《资治通鉴·汉纪》205｜女皇帝吕雉，竟然因狗而死？（1）

Summary

This 芮淇讲透资治通鉴 episode narrates the final months of 吕雉 in 180 BCE. After further Lü-family enfeoffments and a reported encounter with a blue-haired dog-like apparition, Lu Zhi becomes seriously ill, gives 吕禄 and 吕产 control of Chang’an’s northern and southern armies, warns them not to leave their posts even for her funeral, and dies before being buried with 刘邦 at Changling.

The episode proposes rabies as an explanation for the apparition, armpit pain, later mental disturbance, and roughly four-month interval. That remains a retrospective diagnosis rather than an established cause of death: the supplied document reports no confirmed bite, complete clinical course, or contemporaneous medical diagnosis. Its firmer political contribution is Lu Zhi’s recognition that Lü-family kingship lacked ministerial consent and that control of the capital garrisons would decide the succession crisis after her death.

Key Claims

• In Gao Hou year eight, the young emperor reportedly enfeoffs Lü Tong as king of Yan and Lü Zhuang as marquis of Dongping, while the episode attributes effective initiative to Lu Zhi.
• After a spring sacrifice at Bashang, Lu Zhi reportedly sees a blue-haired dog-like figure rush toward her armpit; a diviner identifies it as the resentful spirit of 刘如意, and the episode says her armpit pain and nighttime fear then worsen.
• Lu Zhi uses late grants to reinforce family and political support, including arrangements around her young grandson Zhang Yan and a reward for Zhang Shi’s earlier support of Lü-family kingship.
• As Lu Zhi becomes gravely ill, she assigns Lü Lu to the Northern Army and Lü Chan to the Southern Army, concentrating the capital’s principal forces in Lü-family hands.
• Her reported deathbed warning explicitly recognizes that senior ministers resent the enfeoffment of Lü-family kings and may rebel after her death while the emperor remains young.
• Lu Zhi therefore orders Lü Lu and Lü Chan to remain in their camps, protect the palace, and avoid leaving military command even to attend her funeral.
• The episode’s rabies hypothesis connects season, a possible dog encounter, armpit pain, an estimated incubation period, and later reports of mental disturbance, but the evidence does not establish exposure or diagnosis.
• Lu Zhi reportedly appoints Lü Chan chancellor, makes Lü Lu’s daughter empress, distributes rewards to princes and officials, dies aged sixty-two, and is buried with Liu Bang at Changling.

Key Quotes

“大臣不平我立吕氏王。” - the episode’s rendering of Lu Zhi’s warning that ministers opposed Lü-family kingship.

“千万不要去给我送葬。” - the reported instruction that Lü Lu and Lü Chan must not abandon military command for the funeral.

Connections

• 吕雉 and 帝王死因史料推断 - final illness evidence and the boundary between a suggestive symptom pattern and a settled diagnosis.
• 吕禄, 吕产, and 摄政终结后的内外合击动员 - deathbed transfer of the northern and southern armies creates the coercive starting position for the post-regency crisis.
• 少帝刘弘 - young nominal ruler whose vulnerability structures Lu Zhi’s final security warning.
• 刘如意 - earlier victim whose resentful spirit is used by the episode’s transmitted supernatural explanation.
• 刘邦 - spouse with whom Lu Zhi is buried at Changling in the episode’s closing retrospective.

Contradictions

• No settled contradiction is adopted. The source adds the pre-death instructions that explain the military arrangement already continued in Hanji 205 part 2.
• Rabies is an episode-level retrospective hypothesis, not an established cause of death. The document does not establish a bite, animal infection, wound, hydrophobia, complete neurological course, or clinical diagnosis; an apparition cannot itself prove physical exposure.
• The spirit of Liu Ruyi is part of the transmitted supernatural narrative and is not treated as a causal explanation by the wiki.
• Exact dates, titles, force sizes, responsibility for enfeoffments, flood figures, symptoms, quotations, age, mental state, burial timing, and the historicity of the deathbed instructions remain source-attributed pending comparison with transmitted texts.