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audreydoeskaren · 2 years
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Abridged History of Qing Dynasty Han Women’s Fashion (part 1: Late Ming & Shunzhi Era)
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Intro
Finally got around to writing this series! Couple notes before we begin. I will only discuss civilian fashion and not court dress because 1) Qing court dress is well documented and there are plenty of other people/blogs/articles that explain it better than I ever could 2) court dress doesn’t really count as fashion because it serves ceremonial/religious/political purposes and is not supposed to change. The overwhelming majority of English language information about Qing Dynasty clothing is about court dress and Manchu women’s fashion, so I will be doing a disservice to the era if I continued that line of discussion. It should be noted that most literature on court dress and Manchu women’s fashion is not flawless either; court dress is often flattened to “dragon robes” by white historians despite it not being a legitimate fashion history term, and much information about “Qing Dynasty” Manchu fashion is really about that of the early 20th century, the Republican era. That is outside the scope of discussion for this series. Instead, I would like to shed some light on the life and times of Han women’s fashion during the Qing, something strictly kept out of the canon of Chinese fashion history until very recently.
Before we jump into it, we need some context. Prior to the establishment of the Qing Dynasty, China was ruled by the Ming Dynasty under ethnically Han (majority ethnicity in China nowadays) rulers since 1368. A collection of Jurchen tribes from what is now northeastern China and parts of Siberia, who later called themselves the Manchus, conquered China in 1644. In order to solidify their power, the new Manchu rulers forced Han Chinese men to adopt Manchu style clothing and hairstyles, but Han women were allowed to continue wearing Han style clothing, which is why the second half of the 17th century appears to be the continuation of the late Ming Dynasty aesthetic. 
However, the early Qing was undeniably distinct from the Ming Dynasty, and I will not tolerate anybody calling clothes from this era “Ming style”. It could potentially be considered hanfu, as it was worn by Han women exclusively----something up for the community to decide----but it definitely did not belong to Ming Dynasty proper. Although in the 1640s and 50s some resistance forces in the south (dubbed “Southern Ming”) were still around, it’s not really worthwhile to make the distinction for womenswear, so let’s place it under Qing Dynasty for convenience. I have berated 18th century erasure quite frequently and passionately in the past (and it’s often extended to the 17th century as well), if you have seen any of those posts you would know that Qing Han women’s fashion prior to the 19th century is routinely mislabelled as Ming because it didn’t adhere to 20th century stereotypes about the “Manchuness” of Qing clothing and supposed Chinese backwardness in the colonial imagination of the time. Because of this reason, please do not be surprised if any of the images from the first couple posts of this series appear to be depicting what is commonly considered “Ming Dynasty hanfu”; they do not, they were from the Qing, plain and simple. It’s often simply because people don’t pay enough attention to the dating of artworks.
I will use emperors’ reign years as a guide for eras in this series because oftentimes that’s the most accurate dating that exists for artworks (many are unclear as to the exact year/decade they were made in), though I would recommend using exact dates instead of emperors wherever possible.
Fashion of the Ming-Qing transition
Han women’s fashion of the very early Qing had significant overlap and continuity with the late Ming. I’m not very knowledgeable on the minutiae of Ming Dynasty clothing so do add/correct anything. The standard ensemble for Han Chinese women was the 袄裙 aoqun (alternatively named 衫裙 shanqun) ensemble consisting of a robe and a skirt. In the 1620s and 30s, the cut of the robe was extremely generous, the hem hitting about knee length and the sleeves almost touching the ground. The sleeves of this era (and often throughout Chinese history) were longer than that of the length of the wearer’s arms, meaning that the wearer is required to grab the cuffs of the sleeves in order to facilitate the use of their arms. Many consider this inconvenient nowadays, but keep in mind that these robes with huge sleeves were made for wealthy people who hired servants and didn’t need to do physical labor. Working class people wore shorter, tighter sleeves that could also be held up by a garter. 
