Talk:Cao Cao/Archive 1

Comments
I'd be interested to see a bit more content on the villainization of Cao Cao. I've read several commentaries by an Australian Scholar, whose name sadly escapes me at the moment, who argues that the historical villainization of Cao Cao stems from Confucists in the court several centuries after the fall of the Han. The Confucist arguement was that Cao Cao was unable to reunite the Han, thus he must have been a wicked individual, and no wicked individual would be able to gain Heaven's blessing. Cao Cao's emphasis on individual merit seems to be somewhere at the root. Then again, I've only read Luo Guanzhong's Three Kingdoms and chapters 58-62 of Sima Guan's History, so I am a bit scant on my first-hand details. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.248.160.82 (talk • contribs) 19:33, 22 August 2006

I am pretty sure that historically Zhuge Liang was not at the battle of Red Cliffs, and that it was Zhou Yu alone who masterminded the affair.

I removed:


 * Cao Cao was in fact not a villain. He fought for the glory of his kingdom but did it in a way that people saw as underhanded or dubious. One of his sayings were "If I would kill my own son for this country, I would surely kill a peasant.". Things of that nature made him seem like a villain because of course a hero would not do such a thing, but Cao Cao was willing to sacrafice everything for his kingdom. Another thing about Cao Cao is that he was a very intelligent man and only trusted a few people. This lack of trust also gave him a bad name because at times he would accuse you of trying to decieve him and throw you out of his kingdom.

Because it is POV, unencyclopedic and somewhat incoherent. Tuf-Kat 09:05, Oct 29, 2003 (UTC)

I changed the section titled "Literary criticism" to "Cao Cao in literature" to better describe the content. Also, the translation of "Xiao Xiong" as "Hero of Chaos": where did this come from? It seems to be a rather strange translation, and a dramatic one at that.


 * That Hero of Chaos line appears to come from a video game.

Cao Cao had ambition to take the throne and seize power for his siblings and family--that's what made him a villain
Cao Cao was a very capable person w/great ability, that was the reason he was appointed to his post. But his motive was very unclear and ambiguous-- He dared not take the throne for himself because he knew well he would be criticized or even murdered, thus he was smart; on the other hand he did not have the intention to restore the Han dynasty to its former glory either! that was his villain part. The intention he had was to instruct to his heirs to take the Han throne after his death. i.e. to abdicate Emperor Xian,. So that's what one of his son did- enthroned himself as Emperor after deposing off Emperor Xian.

The job of a national military-lord-chancellor like CaoCao's should be first and foremost restore the glory of the Han Dynasty and not to instruct his sons to seize power for themself, but to instruct his family to continue to help Emperor Xian(now a grown up man)to re-establish the Han Dynasty and lineage, not destroying it. His ill intention was made apparent after his death, and the Chinese people could see throught that because right after CaoCao died, the whole kingdom was seized by his son/s.

Note also the Publication date of the book "Three Kingdoms" was in 14th century, but from 263 AD on till the year before the book was written, Chinese people already venerated the 3 sworn brothers and no single temple or stele was erected to give praise to Cao Cao. For Example: as early as Tang time, that is way before 14th century, the Chinese populace already venerated the 3- sworn brothers at the Temple of Bai Di Cheng.

Hence one can not blame entirely on the book and its author Luo GuanZhong to spread the story, as some jealous Northerner CCP critics are found to accuse or point finger to. Quite the contrary, the author only wrote what was conformed to history, and what he had collected from history books and oral stories and sentiment circulated among the Chinese folks at the time, like oral tradition, folk tales and plays etc, so overall the whole picture as told by the book "Romance of 3 kingdoms" was still very close to the truth, that indeed not only Cao Cao but also his family had ill intention to seize the throne and power for themself(Cao family). Note: By fate or bad karma the new "Wei" Dynasty did not last long at all as his sons proved to be uncapable to rule. They didn't have the support of the people at all.

Just imagine if Luo GuanZhong was to set out to write a book to give glory & praises to Cao Cao, I don't think the Chinese people at the time would have accepted it, i.e. the book would not sell well, because it would not be conformed to the truth nor the Chinese history but distorting Chinese history. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.174.163.97 (talk) 09:01, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Please check this phrase
"self-appointed Imperial Secretaris"

I don't recall Cao Cao self-appointing himself into any position. --- As any man in great power, I wouldn't doubt he had great ambition, it's hard to say if he's appointed himself to better positions. What seems to be undisputed fact is that Cao Cao never declared himself emperor, but Liu and Sun did. -XR Apr 2,2006.

