Chongzhen Emperor

Chongzhen Emperor 崇禎帝
Emperor of the Ming dynasty
Reign	2 October 1627 – 25 April 1644
Predecessor	Tianqi Emperor
Successor	Hongguang Emperor
Emperor of China
Reign	2 October 1627 – 25 April 1644
Predecessor	Tianqi Emperor
Successor	Shunzhi Emperor
Spouse	Empress Zhuang Lie Min Noble Consort Gong Shu, concubine Noble Consort Yuan concubine Consort Shun, concubine Consort Shen, concubine Consort Wang, concubine[1] Consort Wang, concubine[2] Consort Liu, concubine Consort Fang, concubine
Issue	Zhu Cilang, Crown Prince Xianmin Zhu Cixuan, Prince Yin of Huai Zhu Cijiong, Prince Ai of Ding Zhu Cizhao, Prince Dao of Yong Zhu Cihuan, Prince Ling of Ding Zhu Cican, Prince Huai of Dao Prince Liang of Dao Princess Kunyi Zhu Meicuo, Princess Changping Princess Zhaoren
Full name Family name: Zhu (朱; Chu in Wade-Giles spelling) Given name:Youjian (由檢; Yu-chien in Wade-Giles spelling) Era name and dates Chongzhen (崇禎; Chung-chen in Wade-Giles spelling): 5 February 1628 – 25 April 1644 Posthumous name Emperor Zhaotian Yidao Gangming Kejian Kuiwen Fenwu Dunren Maoxiao Lie(martyr, staunch) 紹天繹道剛明恪儉揆文奮武敦仁懋孝烈皇帝 Temple name Ming Sizong (明思宗)[3]
House	House of Zhu
Father	Taichang Emperor
Mother	Empress Dowager Xiao Chun
Born	(1611-02-06)6 February 1611
Died	25 April 1644(1644-04-25) (aged 33) Jingshan Hill, Beijing
Burial	Ming tombs, Beijing

The Chongzhen Emperor (simplified Chinese: 崇祯; traditional Chinese: 崇禎; pinyin: Chóngzhēn; Wade–Giles: Ch'ung-chen) (6 February 1611 – 25 April 1644) was the 16th and last emperor of the Ming dynasty in China. He reigned from 1627 to 1644, under an era name that means "honorable and auspicious".

Early years

Born Zhu Youjian (Wade-Giles: Chu Yu-chien; Chinese: 朱由檢), Chongzhen was the fifth son of Zhu Changluo, the Taichang Emperor, by Lady Liu Shunu, a lower ranked concubine. When he was four years old his mother was killed by the emperor for unknown reasons and buried secretly. Zhu Youjian was adopted first by Consort Kang; some years later he was transferred to Consort Zhuang, when Consort Kang gave birth to another princess and adopted Zhu Youxiao (later the Tianqi Emperor) as well.

All of the Taichang Emperor's sons died young except the eldest, Tianqi, and the fifth son, Chongzhen. Chongzhen grew up in a relatively lonely but quiet environment, since most of the younger sons were left out of the power struggle that their elder brother the Tianqi Emperor had to endure. Fearing the powerful eununch Wei Zhongxian, Chongzhen avoided going to court under the pretext of illness, until he was summoned by the Tianqi Emperor in 1627. By that time Tianqi was gravely ill and wanted Chongzhen to rely on Wei Zhongxian in the future.^[4]

Chongzhen succeeded his brother to the throne at age 16 in October 1627.^[5] His succession was helped by Empress Zhang, despite the manoeuvers of Wei Zhongxian to keep dominating the court.^[6] From the beginning of his rule, Chongzhen did his best to salvage the Ming dynasty. His efforts at reform focused on the top ranks of the civil and military establishment. However, years of internal corruption and an empty treasury made it almost impossible to find capable ministers to fill important government posts. Chongzhen also tended to be suspicious of his subordinates, executing dozens of field commanders, including the famous general Yuan Chonghuan, who had directed the defense of the northern frontier against the Manchus. Chongzhen's reign was marked by his fear of factionalism among his officials, which had been a serious issue during the reign of his predecessor the Tianqi Emperor. Soon after his brother's death, Chongzhen immediately eliminated Wei Zhongxian and Madame Ke, as well as other officials thought to be involved in the "Wei-Ke conspiracy".^[7]

