Dorgon

Dorgon (Manchu: , literally "badger";^[1] 17 November 1612 – 31 December 1650), formally known as Prince Rui, was a Manchu prince and regent of the early Qing dynasty. Born in the Aisin Gioro clan as the 14th son of Nurhaci (the founder of the Qing dynasty), Dorgon started his career in military campaigns against the Ming dynasty, Mongols and Koreans during the reign of his eighth brother, Huangtaiji, who succeeded their father. After Huangtaiji's death in 1643, he was involved in a power struggle against Huangtaiji's eldest son, Hooge, over the succession to the throne. Both of them eventually came to a compromise by backing out and letting Huangtaiji's ninth son, Fulin, become the emperor; Fulin was installed on the throne as the Shunzhi Emperor. Dorgon served as Prince-Regent from 1643–1650, throughout the Shunzhi Emperor's early reign. In 1645, he was given the honorary title "Emperor's Uncle and Prince-Regent"; the title was changed to "Emperor's Father and Prince-Regent" in 1649. Under Dorgon's regency, Qing forces occupied Beijing, the capital of the fallen Ming dynasty, and gradually conquered the rest of China in a series of battles against Ming loyalists and other opposing forces around China. Dorgon also introduced the policy of forcing all Han Chinese men to shave the front of the heads and wear their hair in queues just like the Manchus. He died in 1650 during a hunting trip and was posthumously honoured as an emperor even though he was never an emperor during his lifetime. However, a year after Dorgon's death, the Shunzhi Emperor accused Dorgon of several crimes, stripped him of his titles, and ordered his remains to be exhumed and flogged in public. Dorgon was posthumously rehabilitated and restored of his honorary titles by the Qianlong Emperor in 1778.

Early life

Dorgon was born in the Manchu Aisin Gioro clan as the 14th son of Nurhaci, the Khan of the Later Jin dynasty (the precursor to the Qing dynasty). His mother was Nurhaci's primary consort, Lady Abahai. Ajige and Dodo were his full brothers, and Huangtaiji was one of his half-brothers. Dorgon was one of the most influential among Nurhaci's sons, and his role was instrumental to the Qing occupation of Beijing, the capital of the fallen Ming dynasty, in 1644. During Huangtaiji's reign, Dorgon participated in many military campaigns, including the conquests of Mongolia and Korea. He fought against the Chahar Mongols in 1628 and 1635.^[2]

Rise to power

After Huangtaiji died in 1643, Dorgon became involved in a power struggle with Huangtaiji's eldest son, Hooge, over the succession to the throne. The conflict was resolved with a compromise - both backed out, and Huangtaiji's ninth son, Fulin, ascended the throne as the Shunzhi Emperor. Since the Shunzhi Emperor was only six years old at that time, Dorgon was appointed regent and became the de facto ruler. In 1645, Dorgon was conferred the title "Emperor's Uncle and Prince-Regent" (皇叔父攝政王). Later, in 1649, the title was changed to "Emperor's Father and Prince-Regent" (皇父攝政王). It was rumoured that Dorgon had a romantic affair with the Shunzhi Emperor's mother, Empress Dowager Xiaozhuang, and even secretly married her, but there are also refutations. Whether they secretly married,^[3] had a secret affair or kept their distance remains a controversy in Chinese history.^[4]

Dorgon's regency (1643–1650)

Dorgon in imperial regalia. He reigned as a quasi-emperor from 1643 to his death in 1650, a period during which the Qing Empire conquered almost all of China.

A quasi emperor

On 17 February 1644, Jirgalang, who was a capable military leader but appeared uninterested in managing state affairs, willingly yielded control of all official matters to Dorgon.^[5] After an alleged plot by Hooge to undermine the regency was exposed on 6 May of that year, Hooge was stripped of his princely title and his co-conspirators were executed.^[6] Dorgon soon replaced Hooge's supporters (mostly from the Yellow Banners) with his own, thus gaining closer control of two more banners.^[7] By early June 1644, he was in firm control of the Qing government and its military.^[8]

