342 BC · Wei–Qi frontier Theater
342 BC
Sun Bin lured his old rival Pang Juan into a night pursuit by feigning mass desertion — reducing his army's cookfires each day so the Wei believed Qi's men were fleeing. At the narrow defile of Maling, Qi crossbowmen waited in the dark for the signal: a tree stripped of bark and inscribed 'Under this tree Pang Juan dies.' Ten thousand bolts fell at once. Pang Juan cut his own throat.
Commanders