Meanwhile, partisans of the Donglin Academy faction, which had been devastated under Wei Zhongxian's influence, established political organizations throughout the Jiangnan region.^[8] Chief among these was the Fushe, or Restoration Society, whose members were a new generation of scholars who identified with the old Donglin faction.^[9] They succeeded in placing their members into high government posts through the imperial examinations of 1630 and 1631. The reversal of Wei Zhongxian's fortunes resulted in a renewal of the Donglin faction's influence at court, arousing great suspicion from the Chongzhen Emperor.^[10] The nomination of Donglin favorite Qian Qianyi for the post of Grand Secretary led to accusations of corruption and factionalism by his rival Wen Tiren. Qian was imprisoned on the emperor's orders. Though he was soon released, his status was reduced to that of a commoner and he returned to Jiangnan. Wen Tiren would later become Grand Secretary himself.^[11]

Peasant rebellions and Manchu invasion

In the early 17th century, persistent drought and famine driven by the Little Ice Age accelerated the collapse of the Ming dynasty.^[12] Two major popular uprisings swelled up, led by Zhang Xianzhong and Li Zicheng, both poor men from famine-hit Shaanxi who took up arms in the 1620s.^[13] At the same time, Ming armies were occupied in the defense of the northern border against the Manchu leader Hong Taiji, whose father Nurhaci had united the Jurchen tribes into a cohesive force. In 1636, after years of campaigns against Ming fortifications north of the Great Wall, Hong Taiji declared himself the emperor of the Great Qing.^[14]

Through the 1630s, rebellion spread from Shaanxi to nearby Huguang and Henan. In 1641, Xiangyang fell to Zhang Xianzhong, and Luoyang to Li Zicheng. The next year, Li captured Kaifeng.,^[15] and the year after that, Zhang took Wuchang and established himself as the king of the Xi dynasty.^[13] Court officials offered a number of unrealistic proposals to stop the rebel armies, including the establishment of archery contests, the restoration of the weisuo military colony system, and the execution of disloyal peasants.^[16] Li Zicheng took Xi'an in last 1643, renaming it Chang'an, which had been the city's name when it was the capital of the Tang dynasty. On the lunar New Year of 1644, he proclaimed himself king of the Shun dynasty and prepared to capture Beijing.^[17]

By this point, the situation had become critical for Chongzhen, who rejected proposals to recruit new militias from the Beijing region and to recall general Wu Sangui, the defender of Shanhai Pass on the Great Wall. Chongzhen had dispatched a new field commander, Yu Yinggui, who failed to stop Li Zicheng's armies as they crossed the Yellow River in December 1643. Back in Beijing, the capital defense forces consisted of old and feeble men, who were starving because of the corruption of eunuchs responsible for provisioning their supplies. The troops had not been paid for nearly a year.^[18] Meanwhile, the capture of Taiyuan by Li Zicheng's forces gave his campaign additional momentum; garrisons began to surrender to him without a fight. Through February and March of 1644, the emperor declined repeated proposals to move the court south to Nanjing, and in early April, he rejected a suggestion to move the crown prince to the south.^[19]

Death

The Chongzhen Emperor Slays One of His Daughters, from Martino Martini's De Bello Tartarico Historia (1655)

In April 1644, the imperial court finally ordered Wu Sangui to move his army south from his fortress at Ningyuan to Shanhai Pass.^[20] It was too late, however, and Wu would not reach Shanhai Pass until April 26.^[21] Word reached Beijing that Shun rebels were approaching the capital through Juyong Pass, and the Chongzhen Emperor held his last audience with his ministers on April 23. Li Zicheng offered Chongzhen an opportunity to surrender, but the negotiations produced no result. Li commanded his forces to attack on April 24. Rather than face capture by the rebels, Chongzhen gathered all members of the imperial household except his sons. Using his sword, he killed Consort Yuan and Princess Kunyi, and severed the arm of Princess Changping. The empress hanged herself.^[22]