In early 1644, just as Dorgon and his advisors were pondering how to attack the Ming Empire, peasant rebellions were dangerously approaching Beijing. On 24 April of that year, rebel forces led by Li Zicheng breached the walls of the Ming capital. The last Ming emperor, the Chongzhen Emperor, hanged himself at a hill behind the Forbidden City.^[9] Hearing the news, Dorgon's Han Chinese advisors Hong Chengchou and Fan Wencheng (范文程; 1597–1666) urged the prince to seize this opportunity to present themselves as avengers of the fallen Ming Empire and claim the Mandate of Heaven for the Qing Empire.^[10] The last obstacle between Dorgon and Beijing was Wu Sangui, a former Ming general guarding the Shanhai Pass at the eastern end of the Great Wall.^[11] Wu Sangui was caught between the Manchus and Li Zicheng's forces. He requested Dorgon's help in ousting the rebels and restoring the Ming Empire.^[12] When Dorgon asked Wu Sangui to work for the Qing Empire instead, Wu had little choice but to accept.^[13] Aided by Wu Sangui's elite soldiers, who fought the rebel army for hours before Dorgon finally chose to intervene with his cavalry, the Qing army won a decisive victory against Li Zicheng at the Battle of Shanhai Pass on 27 May.^[14] Li Zicheng and his defeated troops looted Beijing for several days until they left the capital on 4 June with all the wealth they could carry.^[15]

Settling in the capital

The circular mound of the Altar of Heaven, where the Shunzhi Emperor conducted sacrifices on 30 October 1644, ten days before being officially proclaimed Emperor of China. The ceremony marked the moment when the Qing dynasty seized the Mandate of Heaven.

After six weeks of mistreatment at the hands of rebel troops, the residents of Beijing sent a party of elders and officials to greet their liberators on 5 June.^[16] They were startled when, instead of meeting Wu Sangui and the Ming heir apparent, they saw Dorgon, a horse-riding Manchu with the front half of his head shaved, present himself as the Prince-Regent.^[17] In the midst of this upheaval, Dorgon installed himself as Prince-Regent in Wuying Palace (武英殿), the only building that remained more or less intact after Li Zicheng had set fire to the Forbidden City on 3 June.^[18] Banner troops were ordered not to loot; their discipline made the transition to Qing rule "remarkably smooth."^[19] Yet, at the same time, as he claimed to have come to avenge the Ming Empire, Dorgon ordered that all claimants to the Ming throne (including descendants of the last Ming emperor) should be executed along with their supporters.^[20]

On June 7, just two days after entering the city, Dorgon issued special proclamations to officials around the capital, assuring them that if the local population surrendered, the officials would be allowed to stay at their posts. Besides, all the men had to shave the front half of their heads and wear the rest of their hair in queues.^[21] He had to repeal this command three weeks later after several peasant rebellions erupted around Beijing, threatening Qing control over the capital region.^[22]

Dorgon greeted the Shunzhi Emperor at the gates of Beijing on 19 October 1644.^[23] On 30 October the six-year-old monarch performed sacrifices to Heaven and Earth at the Altar of Heaven.^[24] The southern cadet branch of Confucius's descendants who held the title wujing boshi and the northern branch 65th generation descendant of Confucius to hold the title Duke Yansheng had their titles confirmed by the Shunzhi Emperor on 31 October.^[25] A formal ritual of enthronement for the Shunzhi Emperor was held on 8 November, during which the young emperor compared Dorgon's achievements to those of the Duke of Zhou, a revered regent of the Zhou dynasty.^[2][26] During the ceremony, Dorgon's official title was raised from "Prince Regent" to "Uncle and Prince Regent" (叔父攝政王), in which the Manchu term for "Uncle" (ecike) represented a rank higher than that of imperial prince.^[27] Three days later Dorgon's co-regent, Jirgalang, was demoted from "Prince Regent" to "Assistant Uncle Prince Regent" (輔政叔王).^[28] In June 1645, Dorgon eventually decreed that all official documents should refer to him as "Imperial Uncle Prince Regent" (皇叔父攝政王), leaving him one step short of claiming the throne for himself.^[28]

Dorgon gave a Manchu woman as a wife to the Han Chinese official Feng Quan,^[29] who had defected from the Ming to the Qing. The Manchu queue hairstyle was willingly adopted by Feng Quan before it was enforced on the Han population and Feng learned the Manchu language.^[30]

To promote ethnic harmony, a 1648 decree from the Shunzhi Emperor allowed Han Chinese civilian men to marry Manchu women from the Banners with the permission of the Board of Revenue if they were registered daughters of officials or commoners or the permission of their banner company captain if they were unregistered commoners, it was only later in the Qing dynasty that these policies allowing intermarriage were done away with.^[31][32] The decree was formulated by Dorgon.^[33]

Examination rooms in Beijing. In order to enhance their legitimacy among the Chinese elite, the Qing reestablished the imperial civil service examinations almost as soon as they seized Beijing in 1644.

