Ti Ying Chunyu

Background

Ti Ying was the youngest of the five daughters of a doctor named Chunyu Yi, who lived in Taicang, in Qi (the present-day city of Zibo, Shandong Province). There is no exact information about the date of her birth.

Career

Ti Ying had to save her father from a punishment that took such forms as branding on the forehead, cutting off the nose, or castration. It was part of the penal system in the early Han Dynasty.

Chunyu Yi failed to save the life of a very wealthy man’s wife, a woman already gravely ill, the devastated husband resented and incriminated him, claiming that Chunyu Yi’s treatment was the cause of his wife’s death.

Ti Ying went with him to Chang’an, where she begged a scribe to draft a petition for her, addressed to Emperor Wen. She herself handed it to the palace guards to give to the emperor. In her petition, Ti Ying said that she was ready to sacrifice herself for her father and become a slave. Ti Ying’s petition not only requested her father’s pardon but also pointed out the unjustness and cruelty of corporal punishment.

Emperor Wen was deeply moved by Ti Ying’s plea. He declined Ti Ying’s servitude and pardoned her father. Moreover, Emperor Wen abolished the cruel corporal punishments.

Achievements

• Ti Ying was a well-known character of Chinese history, whose eloquent plea to rescue her father launched the reform of corporal punishment in the early Han Dynasty.

Personality

Ti Ying was a brave woman and a loving daughter.

Connections

There is no information about her marital status.

Father:

Chun Yi

Chun Yi initially worked as a low-ranking official, but later became a physician of high rank after he completed study with a famous doctor.

References

• The Position of Woman in Early China According to the Lieh Nu Chuan, The Biographies of Chinese Women.
  1971
• Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women: Antiquity Through Sui, 1600 B.C.E. - 618 C.E This new volume of the "Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women" spans more than 2,000 years from antiquity to the early seventh century. It recovers the stories of more than 200 women, nearly all of them unknown in the West.
  1998