A modern replacement of the tree from which Chongzhen was said to have hanged himself

On April 25, Chongzhen was said to have walked to Coal Hill in Jingshan Park. There, he either hanged himself, or strangled himself with a sash. By some accounts, the emperor left a suicide note which said, "I die unable to face my ancestors in the underworld, dejected and ashamed. May the bandits dismember my corpse and slaughter my officials, but let them not despoil the imperial tombs nor harm a single one of our people."^[23] According to a servant who discovered the emperor's body under a tree, however, the word Tianzi (Son of Heaven) was the only written evidence left after his death.^[24] The emperor was buried in the Ming tombs.

The Manchus were quick to exploit the death of Chongzhen: by claiming to "avenge the emperor," they rallied support from loyalist Ming forces and civilians. The Shun dynasty lasted less than a year with Li's defeat at the Battle of Shanhai Pass. The victorious Manchus established the Shunzhi Emperor of the Qing dynasty as ruler of all China. Because Chongzhen had refused to move the court south to Nanjing, the new Qing government was able to take over a largely intact Beijing bureaucracy, aiding their efforts to displace the Ming.^[25]

After Chongzhen's death, loyalist forces proclaimed a Southern Ming dynasty in Nanjing, naming Zhu Yousong, Prince of Fu as the Hongguang Emperor. However, in 1645 Qing armies started to move against the Ming remnants. The Southern Ming, again bogged down by factional infighting, were unable to hold back the Manchu onslaught, and Nanjing surrendered on 8 June 1645. Zhu was captured on 15 June and brought to Beijing, where he died the following year. The dwindling Southern Ming were continually pushed farther south, and the last emperor of the Southern Ming, Zhu Youlang, Prince of Gui, was finally caught in Burma, transported to Yunnan, and executed in 1662 by Wu Sangui.

Legacy

While Chongzhen was not especially incompetent by the standards of the later Ming, he nevertheless sealed the fate of the Ming dynasty. He did his best to save the dynasty. Despite a reputation for hard work, Chongzhen's paranoia, impatience, stubbornness and lack of regard for the plight of his people doomed his crumbling empire. Chongzhen's attempts at reform did not take into account the considerable decline of Ming power, which was already far advanced at the time of his accession. Over the course of his 17 year reign, Chongzhen executed 7 military governors, 11 regional commanders, replaced his minister of defense 14 times, and appointed an unprecedented 50 ministers to the Grand Secretariat (equivalent to the cabinet and prime minister).^[26] Even though the Ming dynasty still possessed capable commanders and skilled politicians in its dying years, Chongzhen's impatience and paranoid personality prevented any of them from enacting any real plan to salvage a perilous situation.

In particular, Chongzhen's execution of Yuan Chonghuan on extremely flimsy grounds was regarded as the decisively fatal blow. At the time of his death, Yuan was supreme commander of all Ming forces in the northeast, and had just rushed from the borders to defend the capital against a surprise Manchurian invasion. For much of the preceding decade, Yuan had served as the Ming Empire's bulwark in the north, where he was responsible for securing Ming borders at a time when the Empire was suffering humiliating defeat after defeat. His unjust death destroyed Ming military morale and removed one of the greatest obstacles to the eventual Manchurian conquest of China.

Personal information

His father was the Taichang Emperor. His mother was Liu Shunu (淑女劉氏) (d. 1615), concubine of the Taichang Emperor, daughter of Liu Yingyuan, Duke of Ying (瀛國公劉應元) and Lady Xu (徐媪), posthumously honored as Empress Dowager Xiao Chun (孝純太后).

Consorts

Sons

Daughters

Ancestry

Notes

References

• Chao, Zhongchen (2000). Chongzhen zhuan (崇禎傳) ISBN 957-05-1612-7
• Fagan, Brian M. (2000), The Little Ice Age: How Climate Made History, 1300-1850, Basic Books, ISBN 9780465022724 
• Mote, Frederick W. (2003), Imperial China 900-1800, Harvard University Press, ISBN 9780520048041 
• Wakeman Jr., Frederic (1986), The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China, University of California Press, ISBN 9780520048041