The robe had a fitted tall standing collar, as opposed to the cross collar popular in previous centuries. The standing collar in the 1620s and 30s was soft, unstiffened and closed by two 子母扣 zimukou, metal clasp buttons, one at the bottom of the collar where it touched the bodice and one at the middle of the collar. Collars with only one button also existed, and these would be worn folded over. Gold or silver piping on the collar began to be popularized on the collar. Robes were closed at the side under the right armpit, commonly with tie strings. The placket forms a straight diagonal line from the collar to under the armpit. In the 17th century, robes were commonly plain and unicolor, with only brocade/embroidery in the same color. When decorative patterns were used, they were frequently in a repetitive arrangement of small clusters of motifs. Light pastel colors or white were very popular. Undergarments whose cuffs could be seen on the outside were commonly red, providing a contrasting flash of color to the otherwise light and plain ensembles.
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Illustration from the late Ming novel 鸳鸯绦, showing the large sleeves popular at the time.
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Late Ming women’s robe from the Confucius Estate collection.
The skirt was usually of 马面 mamian construction, basically two pleated pieces of fabric with two unpleated sections at the middle each, called 裙门 qunmen, that are sewn onto a waistband with one unpleated section overlapping, creating a wrap skirt. It has ribbons attached to each end of the waistband and was closed by wrapping the skirt around the waist and tying with the ribbons. Throughout much of the Ming Dynasty, mamian skirts were decorated using 裙襕 qunlan, a horizontal row of gold brocade or embroidery across the skirt, whose placement and widths varied depending on the trends of the decade. In the 1620s and 30s, skirts became increasingly simple, and plain white skirts were all the rage. Decorative features like qunlan were frequently relegated to formal dress.
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Illustration for the Chongzhen era novel 醋葫芦. The repetitive decorative patterns could be seen on the robe of the lady to the left.
Women’s hairstyle of this period is referred to as 三绺梳头 or “hair in three sections”, where the front of one’s hair would be divided into three sections, top, left and right, which would then be tied and coiled at the back, sometimes forming an elongated end at the bottom called a 燕尾 or “swallow tail”.
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Late Ming/early Qing painting showing two fashionable women. The flash of red from the under robe is visible.
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Beside the skirt and robe, women could layer a 披风 pifeng on top of the robe. These were equally generous in cut as the robe but had a 直领 zhiling, parallel collar, and were closed by tie strings or bigger decorative clasp buttons at the center front. It usually had a wide facing at the collar, which in the 1620s and 30s were often plain and in the same color as the garment. 
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Mid 17th century portrait. This lady is wearing a plain red robe with gold buttons and piping, blue pifeng and plain white mamian skirt. 
By the 1640s, the width of the sleeves had become smaller, and hairstyles became gradually fuller and more voluminous at the top, beginning the transition to the Kangxi era. The diagonal placket on robes began to be replaced by closures at the center front, often held together by tie strings.
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Section of 浴砚图 by 蓝瑛 Lan Ying and 徐泰 Xu Tai, 1659. We can see the center front closure with tie strings instead of the diagonal placket closing under the right armpit popular in previous eras.
Around this time, robes made of sheer fabric were being popularized as informal loungewear for warmer weather. Sheer robes were not proper enough to be worn outside, but we can catch a glimpse of these robes along with the undergarments beneath in romantic paintings with a domestic setting. The principle women’s undergarment for the upper body remained a 主腰 zhuyao, a tube top-like garment that provided bust support. It could have shoulder straps and was usually closed at the back with tie strings, though closures with cloth buttons became increasingly common throughout the Qing.
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Shunzhi era painting series by Sun Huang (the cover image for this post is from the same series), showing a lady and her maids in lounging clothes, the zhuyao visible under the sheer robe.
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I’m not as knowledgeable about the earlier parts of the Qing Dynasty as the later ones, so as always feel free to correct or add anything to this post :))
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mortonmattd · 11 months
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Amazing Historical Events That Occurred on 4/25🎉 #shorts #history
Welcome to our latest video on the fascinating events that occurred on April 25th in history. From groundbreaking discoveries to tragic endings, this day has seen some incredible moments that have shaped our world. Let's start with one of the most significant events that took place on April 25th, 1507. This was the day when the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller made history by being the first person to use the name "America" on his world map. This was a landmark moment in the history of cartography, and the map is now considered a priceless artifact.