Revamp
The life story of Cao Cao is all wrong!!! i'm going to re-write it soon. By the way, "hero of chaos" is of course not an appropriate translation. "Xiao xiong" (枭雄), according to Han Yu Da Ci Dian, means a strong-handed and ambitious person. A lot of people (including me previously) misunderstand "&#26541;", thinking that it has a negative implication. But it doesn't.

About "Xiaoxiong"
The word, 枭, originally means a kind of unfriendly bird that people kill and hang on the tree (the structure of the character is a bird on top of the wood). It later extended to "unfilial bird" and fierce and ambitious people. Here Xiao branches into 2 meanings: sometimes it refers to valour but other times it means ambitious and evil. Actually, the derogatory meaning of Xiao was used as early as during Warring States; Xun Zi used it as a verb that means "disturb" or "cause trouble". Therefore I think it is reasonable to interpret the Xiao in Xiaoxiong as derogatory.
 * Thanks for the info! Next time remember to sign off using "~ ~ ~ ~" without the spaces. --Plastictv 01:08, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This is confirmed in by The Chinese Text Project, http://ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E6%A2%9F. Colin McLarty (talk) 22:14, 19 August 2012 (UTC) 22:13, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Numbers
The troop numbers in this article are those given in traditional sources that are now thought to be mostly exagerated. Here they are quoted as definite. I have seen, in the past, discussions of these figures - especially the 830,000 supposedly mobilized for the Battle of Red Cliffs, which I have seen revised down to anything from two hundred thousand to six hundred thousand. To state these numbers as absolute facts is misleading. It is no different to saying that the Persian army of Xerxes during his invasion of Greece numbered 2.6 million - that is the figure given by Herodotus, but is certainly grossly exagerated.

"A wandering throng of the rebels from the Qing Province (&#38738;&#24030;) numbering a million invaded the Yan Province (&#20822;&#24030;)." - on this figure I've seen nothing before, so I can't factually dispute it. But it would seem to be ridiculously exagerated. During the Taiping Rebellion in the Nineteenth Century the Taiping army never numbered more than maybe 1.5 million in total. At that time China's population was about ten times what it was in Cao Cao's time. That a "wandering throng" could number a million (a third of the size of the force Hitler used to invade the Soviet Union in the largest war in human history!) is ludicrous in the extreme.

Unfortunately I lack sources that provide concrete figures on any of these or any that at least suggest the most commonly agreed upon approximate figures, but if anyone else has any sources that might clear this up they should edit the article to say something along the lines of "traditional histories claim that x's army number x, but most modern historians agree that a figure of x is more likely." Alternatively if no mdoern sources provide an estimate of the numbers then perhaps it should simply be stated that the traditional figures are almost certainly exagerated.


 * i do very much agree with you, though i had to copy wholesale from the Sanguo Zhi as i did not have any other reference at hand. i join your appeal for anyone with better understanding in this to step forward. --Plastictv 12:48, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
 * 830,000 is the number in the novel, and according to the estimate of Zhou Yu, the commander of the Sun-Liu coalition army at the time, the number of Cao Cao's legions in the southern expedition was about 200,000-300,000. 李双能 (talk) 01:49, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I assume both of you can read Chinese. here is the Chinese wiki article of the Battle of Red Cliffs, and you may find useful information in it.--Skyfiler 18:41, May 10, 2005 (UTC)

Fact or history
Oops, i realized that this incident did happen as recorded by the Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms (in biography of Liu Bei). So i took it out of the article:

Discussion of "heroes"
In 199, Lü Bu attacked Xiaopei (小沛), forcing Liu Bei to flee to Xuchang and seek refuge under Cao Cao. Cao Cao treated Liu Bei well, even conferring him the title of Yuzhou Governor (豫州牧) and hence the rightful ownership of Xiaopei. However, the Romance of the Three Kingdoms gave Liu Bei's stay in Xuchang a little twist.

