The Forbidden City
The residence of the emperors for nearly five hundred years, from the Ming
Dynasty (1368-1644) to the Qing Dynasty (1644 - 1911).
The imperial Court for ceremonies and rituals, births and deaths, banquets and processions.
FORBIDDEN CITY
Gates, walls and moat
Contains 9,999 rooms.
Is surrounded by ten-foot-high walls.
Crowned by four observation
watchtowers and flanked by a deep
moat.
Its layout is based on a Chinese
cosmic diagram.
Watchtower
Meridian Gate (The main gate built in 1420)
Gate of Supreme Harmony. The square links the two gates.
Halls of Harmony
FORBIDDEN CITY
The Hall of Supreme Harmony (Taihedian)
The throne, for important ceremonies: for
crowning princes, birthdays, military
expeditions.
The Hall of Middle Harmony
(Zhonghedian), for receiving officials,
meetings.
The Hall of Preserving Harmony
(Baohedian), for banquets and
interviews.
Halls of Peace
FORBIDDEN CITY
Hall of Heavenly Peace, front
chamber. Emperors attended state
affairs daily here.
Hall of Union and Peace, keeping 25
jade seals of the imperial court monarchial
authority.
Hall of Earthly Peace, empress residence.
The map
History
THE FORBIDDEN CITY (1)
The Forbidden City was built in the
Ming Dynasty, of the Yongle period
(1406 - 1420 AD). Many of the
buildings of the Palace have been
repaired and rebuilt, but their basic
form and layout remain in their
original state.
The Forbidden City witnessed the
Qing Dynasty, from the entry into the
city led by Li Sicheng to the pinnacle
of artistic creativity under Qianlong,
to the decline of the dynasty and the
abdication of the last Emperor
Xuantong in 1912.
History
THE FORBIDDEN CITY (2)
• The Qing Dynasty emperors were
descended from the Jurchen horsemen
of the northeast of China.
• After the decline of the preceding
Ming dynasty and the last Ming
emperor's suicide, the Manchus
occupied Beijing and conquered
China.
• The majority of the Chinese
population, the Han, thus were under
foreign rule for the next three
centuries.
• The Manchus successfully held on to
their power by adopting Han customs
while preserving their own superior
horsemanship along with the Manchu
dress.
End of Ming and beginning of Qing
THE FORBIDDEN CITY (3)
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While the Jurchen transformed their social and military organization north of the
Great Wall, China to the south faced serious crises. In the 1620s and 1630s, starving
peasants struggled to survive by scraping edible bark and by selling their children
into servitude.
Joined by underpaid soldiers, peasants formed bands to raid towns for food. One of
the leaders was Li Zicheng (Li Tzu-ch’eng).
In 1644 Li declared a new dynasty, seized the capital of Beijing and designated
himself emperor.
To avoid the disgrace of capture, the Ming emperor, Chongzhen, hanged himself. A
Ming general invited the Manchus to help fight the rebel Li.
Taking advantage of the power vacuum, the Manchus captured Beijing from Li
Zicheng in 1644 and took control of China.
In 1645 they issued orders that made their domination clear: They commanded all
Chinese males to shave the front of their heads and to wear a Manchu-style pigtail.
The Manchus took over the Ming capital of Beijing as their administrative center. At
the time, the city had a population of around one million, which included 10,000
government officials and numerous clerks.
History
Kangxi (Important Ruler)
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The early Qing dynasty owed its success to three extraordinary emperors, who ruled
in succession from 1654 to 1796.
Emperor Kangxi (K’ang-hsi) was enthroned in 1661, at the age of 7. At age 13 he
shrewdly got rid of the regents who were supervising him.
In 1670 Kangxi issued the Sacred Edict, which consisted of 16 moral maxims, based
on Confucian teachings. He was a Manchu, and an educated, moral leader of Chinese
Confucian values.
Emperor Kangxi sponsored several ambitious literary projects. Kangxi made it widely
known that he not only endorsed the cultural values of the Chinese but had also
mastered them. Indeed, through ambitious projects, he showed that he could
outperform his Chinese predecessors:
– He held a special examination to recruit 50 scholars to write the history of the
Ming dynasty.
– He set other scholars on a dictionary (Kangxi zidian) that contained entries for
nearly 50,000 Chinese characters.
– He sponsored the compilation of a library catalog of 10,000 volumes, the Gujin
tushu jicheng, which was published shortly after his death.
History
Yongzheng (Important Ruler)
• Kangxi’s son, Emperor Yongzheng,
reigned from 1723 to 1735, but
accomplished much, especially in
strengthening the powers of the
monarchy.
• He did this by
–setting up an inner core of advisers called the
Grand Council
–developing a secret system of memoranda that
bypassed regular bureaucratic channels
–warning all scholars and officials against
forming factions or political alliances.
These measures increased imperial
power at the expense of the officials.
History
Qianlong (Important Ruler)
Emperor Qianlong (Ch’ien-lung) reigned
from 1736 to 1796.
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He combined his father’s authoritarianism
with his grandfather’s support of culture.
He sponsored an enormous literary
enterprise that both benefited scholars and
kept them under his control. This was the
compilation of the Siku quanshu (The
Complete Library of the Four Treasuries)
These projects provided scholars with
rewarding work, but they were also used
by the court to find and destroy all books
considered harmful to the empire.
