184 AD · North China Plain Theater
184 AD
A massive peasant uprising led by the Taoist healer Zhang Jiao, who promised that the corrupt Han dynasty's 'blue sky' was dead and the 'yellow sky' would rise. Hundreds of thousands of starving peasants tied yellow scarves around their heads and rose simultaneously across eight provinces. The Han court mobilized its armies and authorized local strongmen to raise private forces — Cao Cao, Liu Bei, and Sun Jian all fought their first campaigns here. The rebellion was crushed within a year, but the precedent of warlords commanding personal armies proved fatal to the dynasty.
Commanders