Moving forward to 1607, Captain Edward Maria Wingfield was named President of the Jamestown governing council shortly before he landed in America. This was a critical moment in American history, as it marked the beginning of the establishment of the first permanent English settlement in North America.
April 25th, 1644, saw the tragic end of the last Ming Emperor Chongzhen. Rather than be captured, he chose to hang himself from a tree on Jing Mountain in Beijing, ending the Ming dynasty and paving the way for the Qing dynasty.
In 1792, the guillotine was first used in France to execute Nicolas Pelletier, a notorious highwayman. This event marked the start of a new era in French history, as the guillotine became the primary means of execution during the French Revolution.
Finally, in 1901, New York became the first state to require automobile license plates with a $1 fee. This was the beginning of the regulation of automobiles, which eventually led to the creation of the DMV and the regulations we have in place today.
In conclusion, April 25th has seen some incredible historical moments that have shaped our world. From the discovery of America to the end of an empire, this day has seen it all. Join us for more exciting history lessons in our upcoming videos. Don't forget to like, share, and subscribe to our channel for more content.
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gensokyogarden · 1 year
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This is something I've mentioned here and elsewhere but I don't believe I've made a specific post talking about, so I thought I'd do it here.
The Patchouli and Remilia of this blog have a "default relationship", if that makes sense. That of being each other's wives. Now I should clarify that this blog is a multiship blog so that's not the case when someone is shipping with one of them, it's not like either would cheat on their spouse. I should also clarify that, of course, that's not a relationship I'd force onto anyone else. If you're writing Remilia/Patchouli I'm not going to have mine treat them like they're married (unless you want to I suppose). But, by default, when I'm writing them Remilia and Patchouli are married.
Anyways, with that mentioned I thought I'd write a little bit about how they ended up with one another. Now I will note a bit of canon divergence on my part. Patchouli is stated to be a witch who "lived for 100 years" in her original profile, but I kind of treat her as if her lifespan far exceeded 100 years as you'll see shortly.
Remilia Scarlet was born in Picardy during the reign of Louis XII in 1502. The daughter of Charles of Angouleme making her the younger half-sister of the future King Francis. While Remilia may claim to be a descendant of the famed Vlad Teppes, this is untrue, however she really is of French noble blood.
Well, biologically she was not related to Vlad. Old Vladdy really did become a vampire and the one that bit Remilia may well have been turned by him. Regardless, Remilia scarlet became a vampire in the year 1517, but two years after the coronation of her half-brother. The intention was to gain a pawn close to the king but even then Remilia was too clever to allow herself to be someone's peon. Her sire was dead not long after she convinced him to turn Flandre as well (a decision she questions fairly regularly).
So my Remilia is French, what about Patchouli? Well, narrowing down Patchouli's homeland is a bit tougher. Her magic is based off of Wuxing, the Chinse five elements, but she's also described as a "Eastern Style Western Magician", which implies to me that she herself is European. The way I rectify these two facts is through the idea that Patchouli is herself the daughter of a European magician (as she is a naturally born one) in the service of the Wanli Emperor of Ming. So procured for her remarkable talent.
Being raised in China, Patchouli learned the style of elemental magic practiced there. She, alongside her mother, would enter into the service of the Chongzhen emperor. The Manchu Invasion combined with the peasant uprisings of the 1640s and the death of the Chongzhen emperor forced Patchouli to flee the country entirely. Returning west in the accompaniment of a bodyguard of the former emperor (it's Meiling).
Eventually she would arrive within Europe. By this point Remilia had watched her brother grow old and die of fever, while she remained eternally young. In the fifty years after that, the house descended from her brother would fall from power. Following a brief period of chaos her distant cousins established the House of Bourbon as the ruling family.
Remilia never truly held a title but nonetheless held some sway throughout it all. She and Patchouli first met in the Palace of Versailles. There the "Eastern Style Western Magician" was considered to be just as much a strange curiosity as "Charles's eternally youthful bastard" (as an aside never call Remilia this).