One of Dorgon's first orders in the new Qing capital was to vacate the entire northern part of Beijing and give it to Bannermen, including Han Chinese Bannermen.^[33] The Yellow Banners were given the place of honor north of the palace, followed by the White Banners to the east, the Red Banners to the west, and the Blue Banners to the south.^[34] This distribution complied with the order established in the Manchu homeland before the conquest and under which "each of the banners was given a fixed geographical location according to the points of the compass."^[35] Despite tax remissions and large-scale building programmes designed to facilitate the transition, in 1648 many Chinese civilians still lived among the newly arrived Banner population and there was still animosity between the two groups.^[36] Agricultural land outside the capital was also delineated (quan 圈) and given to Qing troops.^[37] Former landowners now became tenants who had to pay rent to their absentee Bannermen landlords.^[37] This transition in land use caused "several decades of disruption and hardship."^[37]

In 1646, Dorgon also ordered that the imperial civil service examinations for selecting government officials be reinstated. From then on, examinations were held every three years as under the Ming Empire. In the very first imperial examination held under Qing rule in 1646, candidates, most of whom were northern Chinese, were asked how the Manchus and Han Chinese could work together for a common purpose.^[38] The 1649 examination asked "how Manchus and Han Chinese could be unified so that their hearts were the same and they worked together without division."^[39] Under the Shunzhi Emperor's reign, the average number of graduates of the metropolitan examination per session was the highest of the Qing dynasty ("to win more Chinese support"), continuing until 1660 when lower quotas were established.^[40]

Conquest of China

A late Qing dynasty woodblock print representing the Yangzhou massacre of May 1645. Dorgon's brother, Dodo, ordered this massacre to scare other southern Chinese cities into submission. By the late 19th century, the massacre was used by anti-Qing revolutionaries to arouse anti-Manchu sentiment among the Han Chinese population.^[41]

Under the reign of Dorgon – whom historians have variously called "the mastermind of the Qing conquest" and "the principal architect of the great Manchu enterprise" – the Qing subdued almost all of China and pushed loyalist "Southern Ming" resistance into the far southwestern reaches of China. After repressing anti-Qing revolts in Hebei and Shandong in the summer and fall of 1644, Dorgon sent armies to root out Li Zicheng from the important city of Xi'an (Shaanxi province), where Li had reestablished his headquarters after fleeing Beijing in early June 1644.^[42] Under the pressure of Qing armies, Li was forced to leave Xi'an in February 1645. He was killed – either by his own hand or by a peasant group that had organised for self-defence during this time of rampant banditry – in September 1645 after fleeing though several provinces.^[43]

From newly captured Xi'an, in early April 1645, the Qing forces mounted a campaign against the rich commercial and agricultural region of Jiangnan south of the lower Yangtze River, where in June 1644 a Ming imperial prince had established a regime loyal to the Ming.^[44] Factional bickering and numerous defections prevented the Southern Ming from mounting an efficient resistance.^[45] Several Qing armies swept south, taking the key city of Xuzhou north of the Huai River in early May 1645 and soon converging on Yangzhou, the main city on the Southern Ming's northern line of defence.^[46] Bravely defended by Shi Kefa, who refused to surrender, Yangzhou fell to Qing artillery on 20 May after a one-week siege.^[47] Dorgon's brother, Dodo, then ordered the slaughter of Yangzhou's entire population.^[48] As intended, this massacre terrorised other Jiangnan cities into surrendering to the Qing Empire.^[49] Indeed, Nanjing surrendered without a fight on 16 June after its last defenders made Dodo promise he would not harm the population.^[50] The Qing forces soon captured the Ming emperor (who died in Beijing the following year) and seized Jiangnan's main cities, including Suzhou and Hangzhou; by early July 1645, the frontier between the Qing Empire and the Southern Ming regime had been pushed south to the Qiantang River.^[51]

A man in San Francisco's Chinatown around 1900. The Chinese habit of wearing a queue came from Dorgon's July 1645 edict ordering all men to shave the front half of their head and wear the rest of their hair in a queue similar to those of the Manchus.

