In this well-written book based on a wide-range of primary and secondary sources in Chinese and English, Bret Hinsch carefully analyses the influence of Chinese empresses in the broad sweep of two millennia of history, tracing the specific circumstances that generated their roles as daughters, wives, mothers, and not least, rulers of the realm. This exposition of the lives of women at court demonstrates how kinship, wealth, and, religion, interacted at the inner sanctum of the Chinese polity. Chinese Empresses is a unique in-depth study of how women in successive dynastic regimes could wield influence, and compete against male authority. The reader will learn a great deal about how Chinese governmental ideals interconnected with female political influence and could purposely thwart the power of empresses. This volume is an ideal study text for university students and research scholars as well as the general public.

Harriet Zurndorfer, Leiden University

While books on Chinese women of the imperial era inevitably discuss empresses, empress dowagers and imperial consorts of various ranks, Hinsch’s book promises to be the first comprehensive one devoted to this group of important women in Chinese history in terms of the ways they gained and exercised political power and how they coped with the misogynistic opposition from male authorities.

Hong Zhang, University of Central Florida

The fresh discussions of ethnic encounters at the borderlands, such as royal marriage alliances being used as an expedient solution for border tensions, are insightful. This study contributes to the author's substantial body of scholarship on Chinese women's and gender history. It is a worthy and inspiring read for university students, researchers, and lay readers interested in female leadership.

Choice