WeiCivil
楊修
Yang Xiu
Courtesy name: 德祖 (Dezu)Lived: 175 ~ 219
Profile
A scion of a great family with an uncanny knack for reading Cao Cao’s mind — most famously packing his bags the night the watchword "chicken ribs" was given. As Cao Zhi’s adviser he was deep in the succession fight, even pre-writing model answers for Cao Cao’s tests of his sons. He was executed for unsettling the army; posterity’s verdict is that his brilliance was the blade that killed him.
Key events
- 219
"Chicken Ribs" and the Death of Yang Xiu
Yang Xiu, who decoded Cao Cao’s "chicken ribs" watchword before the Hanzhong withdrawal, is executed for unsettling the army.
History vs. the novelHistoryvsNovel
The "killed for showing off his wit" arc is the novel’s polish; the historical record reads more like a political execution of Cao Zhi’s chief partisan in the succession struggle.