To prevent Cao Cao from seeing through his ambitions, Liu Bei devoted himself to growing vegetables in his backyard. One day, Cao Cao summoned Liu Bei to his residence for a drink. While drinking, cumulous clouds began to gather on the horizon. Cao Cao pointed to a piece that resembled a dragon and compared dragons to heroes. Liu Bei was then asked who the heroes living among them were.

After making some vain guesses, Liu Bei gave up the attempt. Cao Cao, pointing at his guest and then himself, said, "The only heroes in this world are you and I." Hearing this, Liu Bei gasped, dropping his spoon and chopsticks. Just at that moment there came a tremendous peal of thunder. Liu Bei quickly attributed his shock to the thunder, and thus successfully hid his ambitions and curbed Cao Cao's suspicion for a while.

Regards, Plastictv 10:32, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

Contribution to Sun Tzu's The Art of War
May I suggest including a paragraph on Cao Cao's involvement with Sun Tzu's The Art of War? Given its popularity in the West, this is probably the most important direct legacy of Cao Cao for English Wikipedia readers, maybe even surpassing his archvillain role in the Romance and its derivatives. Here is my first draft; please edit as necessary.

Cao Cao's other key contribution to Chinese literature was the editing and commentaries on Sun Tzu's The Art of War. By comparing the various editions in circulation at the time, he eliminated chapters falsely attributed to Sun Tzu and produced a definitive edition of thirteen chapters. In addition, he supplemented Sun Tzu's writing with running commentaries, clarifying Sun Tzu's intention (Sun Tzu's text was already many centuries old by Cao Cao's time), and adding original insights drawn from his own battlefield experience and study of military history. Together, they form the basis of all The Art of War texts in use today. (Fragments of the book excavated at Yinqueshan in 1972 predates Cao Cao by two to four centuries, and show some significant discrepancies. However, as of 2005, few, if any, modern translations reflect the Yinqueshan version.)


 * That is a very good addition, definitely worthy to be included! Could you provide a source for your draft? --Plastictv 08:02, 21 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Ok i've found a mention of Cao Cao's annotation of The Art of War in the Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms. And i'll include it in the next grand revision of the article to come. :) Please provide more sources in the meantime! --Plastictv 01:06, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

I remember some versions of the Samuel B. Griffith translation of Sun Tzu's Art of War included information on Cao Cao's role as a commentator on Sun Tzu's work. When I lay my hands on another copy I may come back and update that section. Naturally, Griffith will be given full credit for his work as translator and for his work in describing Cao Cao's role.

Cao Cao the demon== ==

An anonymous editor added this:

"Due to his sinful acts in Xuzhou, locals there still portray Cao Cao as a demon who eats children for breakfast."

Is this true? Could anyone verify please? It would be good if he/she who wrote this could come forward and provide a source. --Plastictv 12:54, 25 August 2005 (UTC)


 * POV disputed, cannot verify.-- Tdxi a  ng  陈 鼎 翔  (Talk)  Contributions Contributions Chat with Tdxiang on IRC! 09:33, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Meaning of the Name
What does Cao Cao mean? I have seen variations such as Tsao Tsao and assume its pronounced as Sao Sao and not Kao Kao. I have also gleaned that the word "cao" in Pinyin means something akin to "have sex," but in a more vulgar way. 67.33.201.53 17:59, 31 August 2005 (UTC)--Joe


 * Firstly, "Cao Cao" is just a name. The first "Cao" is his family name (which has no meaning by itself) and the second "Cao" is his given name (which roughly translates to "virtuous conduct"). Yes, his given name could also mean "f*ck", but must be said with a different accent. Chinese is complicated eh? :)
 * Secondly, different variations of his name are due to different transliteration systems people have been using. "Cao Cao" is pinyin and "Tsao Tsao" is Wade-Giles. It is not pronounced as "Kao Kao". A "c" in pinyin is pronounced as "ts", which is close to a "ch" in English but with a straight tongue. Hope that answered your question. :) --Plastictv 00:14, 1 September 2005 (UTC)