The pair hit it off well. Striking up an immediate friendship as the two oddities of Versailles. What was initially a strange friendship evolved into a deep closeness. Their courting process, in truth, lasted nearly century. It took Remilia a decade to even work up the courage to tell Patchouli she liked her. Given the time and era such a relationship was quite obviously kept a secret but they were eventually wed. At the witching hour, on Remilia's insistence.
The French Revolution was the nail that finally forced them to flee from France and their old lives. It was the time that Remilia took up the surname Scarlet (A reference to her mother). Thankfully she made off with a great degree of royal treasure on her way out. Her ninth cousin Louis wasn't going to need it given what happened.
From there they were vagabonds for a short while. Drifting from the shadows of one court to another for quite some time. This is a headcanon about how Patchy and Remmy met though, so I won't bore you with those details.
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aion-rsa · 4 years
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Mulan And The Chinese Women Warriors of History and Legend
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While American audiences know the story of Mulan through the 1998 animated Disney film and the upcoming live-action reboot, they may not know that the films are based on a Chinese legend. Hua Mulan is a legendary figure whose story was first told in “Ballad of Mulan,” a folksong first transcribed in the 6th century. In the legend, Mulan is a girl who disguises herself as a man and goes to war in place of her father. Mulan fights for many years as part of the army and, after earning much honor and gifts from the emperor, returns home to her family. Only then does she reveal her gender identity.
While Mulan may be the most familiar of woman Chinese warriors (at least to American audiences), she’s only one in a rich history of historical and legendary female heroes in Chinese history. With the live-action adaptation of Mulan releasing on Disney+ this Friday, here are some of the highlights you might encounter when brushing up on your Chinese legends and history—figures who perhaps warrant their own feature film adaptation…
Xun Guan
At thirteen, Xun Guan was already an accomplished martial artist and tactician. Her father, Xun Song, was the governor of Xianyang in the late 200s A.D. One night, when the castle was under siege, Xun Song was ready to lead a force against the opposing soldiers. Convinced that her father leaving the castle would be bad for morale, she proposed that instead she lead a group of elite soldiers out to defeat the enemy. Even though she was only thirteen, Xun Gun had her father’s trust, and he sent her out. Once outside the walls, Xun Guan immediately spotted a weak spot in the enemy’s position, and she and her troops were triumphant against them, successfully allowing the castle to hold out until more reinforcements could arrive.
Pingyang
During much of Pingyang’s lifetime in the early 600s, the emperor, Yangdi, was incompetent, greedy, and vain—he’s become a villain of Chinese history. Pingyang was the daughter of military commander Li Yuan, and became the wife of Chai Shao, the leader of Yangdi’s palace guard. Yangdi decided that Li Yuan was just too good at his job, so he trumped up false charges and had Li Yuan arrested, only to realize that Li Yuan was the only person who could protect Yangdi from people who actually were plotting against him. Yangdi released Li Yuan, but the damage was done: now Li Yuan wanted Yangdi dead, as well. As Li Yuan rebelled, Chai Shao and Pingyang had to decide how both of them could safely support her father; Chai Shao left first to openly join Li Yuan’s rebellion, and Pingyang later escaped on her own, braving the danger because she was confident she could hide in plain sight. 
She journeyed back to her family’s lands and threw open the larders, endearing the people to her and recruiting the first members of what would become known as the Army of the Lady, or the Woman’s Army. As the war continued, Pingyang made alliances and built an army 70,000 strong, keeping them all under a strict code of conduct the prohibited looting, raping, and pillaging. Where the army went, they brought food with them to feed the locals, so they were greeted as liberators. Yangdi dismissed Pingyang as a threat (she was just a woman, after all!), until it was far too late; her forces were unhindered by Yangdi’s troops, and they joined up with Li Yuan and Chai Shao for the final attack on the capital—and, in their victory, the establishment of the Tang Dynasty.
