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Qianlong Emperor

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Emperor Qianlong (乾隆 Qiánlōng) (Wade-Giles Ch'ien-Lung) (born Hongli, September 25, 1711 – February 7, 1799) was the fifth emperor of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and the fourth Qing emperor to rule over China which formed part of the Manchu Empire.[1] The fourth son of the Yongzheng Emperor, he reigned officially from October 18, 1735 to February 9, 1796, at which point he abdicated in favor of his son, the Jiaqing Emperor - a filial act in order not to reign longer than his grandfather, the illustrious Kangxi Emperor. Despite his retirement, however, he retained ultimate power until his death in 1799. Although his early years saw the continuity of an era of prosperity in China, he was of unrelentingly conservative and sinocentric attitude. As a result, the Qing Dynasty's decline began later in his reign.

Early years

During the first year of reign

There are myths and legends that say Hongli was actually a Han and not of Manchu descent, whilst there were some that say Hongli is only half Manchu and half Han Chinese descent. Nevertheless, looking at historical records, Hongli was adored both by his grandfather, the Kangxi Emperor and his father, the Yongzheng Emperor. Some historians argue that the main reason why Kangxi Emperor appointed Yongzheng as his successor was because Qianlong was his favourite grandson. He felt that Hongli's mannerisms were very close to his own. As a teenager he was very capable in martial arts, and possessed a high literary ability.

After his father's succession in 1722, Hongli became the Prince Bao (宝亲王/寶親王). Like many of his uncles, Hongli entered into a battle of succession with his older half-brother Hongshi, who had the support of a large faction of court officials, as well as Yinsi, the Prince Lian. For many years the Yongzheng Emperor did not allow the position of Crown Prince, but many speculated his favoring of Hongli. Hongli went on inspection trips to the south, and was known to be an able negotiator and enforcer. He was also chosen as chief regent on occasions, when his father was away from the capital.

Ascension to the throne

Even before Hongli's succession was read out to the assembled court, it was widely known who the new emperor would be. The young Hongli had been a favorite of his grandfather, Kangxi, and his father alike; Yongzheng had entrusted a number of important ritual tasks to him while Hongli was still a prince, and included him in important court discussions of military strategy. Hoping to avoid repetition of the succession crisis that had tainted his own accession to the throne, he had the name of his successor placed in a sealed box secured behind the tablet over the throne in the Palace of Heavenly Purity (Qianqing Gong 乾清宫). The name in the box was to be revealed to other members of the imperial family in the presence of all senior ministers only upon the death of the Emperor. Yongzheng died suddenly in 1735, the will was taken out and read out before the entire Qing Court, and Hongli became the 4th Manchu Emperor of China. He took the Reign title of Qianlong (乾隆), meaning strong/heavens (qian); prosperous (long), or put together, the Era of Strong Prosperity.

Frontier Wars

Further information: Ten Great Campaigns
Military costume of Emperor Qianlong. Musée de l'Armée, Paris.
The Puning Temple, built in 1755 to commemorate Qianlong's victory over the Dzungars in the west.

The Qianlong Emperor was a successful military leader, presiding over a huge consolidation in the territory controlled by the Qing dynasty. This was made possible not only by Chinese strength but also by the disunity and declining strength of the Inner Asian peoples. Under Qianlong, Chinese Turkestan was incorporated into the Qing dynasty's rule and renamed Xinjiang, while to the West, Ili was conquered and garrisoned. The Qing also dominated Outer Mongolia after inflicting a final defeat on the Western Mongols. Throughout this period there were continued Mongol interventions in Tibet and a reciprocal spread of Tibetan Buddhism in Mongolia.

Qianlong again sent armies into Tibet and firmly established the Dalai Lama as ruler, with a Qing resident and garrison to preserve Chinese suzerainty. Further afield, military campaigns against the Burmese, Nepalese, and Gurkhas forced these peoples to submit and send tribute.

The circumstances in Vietnam were not as successful. In 1787 the last Le king fled Vietnam and formally requested that he be restored to his throne in Thanglong (Hanoi today). The Qianlong Emperor agreed and sent a large army into Vietnam to remove the Tay Son (peasant rebels who had captured all of Vietnam). The capital, Thanglong, was conquered in 1788 but a few months later, the Chinese army was defeated in a surprise attack during Tet by Nguyen Hue, the second and most capable of the three Tay Son brothers. The Chinese gave formal protection to the Le emperor and his family, and would not intervene in Vietnam for another 90 years.