 * The meaning "to have sex" is a vulgar one, and it is very obvious that the meaning of the character did not exist back in the time of Cao Cao; it is a phrase from the Northern dialect. -- 59.121.214.134 15:57, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
 * I thought it came from a southern dialect. But in any case, the "to have sex" is not considered a real definition of the character "cao", i.e. you won't find it in any dictionary (though one could argue that it should be, since the vulgar meaning is now widely understood).  Since the meaning came from a dialect, that meaning is only applied to "cao" out of convenience, since characters pronounced "cao" in the fourth tone is rather rare, and this "cao" is the most commonly used among them.  Of course all this may be meaningless to someone without at least basic knowledge in Chinese.  As a rule, since Chinese characters are all monosyllabic, since there are relatively few sounds, and that words are often distinguished tonally, simillarly transliterated words, especially when the tones are neglected, are more often then not different in actuality.  The transliteration "cao" without the tone noted, for example, can be any one of at least 30 possible character in Chinese.
 * Furthermore, one should note that Chinese, in common with any other language, has evolved quite dramatically in the ~1,800 since Cao Cao's time; to give some idea that might resonate in the West, most Europeans of that time were still speaking Classical Latin or something rather close to it. In particular for this discussion, one should note that many homophones that exist on modern Chinese, even true homophones pronounced with the same tone, were unlikely to have been homophones back then. This is why Classical Chinese, which was based on the Chinese spoken in the Warring States period a few centuries prior to Cao Cao's time, generally makes little sense when read aloud, even though it reads just fine. So in other words, even if there was a word in Cao Cao's time that had a sexual meaning and has since come to be pronounced "cao", it is unlikely to have sounded particularly similar to either part of his name. 94.14.144.113 (talk) 12:38, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

The Cao you refer to is the same character as Cao's last name, but it's a modern slang meaning f*ck, the actually character does not mean f*ck though. And note Cao Cao's name is made up of two different character that pronouced similiar, but bares different meanings. -XR Apr 02, 2006.

Actually the have sex "Cao" character is his given name (or First name), it is written after the family name in Chinese though, see Chinese name —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.154.176.212 (talk) 04:35, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Actually his given name Cao(操) didnot mean fuck, the exact one is 肏.--刻意(Kèyì) 21:52, 10 January 2009 (UTC)


 * According to the article in Mandarin Wikipedia, King Wen of Zhou gave Cao County to his sixth son Ji Zhen Duo (姬振鐸), who established the vassal state of Cao (曹國). Ji Zhen Duo came to be known as "Uncle of the State of Cao" (曹叔).  Apparently, he fathered children who adopted Cao as their surname.  The first descendant in this line who is linked to Cao Cao is Cao Can, who was a noted prime minister of the Han Dynasty.  However, Cao Cao's father Cao Song was supposedly adopted by the eunuch Cao Teng; Cao Song's real surname was supposedly Xiahou (夏侯). As for Cao Cao's given name of Cao (操), we can only speculate as to why he might have been given this name.  We know what the possible meanings are, but not necessarily which meaning Cao Cao's parents had intended when naming their son.  -- A-cai (talk) 12:55, 11 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Considering Cao Cao's zi was 孟德, the ming 操 should had similar meaning virtue.--刻意(Kèyì) 13:57, 11 January 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Keyi (talk • contribs)


 * An excellent observation. Although, I'm not sure there is a way to verify that.  -- A-cai (talk) 14:03, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi, as a non chinese-speaker I was just wondering, are his first and last names pronounced the same? because they're spelt differently in chinese, so is there a difference that just doesn't come out in English translations, or are both characters pronounced the same. 125.237.102.165 (talk) 11:22, 4 October 2012 (UTC)


 * The pronunciations are similar, except in different tones. The name is pronounced Cáo Cāo in pinyin. 220.255.1.82 (talk) 17:20, 4 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Agreed. Even if same character you would soften the second Cao to first tone.Jobberone (talk) 09:03, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

Cousins
It's mentioned that Cao Cao's father, Cao Song, was originally a Xiahou, and as such Xiahou Dun and Xiahou Yuan were Cao Cao's cousins? Would this be first cousins, or more distant? If Cao Ren was also a first cousin, this would mean that Cao Cao and Ren, and Xiahou Dun and Yuan were all related paternally, ie. their fathers were brothers. Is this the case? And does anybody know if Cao Ren was related by blood to Cao Cao? 03:12, 19 September 2005 (UTC)


 * It's impossible to tell how Cao Song, if truly a Xiahou, was related to fathers of Xiahou Dun, Xiahou Yuan and Cao Ren. If Cao Song was truly adopted into the Cao clan, it'd mean that Cao Cao was related to Cao Ren (and the other Caos) only by name. Anyway in practice, both the Xiahou and Cao clans were considered nei qin, literally "one's own relatives", and the pillars of Cao Cao's power.


