel 7Three Kingdoms 8 · panel 9Three Kingdoms 8 · panel 17
Relations
- Cao Cao general & lord — The senior veteran of thirty years of frontier wars; sent south to raise the siege of Fancheng, he surrendered when the rains drowned his camp, and lived to be ashamed of it.
- Guan Yu opponents — Ringed on high ground with what was left of the seven armies, he gave himself up and was held under arrest at Jiangling.
Myth vs record
The story you may know
Guan Yu loosed the waters himself and drowned the seven armies by design.
What the sources say
The flood is in the record as weather: autumn rains, the Han River over its banks, fathoms of water on the level ground — and Yu Jin's biography says not a word of dams or diversions. His camps were set low and without ships. He surrendered on the embankment; a year later, when Cao Pi had the surrender painted on the walls of the audience hall, he died of shame.