His ancestral name was Ji (姬), given name Song (宋), and Duke Ding was his posthumous title.
Efforts of Confucius, who served as Duke Ding's Minister of Crime (大司寇), to curb the power of the Three Huan were met with failure.
Eventual political differences and externally-fomented discord caused Confucius to go on exile, seeking to realize his ambitions elsewhere.
Qi surrendered Yun a year later, in spring 503 BC, and Yang Hu occupied it as his own base of power.
The first part of the coup involved assassinating Jisun Si while offering him ceremonial toasts at the Pu Gardens (蒲圃) outside of Qufu, the capital of Lu on 9 September, 502 BC.
Yang Hu put the capital guard on high alert and instructed them to arrive at the Pu Gardens on the day after the planned assassination.
The Mengsun clan had prepared for the coup by stationing three hundred strong workers at the compound in the guise of working on the building.
Now this Yang Hu enjoyed favor with the Ji lineage, yet he was going to kill [Viscount Huan of Jisun] in order to act against the interests of the domain of Lu and seek acceptance here.
Eventually, however, Shusun Zhouchou managed to kill Gongruo Miao by accepting a groom's advice and have him pass through the court holding a sword, piquing Gongruo Miao's interest in it, and thrusting the sword into him after presenting it to him blade first.
According to the Records of the Grand Historian, Duke Ding made Confucius the governor of a minor town (中都宰) in 501 BC.
The Shusun clan, having recently experienced a rebellion making used of the walls of Hou, voluntarily razed them.
As the Jisun clan began to raze the walls of Bi, Gongshan Buniu and Shusun Zhe, who had rebelled against the Jisun clan four years prior but managed to flee to Bi, rebelled again in defiance, but were soon defeated and forced to flee to Qi.