ABSTRACT
Queen Ma (ca. 39-79 a .d .) , the queen-consort of Emperor Ming (r. 57-75 a .d .) in the Eastern Han dynasty and a powerful force within the imperial court, was originally from Maling in Fufeng county (in the northeast section of modern-day Xinping, Shanxi). Her first name is unknown. Ma’s father was Ma Yuan, a famous general during the Eastern Han dynasty. Her father’s first wife had been a member of the Jia family, but she died childless while quite young; he remarried, selecting a wife from the Li family. The young girl who would grow up to become Queen Ma had one older brother, three younger brothers, and two older sisters; she was the fourth child bom and the youngest daughter. Her father died when she was ten, and her older brother also died young; after their deaths, her mother’s mind became disoriented, thus placing heavy family burdens on the young girl. She displayed excellent management skills and honed life skills of endurance, thrift, and strength. In her youth, she was well educated; among the books she read were the Lushi chunqiu (Spring and Autumn Annals of Master Lu), Chu ci (El egies of Chu), and Yi jing (Book of Changes). She was espe cially fond of reading works by the great Confucian scholar Dong Zhongshu.