Wu Zetian
In the late 600s, China had a woman emperor. Depending on which historical records you read (the sources tend to be very biased against or very biased toward the empress), she lied, cheated, and murdered her way to the throne—and did more of the same to stay there. She started her imperial career as the favorite concubine of Emperor Taizong. When he died, she married his son, the new emperor, Gaozong. Some sources imply that a romance was going on long before the old emperor’s death; others suggest she was so good at courtly intrigue that Gaozong kept her by his side and ruled equally with her, relying on her political savvy. After Gaozong’s death, their children were in line for the throne; Wu poisoned the eldest, exiled the second, and had plans to manipulate the third and continue to rule. When that son showed too much backbone (and made too many other courtiers angry), she had him deposed, replaced him with his younger brother, and then eventually deposed that child, too, taking on the mantle of rule for herself. Though her rule as emperor was short, she made a number of state improvements in religion, literature, and education—and some historians credit those changes with still having an influence on modern Chinese scholarship.
Liang Hongyu
Although she started her career as a musician, Liang Hongyu ended up using her instrumental skills for a more military purpose. She is said to have met her husband, military officer Han Shizhong, when she was performing as a singer and drummer for his troop. They married in 1121, and she later fought by his side as the army pushed back an invasion by the Huns. The drumming comes in because, during that era, commands were sent to different units in the military through flags and drum signaling. Her drummed orders (and the strategy she came up with) are credited with leading a group of only 8,000 soldiers to victory against a force of 100,000 Hun warriors.
Qin Liangyu
Fighting against the Manchus was a family experience for Qin Liangyu, who went to war alongside her brothers in the early 1600s. When the Manchus—from beyond the Great Wall—threatened Beijing, Qin Liangyu led troops from Sichuan to defend the capital. But there were also rebel forces within the Ming Dynasty, and Qin Liangyu fought against them as well, alongside her son, Ma Xianglin. There’s not just one story of Qin Liangyu’s successes; she fought so many successful campaigns that the Chongzhen Emperor appointed her Crown Prince’s Guardian and a title equivalent to marquis. When the Ming Dynasty fell during Qin Liangyu’s later years, she remained in control of an area of Sichuan, where she helped settle 100,000.
Wu Mei
Women in martial arts are common enough in modern schools (and modern film), but they’ve been around much longer! In fact, the founder of the famous kung fu style Wing Chun was one of the legendary five elders of Shaolin Martial Arts, was a woman. Buddhist nun Wu Mei (also known as Ng Mui) survived the destruction of the Shaolin Temple of Dengfeng during the Qing Dynasty. The shaolin practitioners had been accused of anti-Qing activities, and the army went to destroy them for it. In the bloody battle that followed, only the five known as the five elders survived. They’re credited with spreading martial arts across China, and Wu was said to have invented some of the most important styles. Her Wing Chun is possibly the best known of these, named after Wu’s first student—also a woman—Yim Wing Chun.
Ching Shih
In the early 1800s, when the Golden Age of piracy had already faded in the Caribbean, a pirate queen was sailing her fleet, commanding as many as 80,000 outlaws (sources differ), in the South China Sea. History has forgotten her birth name—Ching Shih translates to “widow of Ching”—but not her amazing deeds, which have put her down in the history books as one of the most successful pirates in history. Ching Shih worked as a prostitute until she married the notorious pirate Cheng I (who was reportedly impressed with her shrewd business sense), who had united different factions of pirates into his Red Flag Fleet. 
Legends say that she required half the fleet to belong to her as a condition of the marriage, and when Cheng I died six years later, she took control of the entire fleet. She kept order by enforcing a strict pirate code, and though the Qing dynasty officials, Portuguese Navy, and the East India Company all tried to defeat the fleet, she ruled the waves, only ending her piratical activities when she was offered amnesty from the Chinese government. She lived until she was 69, and she’s the inspiration behind Mistress Ching, one of the Pirate Lords in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise.