Decline of the Qing
Qianlong’s death in 1799 marks the end of the era of
Qing success. Causes include:
• Corruption
• Over population and the breakdown in government
administration. The population grew from 100
million in 1644 to 430 million in 1850. The number of
government officials, however, remained constant.
The dynasty was ended by Xinhai Revolution led by Dr.
Sun Yentsen in 1911.
Foreign Invasions
• Qianlong poorly understood the changes in the
world beyond China.
• Chinese trade was limited to one port—Canton. The
conflict between British trade ambitions and
China’s policy of seclusion resulted in:
• The First Opium War (1840-42) that required
China to:
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open up five ports.
pay an indemnity of $21 million to the British.
hand over the island of Hong Kong to the British.
legalize the importation of opium.
The Second Opium War (1856-1860)
• Foreigners took advantage of mishaps to increase their
demands for concessions from the Chinese.
• In 1860 British and French troops occupied Beijing,
forced the emperor to flee to his summer residence to the
north of the Great Wall, and burned and looted the
magnificent Summer Palace outside Beijing.
Taiping Tianguo
• Much economic suffering and social unrest followed the
Opium Wars.
• The government had to pay huge indemnities to foreign
countries; it lacked funds for social welfare and public
works.
• At the mid-19th century, several rebellions (Nien, Muslim)
ripped through the country, among which was the Taiping
(“Great Peace”) Rebellion (1850-1864).
– It started in the economically depressed south under the leadership
of Hong Xiuquan.
– Combining Chinese and Christian beliefs into a revolutionary social
program, Hong founded his Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace in
Nanjing.
– The rebellion devastated 16 provinces and nearly brought about the
collapse of the Qing dynasty.
– These rebellions resulted in the deaths of between 20 million and 30
million people.
Empress Dowager
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Cixi (Tz’u-hsi)
Mother of the Tongzhi (T’ung-chih) Emperor
Regent when the emperor was enthroned as an
infant. Upon his death at the age of 18, she had her
nephew made emperor, while she remained
regent.
Ruled China for almost 50 years.
Chinese scholar-officials tried to revive the dynasty
by the “Self-strengthening Movement.”
– Modernized China’s military forces and manufactured
Western-style steamships and weapons.
– Set up textile mills, coal mines, iron factories, railroads,
and telegraph and electric companies.
– Set up schools for learning Western languages and
science.
Foreign Invasions
China’s territory shrank
• The French took Annam (northern Vietnam) in 1885.
• Germany took over parts of the Shandong (Shantung)
peninsula in 1897.
• The Russians encroached upon Sinkiang. They
annexed parts of the Liaodong Peninsula in 1898.
• In 1874 the Japanese raided Taiwan. Japan occupied
the Ryukyu Islands and then began to encroach upon
Korea.
• In 1894 China went to war with Japan over Korea and
suffered another humiliating defeat. The Treaty of
Shimonoseki (1895) ended Korea’s tributary
relationship with China and forced China to:
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pay a costly indemnity to Japan,
cede to the Japanese the island of Taiwan,
open up several ports to foreign trade, and
allow Japanese to build factories in China.
The Open Door Policy & Yi he Tuan
• The Western powers agreed upon the Open Door
Policy, which guaranteed them equal rights to
trade in China, and further increased their
commercial opportunities in China.
• The 1900-01 Boxer Rebellion.
– practiced martial arts with the belief that,
being possessed by spirits, they had a magical
invulnerability to weapons.
– opposed foreign influence in China, destroyed
signs of foreign influence such as railways and
churches.
Result: the Chinese government agreed
to pay to the foreign allies,
to destroy several Chinese forts,
to allow foreign troops to control the railway
stretching from Tianjin (Tientsin) to Beijing.
Social Structures
The social hierarchy under the
emperor was divided into four
levels.
– The descendents, who inherited Social titles.
– The civil bureaucrats (scholar-officials), who earned
their positions by passing a sequence of civil service
examinations.
– Well-to-do educated men, who had passed or hoped
to pass examinations but had no official position.
– Peasants, 80-90 percent of the population.
Women were subordinate to men. “Only women who
lacked literary talent were virtuous.”
EDUCATION
• In theory, anyone who had mastered the classics
of Confucius could take the civil service
examinations, earn office, and achieve honor.
• In practice, members of wealthy families had the
best opportunities to prepare for and pass the
civil service examinations.
• In 1713 Emperor Yongzheng
specifically ordered that elementary
schools for poor boys be established
throughout the empire.
• Education was also an instrument of
socialization.
Arts and
Literature
• Hong lou meng (1792; The Dream of the
Red Chamber, 1929), by Cao Xueqin. It
portrays the decline of an elite and
extensive family.
• , a satire that pokes fun at the civil
service examination system and many
social customs.
IMPERIAL
DRESS
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The color yellow and the dragon emblem are an exclusive affirmation of
power.
Emperor Qing’s dress adhered to a rigid code that specified clothing for every
occasion.
Requisite silks, gauzes, satins, brocades and damasks of the highest quality
were woven in the imperial weaving factory in Suzhou, and the clothing was
sumptuously embroidered and embellished with gold, pearls and precious
stones.
The empress had her own wardrobe designed for various occasions. Formal
occasions demanded a ceremonial dress, a crown, a single-strand pearl
necklace, a double-strand coral necklace, and earrings made of gold and
pearls.
Useful web site
• http://www.yutopian.com/history/qing.html