Overall the Qianlong Emperor's military expansion captured millions of square miles and brought into the empire non-Han-Chinese peoples--such as Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyzs, Evenks and Mongols--who were potentially hostile. It was also a very expensive enterprise; the funds in the Imperial Treasury were almost all put into military expeditions.[2] This may have been the cause of the later decline of the dynasty--when faced with a Western threat, the army was unable to develop and upgrade its weapons.

Overall, though the wars were successful, they were not overwhelmingly so. The army declined noticeably and had a difficult time facing some enemies: the Jin Chuan area took 2-3 years to conquer--at first the Qing army were mauled, though Yue Zhongqi later took control of the situation. The battle with the Dzungars was closely fought, and caused heavy losses on both sides.

At the end of the frontier wars, the army had started to weaken significantly. In addition to a more lenient military system, warlords became satisfied with their lifestyles. Since most of the warring had taken place, warlords no longer saw any reason to train their armies, resulting in a rapid military decline by the end of Qianlong's reign. This is the main reason for the military's failure against the White Lotus Sect, at the very end of Qianlong's years.

Artistic achievements

The Qianlong Emperor was also a major patron of the arts. The most significant of his commissions was a catalogue of all important works on Chinese culture, the Siku Quanshu (四庫全書). Produced in 36,000 volumes, containing about 3450 complete works and employing as many as 15,000 copyists, the entire work took some twenty years. It preserved numerous books, but was also intended as a way to ferret out and suppress perceived political opponents. Some 2,300 works were listed for total suppression and another 350 for partial suppression. The aim was to destroy the writings that were anti-Qing or rebellious, that insulted previous barbarian dynasties, or that dealt with frontier or defense problems.

Qianlong was a prolific poet and a collector of ceramics, an art which flourished during his reign; a substantial part of his collection is in the Percival David Foundation in London.

Architecturally, Qianlong took personal interest in the expansion of the Old Summer Palace and supervised the construction of the Xiyanglou, or the western mansion. In the 1750's he commissioned Italian Jesuit Giuseppe Castiglione to design a series of timed waterworks and fountains complete with underground machinery and pipes, for the amusement of the Imperial family. During his reign the Emin Minaret was built in Turfan to commemorate his father.

Later years

In his later years, Qianlong became disillusioned, spoiled with power and glory. With Heshen as the highest ranked minister and most favoured by Qianlong at the time, the day-to-day governance of the country was left in his hands, while Qianlong himself indulged in luxuries and hunting, his favourite pastime. It is widely considered that Heshen caused the Qing government's process of collapse and corruption. When Heshen was killed it was found that he himself was richer than the country's depleted treasury. Qianlong began his reign with about 33,950,000 taels from Yongzheng's period. At the peak of Qing prosperity, around 1775, the treasury reached 73,900,000 taels, a record unmatched by Kangxi or Yongzheng. However, corruption across all levels of government, along with the outlay of over 150,200,000 taels on military expeditions, palace building, personal trips to Jiangnan, the White Lotus Rebellion, opium, and general luxuries spending, nearly emptied the treasury. At the end of his reign in 1796, Qianlong left an exhausted treasury and a weakened 8 Banner Army to his successor, Jiaqing.

The Macartney Embassy

Main article: Macartney Embassy
Emperor Qianlong in his study, painting by Giuseppe Castiglione, 18th century

During the mid-eighteenth century, Qianlong began to face severe pressures from the West to increase foreign trade. Lacking a Ministry of Foreign Affairs further upheld the belief that China was the "central kingdom". Worse still, the proposed cultural exchange between the British Empire at the time and the Qing Empire collapsed when Heshen encouraged Qianlong to maintain the belief that the Qing Empire was the centre of the world and need not pay much attention to the British proposal for trade and cultural exchange. The British trade ambassador at the time, George Macartney, was humiliated when granted an audience with the Qianlong Emperor only to find just an Imperial Edict placed on the Dragon Throne. This announced to him that the Qing Empire had no need for any goods and services that the British could provide and that the British should recognize that the Qing Empire was far greater.In Qianlong's Edict on Trade with Great Britain, the frustrated Emperor cites the term "barbarians" to refer to Macartney's crew, displaying the vital idea in China at the time: that all countries are "peripheral" in comparison to China.[3]

Insistent demands from Heshen and the Qing Court that the British Trade ambassadors should kneel and kowtow to the empty dragon throne worsened matters. The British of course rejected these demands and insisted they would kneel only on one knee and bow to the Dragon throne as they did for their own monarch. This caused uproar in the Qing Empire at that time. The Trade ambassadors were dismissed and told to leave China immediately. They were further told that the Qing Empire had no particular interest in trading with them, with strict orders given to all local governors not to allow the British to carry out any trade or business in China. [4]

In contrast, Isaac Titsingh, the Dutch and VOC emissary in 1795 did not refuse to kowtow. In the year following Mccartney's rebuff, Titsingh and his colleagues were much feted by the Chinese because of what was construed as seemly compliance with conventional court etiquette. [5]

Abdication

The Qianlong Emperor in Armor on Horseback, by Italian Jesuit Giuseppe Castiglione (1688-1766 AD).

