ABSTRACT
The corporate nature of the Song founding focuses attention on the personalities involved rather than the institutions alone, and changes our understanding of the task that lay before Zhao Kuangyin as he tried to make himself emperor. This chapter discusses its effects in the institutional framework of the time, explains how Zhao and his comrades positioned themselves to take over, and discusses the drinking party of 961. In order to understand the dramatic shift in political and military power after Gaoping, and to clarify the reasons for that shift, the chapter briefly outlines the structure of the Zhou imperial army before the battle. The chapter presents Zhao Kuangyin's task was to change his personal relationship with his comrades into a new emperor-official relationship. Zhao Kuangyin was part of a small group of generals who rose together through the ranks of the imperial army.
