As we all know, empress eldest grandson and eldest grandson wujie brothers and sisters were very important to the life of Tang Taizong, the "Emperor Fan of the Ages". Empress Eldest Sun was the highest-rated empress in Chinese history (Wu Zetian was emperor), and Empress Changsun Wuji was the first meritorious servant of LingYange. What is less well known is that the family of Empress Changsun and Changsun Wujie was higher than that of the Li Tang imperial family during the Northern Wei Dynasty.
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Xianbei gradually became the most powerful nomadic people in the north. Xianbei is geographically divided into three parts: eastern Xianbei, central Xianbei and western Xianbei, and the leading clan of The central Xianbei is the Xianbei Tuoba, also known as The Tuoba Xianbei. During the Sixteen Kingdoms period of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, Tuoba Xianbei appeared a ming lord named Tuoba Shiyi Qian, and the daiguo established by Tuoba Shiyi was the predecessor regime of Northern Wei.
However, Tuoba Shiyi died in civil unrest in his later years, and the daiguo he established was also destroyed by Former Qin. Later, Former Qin died in the "Battle of Shuishui", and Former Qin, which had just unified the north, collapsed. Tuoba Shiyi's grandson took advantage of the collapse of Former Qin to successfully restore the country, and in the first year of the Taichu Dynasty (386), the name of the state was changed to Wei. This grandson was the founding emperor of the Northern Wei Dynasty, Emperor Tuoba Jue of Daowu.
Tuoba Shiyi had an older brother named Tuoba ShaMoxiong, who later became the southern lord of the Daiguo and contributed to the establishment of both the Daiguo and the Northern Wei. Coupled with the fact that Tuoba Sha Moxiong was the elder brother of Tuoba Shiyi, Tuoba Jue gave the "eldest grandson" to Tuoba Song, the son of Tuoba Sha Moxiong. Tuoba Song's family later became "Eldest Son Tuoba", meaning the head of the Tuoba clan, and his status was only below that of the Northern Wei Emperor.
After Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty ascended the throne, he began to carry out Sinicization reforms, and one of the main contents of the Sinicization reform was to comprehensively study the patriarchal concepts of the Central Plains. According to the patriarchal concept of the Central Plains, the concubine of the hereditary throne is also the head of the clan, and there can be no other clan leader outside the concubine. At that time, the Northern Wei Tuoba clan had the head of the two clans of the imperial family and the "eldest grandson Tuoba", which was not in line with the patriarchal concept of the Central Plains.
Therefore, Emperor Xiaowen changed the surname of "Changsun Tuoba" to "Changsun Clan", while the surname of the Northern Wei imperial family was changed to "Yuan", and the descendants of "Changsun Tuoba" have since taken "Changsun" as their surname. When the Northern Wei Dynasty was classified as Eastern Wei and Western Wei, the descendants of the "Eldest Sun Tuoba" (長孙拓拔) defected to Western Wei and became a member of the Guanlong clique. The great-grandson of Changsun Zhi was Sun Sheng, a famous diplomat and military leader of the Sui Dynasty.
Changsun Sheng is the father of Empress Changsun and Eldest Sun Wuji, that is to say, Empress Changsun and Eldest Sun Wuji are both descendants of Changsun Zhi. Because the eldest grandson was a descendant of "Changsun Tuoba", the ancestors of Empress Changsun and Changsun Wuji were all Tuoba surnames, that is, the side branches of the Northern Wei Sect.