Seven Captures of Meng Huo

Also called: Meng Huo

An anecdote passed down outside the official histories. It may or may not be true.

An anecdote from the Han-Jin Chunqiu: Zhuge Liang captured the Nanzhong chief Meng Huo seven times and released him seven times, until he submitted willingly.

Not in the main text of the Records of the Three Kingdoms, this anecdote comes from Xi Zuochi’s Han-Jin Chunqiu, quoted by Pei Songzhi. On his southern campaign Zhuge Liang captured Meng Huo, a chief revered by the people of Nanzhong, showed him around his camp and let him go; he fought and captured him again, seven times in all, and seven times released him. After the seventh, Meng Huo would not leave and said, "Your Excellency has the majesty of Heaven; the southerners will not rebel again."

Zhuge Liang’s biography says only that by autumn all was pacified and never names Meng Huo. Many scholars doubt the story, since the Han-Jin Chunqiu was written in the fourth century, under the Eastern Jin. The Romance of the Three Kingdoms expands it over several chapters.