On 21 July 1645, after Jiangnan had been superficially pacified, Dorgon issued a most inopportune edict ordering all Han Chinese men to shave the front half of their heads and wear the rest of their hair in queues identical to those of the Manchus.^[52] The punishment for non-compliance was death.^[53] This policy of symbolic submission helped the Manchus distinguish friend from foe.^[54] For Han officials and literati, however, the new hairstyle was shameful and demeaning (because it breached a common Confucian directive to preserve one's body intact), whereas for common folk cutting their hair was the same as losing their virility.^[55] Because it united Chinese of all social backgrounds into resistance against Qing rule, the hair cutting command greatly hindered the Qing conquest.^[56] The defiant population of Jiading and Songjiang was massacred by former Ming general Li Chengdong (李成東; d. 1649), respectively on August 24 and September 22.^[57] Jiangyin also held out against about 10,000 Qing troops for 83 days. When the city walls were finally breached on 9 October 1645, the Qing army led by the previous Ming defector Liu Liangzuo (劉良佐; d. 1667) massacred the entire population, killing between 74,000 and 100,000 people.^[58] These massacres ended armed resistance against the Qing Empire in the Lower Yangtze.^[59] A few committed loyalists became hermits, hoping that for lack of military success, their withdrawal from the world would at least symbolise their continued defiance against foreign rule.^[59]

After the fall of Nanjing, two more members of the Ming imperial household created new Southern Ming regimes: one centred in coastal Fujian around the "Longwu Emperor" Zhu Yujian – a ninth-generation descendant of the Hongwu Emperor, the Ming dynasty's founder – and one in Zhejiang around "Regent" Zhu Yihai, Prince of Lu.^[60] But the two loyalist groups failed to cooperate, making their chances of success even lower than they already were.^[61] In July 1646, a new southern campaign led by Bolo sent Prince Lu's Zhejiang court into disarray and proceeded to attack the Longwu regime in Fujian.^[62] Zhu Yujian was caught and summarily executed in Tingzhou (western Fujian) on 6 October.^[63] His adoptive son Zheng Chenggong fled to the island of Taiwan with his fleet.^[63] Finally in November, the remaining centers of Ming resistance in Jiangxi province fell to the Qing.^[64]

Johan Nieuhof's portrait of Shang Kexi, who recaptured Guangzhou from Ming loyalist forces in 1650. He was one of the Han Chinese generals the Qing government relied on to conquer and administer southern China. Entrenched in the south, he eventually took part in the anti-Qing rebellion of the Three Feudatories in 1673.

In late 1646, two more Southern Ming monarchs emerged in the southern province of Guangzhou, reigning under the era names of Shaowu and Yongli.^[64] Short of official robes, the Shaowu court had to purchase from local theatre troupes.^[64] The two Ming regimes fought each other until 20 January 1647, when a small Qing force led by Li Chengdong captured Guangzhou, killed the Shaowu Emperor, and sent the Yongli court fleeing to Nanning in Guangxi.^[65] In May 1648, however, Li mutinied against the Qing Empire, and the concurrent rebellion of another former Ming general in Jiangxi helped the Yongli Emperor to retake most of south China.^[66] This resurgence of loyalist hopes was short-lived. New Qing armies managed to reconquer the central provinces of Huguang (present-day Hubei and Hunan), Jiangxi, and Guangdong in 1649 and 1650.^[67] The Yongli Emperor had to flee again.^[67] Finally on 24 November 1650, Qing forces led by Shang Kexi captured Guangzhou and massacred the city's population, killing as many as 70,000 people.^[68]

Meanwhile, in October 1646, Qing armies led by Hooge reached Sichuan, where their mission was to destroy the regime of bandit chief Zhang Xianzhong.^[69] Zhang was killed in a battle against Qing forces near Xichong in central Sichuan on 1 February 1647.^[70] Also late in 1646 but further north, forces assembled by a Muslim leader known in Chinese sources as Milayin (米喇印) revolted against Qing rule in Ganzhou (Gansu). He was soon joined by another Muslim named Ding Guodong (丁國棟).^[71] Proclaiming that they wanted to restore the Ming, they occupied a number of towns in Gansu, including the provincial capital Lanzhou.^[71] These rebels' willingness to collaborate with non-Muslim Chinese suggests that they were not only driven by religion.^[71] Both Milayin and Ding Guodong were captured and killed by Meng Qiaofang (孟喬芳; 1595–1654) in 1648, and by 1650 the Muslim rebels had been crushed in campaigns that inflicted heavy casualties.^[72]

Death

Dorgon died in 1650 during a hunting trip in Kharahotun (present-day Chengde, Hebei). He was posthumously granted the title "Emperor Yi" (義皇帝) and the temple name "Chengzong" (成宗), even though he was never emperor during his lifetime. The Shunzhi Emperor even bowed thrice in front of Dorgon's coffin during the funeral.