 * "夏侯、曹氏，世為婚姻，故惇、淵、仁、洪、休、尚、真等並以親舊肺腑，貴重于時，左右勳業，咸有效勞. " &mdash; 三國志卷九·諸夏侯曹傳


 * --Plastictv 07:05, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Alternate links
There is a song about him, so I placed them (there's an album, too, but at this time, has not be created (as in the article).-- Tdxi a  ng  陈 鼎 翔  (Talk)  Contributions Contributions Chat with Tdxiang on IRC! 09:31, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Family templates
I plan to use templates to reduce duplicating the family trees from one page to another but I found that it is difficult to Any comments?--Skyfiler 05:08, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
 * display a tree using a table
 * display relationships between tree nodes

This template is sort of raw. See de:Vorlage:Navigationsleiste Cao-Familie, which I created yesterday. --Sarazyn • TALK • DE 08:58, 2 May 2006 (UTC) This solved part of the questions, but it is still hard understand the relationships from the table. Maybe we need to use nested lists —Preceding unsigned comment added by Skyfiler (talk • contribs) Signature added by Sarazyn

Fact/Fiction
I think in an encyclopedia we need to separate facts from fictions. Several events or incidents in the main article are heavily influenced by the novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms and are either presented incorrectly, have important facts omitted, or have fictions presented as facts. We need to go by the actual official historical records here.

I will be attempting to revise the whole article after I finish the Three Kingdoms Main article and a few Samurai articles. Allan Lee 17:49, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
 * There's also an increasingly popular caricature of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. We'll probably be receiving a lot of nonsense in this article, along with the traditional Romance of the Three Kingdoms fabrications. Take care. Aran|heru|nar 13:37, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Konami
Trimming of the 'modern reference section to tone down the Konami propaganda. The presence of the long winded part on the video game character here is misleading, besides it already has its own page.88.162.116.24 08:45, 19 July 2007 (UTC)
 * That page will probably wind up being deleted before too long. Not to mention that the modern references are in regard to cultural interpretations of historical Chinese figures of which these articles represent. Not only this, the information you've deleted is in regards to possibly the single most largely influential Three Kingdoms-based media ever, possibly even surpassing the Romance of the Three Kingdoms novel itself in present day popular culture outside of Asia.  Regardless of your personal dislike or apathy towards the gaming medium, this is still a significant addition, to say the least. Gamer Junkie 12:29, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Image of Cao Cao
The image does not have any information as to its source. Even if the original artist isn't known, the image had to have come from "somewhere." The metadata shows it was created or edited in PhotoshopCS. If the image can be traced to a specific source (even if it was edited), it should state that source. Without the source, it shouldn't be included here as it could likely be original artwork. ++Arx Fortis 18:11, 25 September 2007 (UTC)
 * The original uploader would know about this more than any of us here. Try contacting him. _dk 00:45, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately the uploader is not linked to the image (unless there's a way to track him/her down that isn't apparent on the image's page). There is no page for Jonathan Groß.  In the interim, I have contact the person who added it to this article (who may or may not be the original uploader). ++Arx Fortis 06:15, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I think Jonathan Groß goes under the name User:Sarazyn on English Wikipedia. _dk 06:24, 26 September 2007 (UTC)


 * It looks like a woodblock print image from a Ming or Qing era book. Then again, who's to say? One thing is for certain, though. It is not contemporary, although the Wei Dynasty did have painted portraits of anonymous people (or tomb occupants?) such as this picture to the right of a fresco found in a Wei Dynasty tomb of Luoyang.-- Pericles of Athens  Talk 10:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

