Zhou Ji (Chinese: 周岌) was a Chinese warlord of the late Tang dynasty who seized control of Zhongwu Circuit (忠武, headquartered in modern Xuchang, Henan) in 880, briefly submitted to the agrarian rebel Huang Chao's new state of Qi, and later returned the Tang fold, controlling Zhongwu until he was forced to abandon it in 884 due to an attack by Lu Yanhong.
As a result of Zhou's mutiny, Qi Kerang the military governor of Taining Circuit (泰寧, headquartered in modern Jining, Shandong), feared that Zhou would ambush him, and thus abandoned his position at Ru Prefecture (汝州, in modern Pingdingshan, Henan) and returned to Taining, causing the various circuits' troops gathered at Yin River to also abandon their positions.
[3] Faced with the Huang threat, the imperial government was unable to act against Zhou and almost immediately commissioned him as the military governor of Zhongwu.
Huang was thereafter able to capture both Luoyang and the imperial capital Chang'an, forcing then-reigning Emperor Xizong to flee to Chengdu.
[4] After Huang Chao captured Chang'an around the new year 881 and declared himself the emperor of a new state of Qi, Zhou Ji submitted to him.
Yang Fuguang subsequently gathered 8,000 soldiers from Zhongwu and divided them into eight corps, commanded by the officers Lu Yanhong, Jin Hui (晉暉), Wang Jian, Han Jian, Zhang Zao (張造), Li Shitai (李師泰), and Pang Cong (龐從), and took them on the campaign against Huang.
They thus sought aid from one of the main contributors of the Tang campaign to recapture Chang'an, Li Keyong the military governor of Hedong Circuit (河東, headquartered in modern Taiyuan, Shanxi).