Welcome to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms podcast.

This is a supplemental episode.

In this episode, we are going to bid farewell to one of the novel's major characters

as we close the book on Guan Yu,

who lost his territory and his head in episode 97.

As I have done in the past, when a major character exits the narrative,

I'm going to cover some of the similarities and differences between Guan Yu,

the fictional character and Guan Yu,

the historical figure. This is no easy task, since so much of his real life has receded

into the background, overshadowed by the fictionalized version. There's a lot to unwind here,

so let's just start from the beginning.

And right at the beginning is where we have our first major discrepancy between history and fiction.

So you know all that talk about the oath of brotherhood in the peach orchard between Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Jiangfei.

Well, there's nothing in the historical records that indicates this

actually happened. Now, according to the records of the Three Kingdoms, the historical text on which

the novel is based, the three of them were close like brothers. For instance, in episode two,

the novel talked about how the three of them slept in the

same bed, and when Liu Bei was sitting in public, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei would stand next to him

all day long. All of that came straight from the records of the three kingdoms, but there's no

mention in the historical records about the three of them actually pledging an oath to be brothers.

But you know, it's a small leap from like brothers to actually brothers,

to being the benchmark by which all fraternal bonds are measured.

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