New poem translation
I want to add a new translation for one of his very well known poem under the Poetry section. It's the "短歌行" or "Short poetry style." Personally, I like it 10x more than "Though the Tortoise Lives Long" and I think many would agree with me. Because through "短歌行", he opened a window and allow people to peak inside on what he was thinking at that time. What do you guys think? TheAsianGURU (talk) 08:39, 7 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, please. This poem, in my opinion, is Cao Cao's signature work of poetry. It's featured in Red Cliff and other adaptations of the Three Kingdoms. _LDS (talk) 04:20, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
 * OK, so if there is no contest to the motion, then I will add it in a few days. TheAsianGURU (talk) 20:40, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Is there any way you can compress the poems part? It's taking up a lot of space. _LDS (talk) 09:05, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
 * I was thinking that might be a problem also. I don't think we should compress a poem. How about I can reduce the size to "100%"? TheAsianGURU (talk) 00:44, 9 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Alright. _LDS (talk) 00:59, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

I've a suggestion for you. Why not move the poems to another article called Poems by Cao Cao and leave a link on this page? You can create a section on this page about Cao Cao's poems, regarding their influence on Chinese poetry, literary analysis etc. Over here, you can elaborate more on the significance of his poems, rather than occupying much space with the full poems. _LDS (talk) 05:38, 12 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Full poems are more suitable for Wikisource rather than Wikipedia. I believe one sample poem is enough and there isn't a need to have an article specifically about his poems. _dk (talk) 09:20, 12 December 2009 (UTC)
 * If everybody thinks 1 poem is enough, then it's OK with me to remove the 1 in order to save space. TheAsianGURU (talk) 19:26, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

King or Prince
I've changed Cao Cao's title of "King of Wei" to "Prince of Wei". I think "Prince" is a better translation than "King" for "王" in this case. In ancient China, before the Qin Dynasty, "King" was used for the sovereign ruler in the Shang and Zhou dynasties. After Qin Shi Huang first used the title of Huangdi (Emperor), in subsequent dynasties, the sovereign ruler of a united China has always been referred to as "Emperor" instead of "King". I think "King" should only be reserved as a title for a sovereign monarch. Cao Cao was given a title of nobility, so "Prince" would be more appropriate. _LDS (talk) 04:20, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
 * See Kings of the Han Dynasty. Generally, those of the house of Liu are Princes, those that are not are Kings. _dk (talk) 05:47, 26 November 2009 (UTC)


 * I see, so I guess King of Wu would be Sun Quan's title before he became the emperor of Wu. What about Liu Bei? He's from the ruling house of Liu, so should he be addressed as Prince of Hanzhong or King of Hanzhong? The WikiProject Three Kingdoms page uses King of Hanzhong. _LDS (talk) 10:08, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Liu Bei's title was self-proclaimed and not hereditary, so King of Hanzhong is appropriate. _dk (talk) 10:23, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Which wife in the Tomb
The News articles state it was his Empress who was entombed with him, which wife are they referring to? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.194.26.172 (talk) 16:55, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Probably Empress Dowager Bian. According to Sanguo Zhi, she was buried with Cao Cao. _dk (talk) 01:47, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
 * But the elder woman in the tomb was supposedly in her 40s, Bian was supposed to have died when she was 70. Hmm. _dk (talk) 03:21, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Tomb contradiction?
Does the discovery of the new tomb which apparently contained "250 articles of artifacts including gold, silver, and pottery," contradict the statement that "His will instructed that he be buried in a commoner's garments and without burial artifacts"? I suppose that his will could have been ignored... --Jfruh (talk) 16:57, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Huh, the sources changed to say the tombs had no gold and jade treasures. I'll reflect that on the article. _dk (talk) 03:19, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
 * There is no way this can be "confirmed" as of yet as "Cao Cao's tomb". People jumped on the story too quickly and now there is all sorts of doubt coming from everywhere. Just look at these videos on Sina. We need to re-edit the section accordingly. Colipon+ (Talk) 15:59, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

verbage problem
"unscrupulous depictions of Cao Cao": This means the people doing the depicting are unscrupulous. While you might believe that is true, if you meant to say that Cao Cao was seen as unscrupulous, you need to say "depictions of Cao Cao as unscrupulous." 71.163.117.143 (talk) 17:50, 23 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your suggestion, this has been acted on. In the future though, you are encouraged to make the change yourself :) _dk (talk) 02:20, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

What
What the hell happened to this article? I've read it periodically and it used to be pretty good. Now it's in broken unpunctuated English. Chinese labor camp refugees, please stay away from this article. Cao Cao is too great a man to have his article stained by your woeful ineptitude. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.170.192.215 (talk) 17:48, 22 October 2014 (UTC)