Pei Ji (Late Tang)

Pei Ji (裴垍) (died 811), courtesy name Hongzhong (弘中), was an official of the Chinese dynasty Tang Dynasty, serving as a chancellor during the reign of Emperor Xianzong.

It is not known when Pei Ji was born, but it is known that his family was from Jiang Prefecture (絳州, in modern Yuncheng, Shanxi). HIs biography in the Old Book of Tang gave no immediate ancestors' names, but indicated that he was the seventh-generation descendant of the chancellor Pei Judao, who had served during Emperor Ruizong's first reign. His biography in the New Book of Tang also gave no immediate ancestors' names, but the table of the chancellors' family trees in the New Book of Tang disavowed that he was a descendant of Pei Judao's — instead indicating that his seventh-generation ancestor had a similar name, Pei Shidao (裴師道), and listing his father as Pei Yu (裴昱) and indicating that Pei Yu was a county magistrate.

Pei Ji passed the imperial examinations when he was young. During the middle of the Zhenyuan era (785-805) of Emperor Ruizong's great-great-grandson Emperor Dezong, there was a special examination in which Emperor Dezong sought criticism of his government, and Pei received the highest score on the examination. He was thereafter made the sheriff of Meiyuan County (美原, in modern Weinan, Shaanxi). After his term of service was complete, many military governors (Jiedushi) invited him to serve on staff, but he declined all of their invitations. He later served as Jiancha Yushi (監察御史), a low-level imperial censor, before being promoted to the higher censor title of Dianzhong Shiyushi (殿中侍御史); he later served as Kaogong Yuanwailang (考功員外郎), a low-level official at the ministry of rites (禮部, Libu). When then-minister of civil service affairs, Zheng Xunyu, requested that Pei be in charge of the poetry portion of the imperial examinations, it was said that Pei scored the examinations properly and did not allow powerful individuals to influence him.

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