The legend goes that Sun Tzu was born into minor nobility in what is now Shandong, a part of China north of Shanghai that became famous for Confucius and the really tasty Shandong Chicken. Born "Sun Wu", he was given a good education and like Machiavelli, he wrote a military treatise in order to get noticed and hired by royalty. Unlike Machiavelli, it worked.

Sun Wu expanded his 13 chapter Art of War into 82 chapters and trained the army. Eventually he broke the peace by invading the southern state of Yue. Other conflicts ensured but although his troops were once outnumbered 30,000 to 200,000 he was always victorious. Many successes followed and continued after his death. Some considered his death to be another of his deceptions.

Finally though, the kingdom was defeated several years after his reported death. Just over 100 years later his descendant, Sun Bing, lead troops to victory again and wrote his own treatise. Sun Wu's name was changed to Sun Tzu on the Art of War as a sign of his status a master of philosophy. The "Tzu - " is similarly shared with Lao Tzu - , and Confucius (whose Chinese name is Kon Tzu - ). Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.