Zhou Yu

Zhou Yu (Chinese: 周瑜, pronunciation) (175–210), courtesy name Gongjin (Chinese: 公瑾), was a Chinese military general. He served under the warlords Sun Ce and later Sun Quan in the late Eastern Han dynasty. Zhou Yu played a leading role in defeating the numerically superior forces of the northern warlord Cao Cao at the Battle of Red Cliffs in late 208, and again at the Battle of Jiangling in 209. Zhou Yu's victories served as the bedrock of Sun Quan's regime, which in 222 became Eastern Wu. Zhou Yu did not live to see Sun Quan's enthronement, however, as he died at the age of 35 in 210 while preparing to invade Yi Province.

In the 14th-century novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which has greatly shaped Zhou Yu’s popular image, he is portrayed as a brilliant and dashing yet temperamentally insecure figure, marked by his jealousy toward Zhuge Liang.