Two Qiaos

The Two Qiaos of Jiangdong (traditional Chinese: 江東二喬; simplified Chinese: 江东二乔; pinyin: Jiāngdōng èr Qiáo) were two sisters of the Qiao family who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty. Their names were not recorded in history, so in later times they are simply referred to as Da Qiao (lit. "older Qiao") and Xiao Qiao (lit. "younger Qiao"). They were from Huan County (皖縣), Lujiang Commandery (廬江郡), which is in present-day Anqing, Anhui. Da Qiao married the warlord Sun Ce, who established the foundation of the state of Eastern Wu in the Three Kingdoms period; Xiao Qiao was married to the general Zhou Yu, who served Sun Ce and his successor Sun Quan.

In fiction

The Qiao sisters are featured as characters in the historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo Yanyi) by Luo Guanzhong, which romanticises the historical events before and during the Three Kingdoms period. In the novel, the Chinese character for "Qiao" in their names, '橋', is replaced with '喬'.

In the novel, the Qiao sisters were the daughters of Qiao Xuan. Zhou Yu's biography in the historical text Records of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguozhi) did not state the name of the Qiao sisters' father, who was simply referred to as "Qiao Gong" (橋公; lit. "Elder Qiao"). Historically, Qiao Xuan died in 183, while the Qiao sisters married Sun Ce and Zhou Yu in 200, so it was not possible that Qiao Xuan was still living when the marriages took place. Therefore, it is highly unlikely that Qiao Xuan was the "Qiao Gong" mentioned in Zhou Yu's biography.