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The War of the Eight Princes, Rebellion of the Eight Kings, or Rebellion of the Eight Princes was a series of civil wars among kings/princes of the Chinese Jin dynasty from 291 to 306 AD. The key point of contention in these conflicts was the regency over the developmentally disabled Emperor Hui of Jin. The name of the conflict is derived from the biographies of the eight princes collected in Chapter 59 of the Book of Jin.
The "War of the Eight Princes" is somewhat of a misnomer: rather than one continuous conflict, the War of the Eight Princes saw intervals of peace interposed with short and intense periods of internecine conflict. At no point in the whole conflict were all of the eight princes on one side of the fighting. The literal Chinese translation, Disorder of the Eight Kings, may be more appropriate in this regard.
While initial conflicts were relatively minor and confined to the imperial capital of Luoyang and its surroundings, the scope of the war expanded with each new prince who entered the struggle. The numerous tribal groups in the north and northwest who had been heavily drafted into the military then exploited the chaos to seize power. At its conclusion, the war devastated the Jin heartlands in northern China, and ushered in the era of Wu Hu uprisings that ended Western Jin, causing centuries of warfare between northern barbarian kingdoms and southern Chinese dynasties.