Yu Shu Lien and Jen Yu
These two are completely fictional, but as far as pop culture goes, these women warriors cannot be left out. In the film Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Jen Yu (played by Zhang Ziyi) is a teenager and an amazing martial artist who has been secretly trained by the villainous Jade Fox, under the nose of Jen’s father, the governor. Yu Shu Lien (played by Michelle Yoeh) owns and runs a private security company; she’s close friends with Li Mu Bai, and she agrees to go with him to take his sword, the Green Destiny, as a gift to a benefactor. When the Green Destiny is stolen, they track it to Governor Yu’s mansion. Eventually, Jen Yu is discovered as the thief, but her youth and talent make both Li Mu Bai and Yu Shu Lien sympathetic to her, even after they realize she’s been taught by Li Mu Bai’s enemy, Jade Fox. Later in the film, Yu Shu Lien tries to teach Jen Yu a lesson, and the two have one of the best choreographed multi-weapon epic martial arts movie fights in the history of martial arts movies.
Aero
Another fictional Chinese hero is Aero, Marvel’s manhua series star. When she’s not being a superhero, Lei Ling is an architect in Beijing. When the monsters start coming, however, she takes to the sky as Aero, the protector of her city. Using powers of manipulating winds and air currents, she struggles with the destruction caused by supervillains, because her passion is for building and creating, not for seeing things torn down. The character was first introduced in the Agents of Atlas comic, but she started starring in her own ongoing comic series in 2019. It’s too much to hope that we’ll get a hint of her in the MCU’s upcoming Shang Chi, but the ongoing series, written by Zhou Liefen with stories by Alyssa Wong and Greg Pak, and art by Keng and Pop Mhan, is definitely worth picking up.
Honorable Mention: Cassandra Cain
I didn’t know this when I watched Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), but Cassandra Cain—the thief kid who swallows the film’s macguffin—has a long and awesome history in DC comics. She’s a first generation Chinese American; her mother, Lady Shiva, is a dangerous assassin who fled from her village, and her father, David Cain, is one of Ra’s al Ghul’s henchmen. It’s not a love match—he blackmails her into having his child, and then he raises Cassandra to be the perfect assassin and bodyguard. But when she was just eight years old, her empathy made her reject a path of killing, and she ends up in Gotham, where she saves Commissioner Gordon’s life and becomes Batgirl. In fact, Cassandra Cain was the first Batgirl to have her own standalone series run (in 2000). Eventually, after a series of twists and turns, she takes a gig working as one of the global team of Batmen as the Black Bat, where she fights crime in Hong Kong. It’s hard to imagine the Birds of Prey version matching up, but I’d love to see that character in more DC movies!
Mulan premieres on Disney+ on September 4th. Find out how and when you can access it here.
The post Mulan And The Chinese Women Warriors of History and Legend appeared first on Den of Geek.
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euleitor · 4 years
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 “Em abril daquele ano (1644), ao perceber que a derrota era inevitável, o Imperador Chongzhen ordenou que o filho primogênito e o seu irmão fossem levados a um local seguro e, no momento em que se despedia deles, disse-lhes: “Se por acaso se salvarem, lembrem-se de vingar no futuro os males que os seus pais sofreram.”” O suicídio no Ocidente e no Oriente, Marzio Barbagli
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arcticdementor · 5 years
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The Chongzhen Emperor (Chinese: 崇禎; pinyin: Chóngzhēn; 6 February 1611 – 25 April 1644), personal name Zhu Youjian (Chinese: 朱由檢; pinyin: Zhū Yóujiǎn), was the 17th and last emperor of the Ming dynasty as well as the last ethnic Han to sit on the throne. "Chongzhen," the era name of his reign, means "honorable and auspicious".
Zhu Youjian was son of the Taichang Emperor and younger brother of the Tianqi Emperor, whom he succeeded to the throne in 1627. He battled peasant rebellions and was not able to defend the northern frontier against the Manchu. When rebels reached the capital Beijing in 1644, he committed suicide, ending the Ming dynasty. The Manchu formed the succeeding Qing dynasty.