In October 1795, Qianlong officially announced that in the spring of the following year he would voluntarily abdicate his throne and pass the crown to his son. It was said that Qianlong had made a promise during the year of his ascension not to rule longer than his grandfather, the Kangxi Emperor.

In anticipation of his abdication, Qianlong decided to move out of the Hall of Mental Cultivation in the Forbidden City, the residence dedicated only for the reigning sovereign, and ordered the construction of his residence in another part of the Forbidden City; however, Qianlong never moved out of the Hall of Mental Cultivation.

Just as Qianlong was not willing to part with his residence, he was also not willing to part with the power that he had exercised for the past 60 years. The elderly Qianlong kept a tight grip on affairs of state and continued to rule, while his son, the Jiaqing Emperor, was kept out of the limelight.

Legends

Qianlong was the son of Chen Yuanlong of Haining. Emperor Kangxi chose the heir to his throne based not just on his son's capability to govern the Empire, but also whether his grandson was of no lesser calibre, to ensure the Manchus' everlasting reign over the country. Yongzheng's own son was a weakling and he surreptitiously arranged for his daughter to be swapped for Chen Yuanlong's son, who became the apple of Kangxi's eye. Thus, Yongzheng got to succeed the throne, and his "son", Hongli, subsequently became Emperor Qianlong. Later, Qianlong went to the southern part of the country four times, he stayed in Chen's house in Haining, leaving behind his calligraphy and also frequently issued imperial decrees making and maintaining Haining as a tax-free state.

However there are major problems with this story being: 1) His eldest surviving son Hongshi was only 7 when Hongli was born far too early to make the drastic choice of replacing a child of royal birth with an outsider (and risking disgrace if not death) 2) Yongzheng had three other princes that survived to adulthood who had the potential of ascending the throne. Indeed given the fact that Hongshi was forced to commit suicide, the story would have been far more logical if he was the adopted child of Yongzheng.

Stories about Qianlong visiting the Jiangnan area disguised as a commoner had been a popular topic for many generations. In total, he has visited Jiang Nan for eight times, as opposed to the Kangxi emperor's 6 inspections.

Family

  • Mother: Empress Xiao Sheng Xian (1692-1777) of the Niuhuru Clan (Chinese: 孝聖憲皇后; Manchu: Hiyoošungga Enduringge Temgetulehe Hūwanghu)

Consorts

Children

Sons

Daughters

See also

References

  1. ^ Laird, Thomas. (2006) The Story of Tibet: Conversations with the Dalai Lama, pp. 202-203. Grove Press. New York. ISBN 978-0-8021-1827-1.
  2. ^ Schirokauer, Conrad & Clark, Donald N. Modern East Asia: A Brief History, 2nd ed. pp. 35. Houghton Mifflin Company. Boston & New York. 2008 ISBN 978-0-618-92070-9.
  3. ^ For a full text of the edict, see Têng, Ssu-yü, and John King Fairbank, eds., China's Response to the West: A Documentary Survey, 1839-1923. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979).
  4. ^ For a conventional account of the audience question, see Alain Peyrefitte, The Immobile Empire, translated by Jon Rotschild (New York: Knopf: Distributed by Random House, 1992.)
    For a critique of the above narrative, see James L. Hevia, Cherishing Men from Afar: Qing Guest Ritual and the Macartney Embassy of 1793.(Durham: Duke University Press, 1995).
    For a discussion on Hevia's book, see exchange between Hevia and Joseph W. Esherick in Modern China 24, no. 2 (1998).
  5. ^ van Braam, A.E. (1797). Voyage de l'ambassade de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales hollandaises, vers l'empereur de la Chine, dans les années 1794 & 1795.
  • Braam, Andreas Everardus van (1795). Voyage de l'ambassade de la Compagnie des Indes Orientales hollandaises, vers l'empereur de la Chine, dans les années 1794 & 1795. Philadelphia: M. L. E. Moreau de Saint-Mery.
  • _____. (1798). An authentic account of the embassy of the Dutch East-India company to the court of the emperor of China in the years 1794-1795. London: Phillips.

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Qianlong Emperor
Born: September 25 1711 Died: February 7 1799
Preceded by Emperor of China
1735-1796 		Succeeded by

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