trad kingdom simp death_date predecessor wg pinyin title zi birth_date article_title other name reign
劉禪 shu han 刘禅 271 207 liu bei liu sh ` an líu shàn emperor gongsi -lrb- -rrb- 207 liu shan
 adou / edou -lrb- -rrb- -lrb- infant name -rrb- liu shan 223 -- 263
liu shan

liu shan -lrb- 207 -- 271 -rrb- , courtesy name gongsi , was the second and last emperor of the state of shu han during the three kingdoms period .
as he ascended the throne at the age of 16 , liu shan was entrusted to the care of the chancellor zhuge liang and imperial secretariat li yan .
during liu shan 's reign , many campaigns were led against the rival state of cao wei , primarily by zhuge liang and his successor jiang wei , but to little avail .
liu shan eventually surrendered to wei in 263 after deng ai led a surprise attack on the shu capital chengdu .
he was quickly relocated to luoyang , capital of wei , and enfeoffed as `` duke anle '' .
there he enjoyed his last years peacefully before dying , most probably of natural causes , in 271 .
widely known by his infant name `` adou / edou '' , liu shan was commonly perceived as an incapable , even mentally handicapped ruler .
he was also accused of indulging in pleasures while neglecting state affairs .
some critics , however , believe that liu shan , like his father liu bei , had excellent people management skills , being able to balance the interests of the two major factions in his court , headed respectively by zhuge liang and li yan .
these critics also praise liu shan for feigning incompetence in the most ingenious and natural way after the fall of shu so as to avoid personal harm .
nevertheless , the name `` adou '' is today still commonly used in chinese to describe incapable people who would not achieve anything even with significant assistance .
liu shan 's given name , when combined with that of liu feng , whom liu bei adopted before liu shan 's birth , would become '' `` fengshan '' '' -lrb- 封禪 -rrb- , meaning `` to ascend the throne in a ceremony '' .
scholars such as yi zhongtian believe that this is a subtle indication of liu bei 's -lrb- hidden -rrb- ambition to become an emperor , even long before the abdication of emperor xian , the last ruler of the han dynasty .
this undermines liu bei 's claim that he was forced to declare himself emperor so as to carry on the lineage of the han dynasty .
as chen shou , the author of `` records of three kingdoms '' , noted , contrary to tradition , zhuge liang banned official historians at liu shan 's court , and after zhuge 's death , it appeared liu did not revive that post .
therefore many of the events during his reign were unrecorded , causing limited details about liu shan 's reign in historical records .
