Sun Tzu Sun Tzu Sun Tzu (; ; also rendered as Sunzi) was a Chinese general, military strategist, writer, and philosopher who lived in the Eastern Zhou period of ancient China. Sun Tzu is traditionally credited as the author of "The Art of War", a widely influential work of military strategy that has affected both Western and East Asian philosophy and military thinking. His works focus much more on alternatives to battle- such as stratagem, delay, the use of spies, and alternatives to war itself- the making and keeping of alliances, the uses of deceit, and a willingness to submit, at least
Sun Tzu most of the notable figures from the Spring and Autumn period. The name "Sun Wu" () does not appear in any text prior to the "Shiji", and may have been a made-up descriptive cognomen meaning "the fugitive warrior": the surname "Sun" can be glossed as the related term "fugitive" ("xùn" ), while "Wu" is the ancient Chinese virtue of "martial, valiant" ("wǔ" ), which corresponds to Sun Tzu's role as the hero's "doppelgänger" in the story of Wu Zixu. The only historical battle attributed to Sun Tzu, the Battle of Boju, has no record of him fighting in that battle.