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afishtrap · 7 years
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This paper describes the late imperial militarized mode of adjudication (yi junfa congshi) and its relationship to eighteenth-century cases of summarized execution under the imperial standard (gongqing wangming). It shows that during the Ming and Qing, militarized adjudications, which were essentially summary in nature, occurred along a spatial-temporal gradient of military operations which was a function of proximity to and intensity of active military operations. The paper also demonstrates that prior to the eighteenth century, militarized adjudication was a different mode of adjudication from the routine adjudicative system (zhuanshen, heshen, qingzhi) associated with the Qing Code (DaQing lüli). When norm-violating behavior occurred closest to the battlefield at the time of battle, it was more likely that the offender would be summarily adjudicated under modal junfa. This relationship changed over time. Imperial standard executions (gongqing wangming jixing zhengfa), primarily an eighteenth-century phenomenon, developed out of the practice of militarized adjudications. The paper relies on writings of Wang Yangming, and criminal cases to delineate the two different paradigms of modal junfa and the routine adjudicative process. It demonstrates the change in time in the relationship between militarized adjudication, routine adjudication, and the military operations gradient.
E. John Gregor. “Military Operations, Law and Late Imperial Space: The Spread of Militarized Adjudication.” Extrême-Orient Extrême-Occident [Online], 40.
The Seven Military Classics, originating mostly during the Warring States period (403-221 BC), early on recognized that rules of military discipline had to be clear, and punishment had to be quick in order to maintain the authority of the commander and unit discipline during battle.10 They already contained the basic ideas of awards and punishments (shangfa) and emphasized that expeditiousness and lack of leniency were critical to military discipline. By the mid-Ming, the association between militarized adjudication and battlefield operations was well-recognized. For instance, Neo-Confucian philosopher and fifteenth-century Board of War minister Wang Yangming (1472-1529) authored a number of memorials while a secretary on the Nanjing Board of War, several of which addressed militarized adjudication, including the following from 1499 discussing actions at the epicenter of military operations:
"From now on, for any officer leading soldiers in combat, if soldiers under his command retreat or fail to follow orders, permission is granted to adjudicate the matter in front of the troops according to militarized adjudication (yijunfa congshi). If the leader himself does not follow orders, then the commander-general (zongtong guan) is granted permission to adjudicate the leader’s case according to militarized adjudication in front of the troops."
[...]
Since military campaigns often took place on the far frontier, sending a case back to the capital for review by the emperor after multiple levels of review detracted from the required efficiency in administering punishment and detracted from military discipline. In fact, one of the earliest (and only) examples of a military law explicitly calling for militarized adjudication in the Ming-Qing Codes involved military crimes on the frontier. That statute was entitled “execution of military rebels” (chujue panjun) .'6 For this type of military rebellion on the frontier—note both the military subject matter and the association with the frontier—the Ming-Qing Codes permitted local officials to execute an accused following only review by the governor (xunfu) and/or governor-general (zongdu), two officials located at the provincial level, rather than go through the routine process of extended retrial-review and approval by the emperor.17 Further, if the plotting occurred during battle, then local officials could execute the accused on the spot without even seeking approval from the governor/govemor-general. In both cases, the emperor had to be notified immediately after the fact.18
While frontier military rebellion statutorily called for militarized adjudication, most instances of militarized adjudication were the result of one time grants of authority based on specific situations. For instance, in an August 7, 1640 (CZ 13/6/20) draft memorial, the Ming Board of War responded to an edict from the Chongzhen emperor seeking recommendations following a disastrous Manchu raid the year prior. The Board styled their memorial a “recommendation that junfa be made manifest (shenming junfa).” But what exactly did the memorialist mean by junfal We know because he provided a historical example of how such an approach could address discipline problems, noting that in the time of the Ming founder, if soldiers were deployed to battle, yet were incompetent and returned from battle, they were immediately beheaded; likewise, if they stole anything that belonged to the people, they were beheaded. From this, we can surmise that the memorialist was requesting the emperor to authorize officials to carry out highly autonomous death sentences in order to maintain military discipline. At the very end of the memorial, using the same language as in the initial styling of the memorial (shenming junfa), the original drafter requested the emperor to order all govemorsgeneral, governors, regional commanders (zongbing), and circuit intendants to make junfa manifest. At some point in the drafting process, the author or another official crossed out that line, and inserted an interlinear correction, requesting “special promulgation of rules to make the criminal process faster and simpler” (teban suxing jieqiu zhi fa). This phrasing really captures the sense of a military process of adjudication; it is not just the substantive law itself, but the manner in which a case was to be adjudicated under the law.19 This memorial also reflects the sense of militarized adjudication as something contingent and available only under unique circumstances and authorized to certain officials.