Posthumous demotion and restoration

In 1651, Dorgon's rivals, led by his former co-regent Jirgalang, submitted to the Shunzhi Emperor a long memorial listing a series of crimes committed by Dorgon, which included: possession of yellow robes, which were strictly for use only by the emperor; plotting to seize the throne from the Shunzhi Emperor by calling himself "Emperor's Father"; killing Hooge and taking Hooge's concubines for himself. The Shunzhi Emperor posthumously stripped Dorgon of his titles and even had Dorgon's corpse exhumed and flogged in public. It is believed that the Shunzhi Emperor hated Dorgon and saw him as a threat to the throne. Dorgon was posthumously rehabilitated during the reign of the Kangxi Emperor. In 1778, the Qianlong Emperor granted Dorgon a posthumous name zhong (忠; "loyal"), so Dorgon's full posthumous title became "Prince Ruizhong of the First Rank" (和碩睿忠親王).

Dorgon was survived by only a daughter. However, he had adopted his nephew Dorbo (fifth son of Dorgon's brother Dodo), so Dorbo inherited Dorgon's princely title.

Dorgon is usually considered a good, devoted politician but he is also blamed for "Six Bad Policies (六大弊政)".^[73] These were policies designed to bolster the rule of the Qing conquerors, but which caused considerable disturbance and bloodshed in China, and included:

• Forced head-shaving (剃发) and adopting Manchu clothing (易服): Chinese men were compelled to shave the front half of their heads and tie their hair in queues after the Manchu fashion, on pain of death. Massacres occurred in southern Chinese cities whose inhabitants resisted the imposition of the law.
• Land enclosure (圈地) and requisitioning of homes (占房): to provide economic bases for the Bannermen, they were allowed to enclose 'wasteland without owners' for their use; this law was however abused to take farmlands and estates which were already inhabited, with military force.
• Forced slavery (投充) and anti-escapee (逃人) laws: in the wake of the enclosure of vast agricultural estates, the manpower was provided by allowing Bannermen to seize commoners and enslave them. This in turn necessitated decrees to tackle the problem of escapees, including summary executions of people harbouring escaped slaves and hanging for repeated escapees.

Family

• Father: Nurhaci
• Mother: Lady Abahai
• Primary spouses:
  • Lady Borjigit (博爾濟吉特氏), a Khorchin Mongol, daughter of Jisang'a'erzhai (吉桑阿爾寨) and cousin of Empress Dowager Xiaozhuang. She was chosen by Dorgon to be his princess consort when Huangtaiji created the Prince Rui peerage for him. When she died as "Princess Rui of the First Rank, the Princess Regent" in 1649, Dorgon posthumously granted her the title of "Grand Consort Jingxiaozhonggong" (敬孝忠恭元妃). After Dorgon died and was posthumously granted the title of an emperor, she received the posthumous title "Empress Chengzongyi" (成宗義皇后).
  • Lady Tunggiya (佟佳氏), from the Jurchen tribe of Jianzhou (建州), daughter of Menggetu (蒙格圖).
  • Lady Borjigit (博爾濟吉特氏), from the Zha'ermang (扎爾莽) Mongol tribe, daughter of Gendu'ertaiji (根杜爾台吉).
  • Lady Borjigit (博爾濟吉特氏), a Khorchin Mongol, daughter of Labuxixitaiji (拉布希西台吉).
  • Lady Borjigit (博爾濟吉特氏), a Khorchin Mongol, daughter of Jisang'a'erzhai (吉桑阿爾寨) and sister of Dorgon's first princess consort Lady Borjigit. Originally Hooge's secondary spouse, she married Dorgon after her husband lost to Dorgon in a power struggle and died.
  • Yi Ae-suk (李愛淑), Princess Yishun (義順公主) of the Korean Joseon dynasty, daughter of Yi Gae-yun (李愷胤). Upon marriage in 1650, she became known as "Princess Rui of the First Rank, the Princess Regent".
• Concubines:
  • Lady Gongqite (公齊特氏), from the Chaha'er (察哈爾) tribe.
  • Lady Borjigit (博爾濟吉特氏), from an unknown Mongol tribe.
  • Lady Ji'ermote (濟爾莫特氏), origins unknown.
  • Lady Yi (李氏), a Korean, daughter of Yi Si-seo (李世緒) and mother of Dorgon's only daughter, Donggo.
• Children:
  • Donggo (東莪), Dorgon's daughter, born to Lady Yi, named after her grandfather Nurhaci's firstborn daughter, Princess Donggo.
  • Dorbo (多爾博), fifth son of Dorgon's brother Dodo, adopted by Dorgon. He inherited Dorgon's princely title.

See also

• Prince Rui (睿)
• Royal and noble ranks of the Qing dynasty#Male members
• Ranks of imperial consorts in China#Qing

References

Citations

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