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A 1637 draft memorial from the Ming Board of War demonstrated three things: first, the conceptual link between military discipline and militarized adjudication was deterrence; second, that militarized adjudication was about expedited procedures and judicial autonomy at a level below the emperor; and third, that such authority was always contingent and normally a function of proximity to battle or physical space associated with military activity. In the 1630’s, one important epicenter of military operations was the northeast in today’s Liaoning and Jilin provinces. By January 1637 (CZ 9/12), with increasing Manchu raids, the Ming Board of War, in conjunction with various govemors-general, memorialized the emperor requesting that militarized adjudication authority be granted to the provincial military commissioners (,dufu) extending authority to execute all officials who dithered, retreated or withdrew in the face of barbarian incursions. In response, the Chongzhen emperor (r. 1627-1644) issued an edict authorizing limited militarized adjudication authority to the govemors-general and governors of the nine frontiers. His response evinced an awareness of the distinction between militarized adjudication and routine criminal approaches: “for those who should be impeached and then punished, immediately memorialize with an impeachment; for those who should be immediately executed, immediately execute them.”21 The fact that the govemors-general had to specially request militarized adjudication authority as late as 1637 for operations essentially at the epicenter at a life-and-death moment for the dynasty, and that the emperor still limited jurisdiction to cases of accused officials under the rank of colonel provides some idea of the irregular status of militarized adjudication.
From these sources, we get an idea of the relationship between spatial conditions and militarized adjudication. Across the late Ming and post-conquest, early Qing, whether a given military case was adjudicated under the routine process or under militarized adjudication corresponded closely with where the case occurred along what I call the “gradient of military operations.”22 One can think of the epicenter of such a gradient as a particular battlefield (a spatial element) at the time of battle (a temporal element). These two elements were themselves both functions of the intensity of military operations at a given place. Expanding out from this epicenter, multiple and irregularly-shaped zones corresponded with a decreasing intensity of military operations. The innermost zone—where the immediacy of operations made discipline a more poignant concern —was the point at which militarized adjudication was most often invoked. Because the power to approve death sentences was a fundamental prerogative of the emperor’s authority, wholly autonomous authority to try and summarily-execute offenders—the fullest extent of militarized adjudication authority—was seldom granted even on campaign except for conduct that occurred at the very epicenter of the gradient.
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Cases from the Yongzheng era (1723-1735) also confirm the relationship between militarized adjudication and the military operations gradient. In a pronouncement relating to soldiers returning from the Zunghar campaigns in 1733, the Yongzheng emperor articulated two different degrees of militarized adjudication for two different positions along the military operations gradient. If someone spread rumors at the military front, then he was to be immediately decapitated under militarized adjudication; but, if soldiers, civilians, genyi or traders in the course of returning from battle—moving outward along the gradient—“spread confusion,” then they were still to be executed, but only after imperial approval.28
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audreydoeskaren · 1 year
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your recent posts abt the misconceptions of ming/qing han fashion have been rly interesting. there's a post on @/chinesehanfu's blog labelled 'late ming' [i cant send links in asks for you to find it but the models were 陈喜悦耶 and 夫诸Fzz], how accurate are the men & women's costumes in this for 'late ming'?
I think you're referring to this post? I would say this isn't outright *wrong* per se, but extremely suspicious. Peony hair in some of its capacity had existed in the 1650s and 60s, when some Southern Ming states were still around, but it certainly wasn't Ming Dynasty proper. I looked at the original post on Weibo and op didn't specify which period it was, so it might well be intended as Southern Ming or Kangxi era Han costume and there was a misunderstanding in the repost. The reference images are of unclear provenance and look to be from the mid 17th century.
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