Hešeri

Hešeri (Chinese: 赫舍里; Pinyin: Hesheli; Manchu: ᡥᡝᠰᡝᡵᡳ Hešeri), is a Manchu clan with Jianzhou Jurchens roots, originally hailing from the area which is now the modern Chinese provinces of Jilin and Liaoning. It was once one of the most important and powerful families in the early Qing dynasty in China, second only to the royal House of Aisin Gioro, to whom they were closely related by marriage.[1][2] The power of the family reached its zenith in the period of Marquess Hešeri Sonin and his second son Duke Hešeri Songgotu (from approximately 1650 to 1705). Although its influence declined following Songgotu's death, clan Hešeri continued to play a role in Chinese politics until the demise of the Qing dynasty in early 1912.

History

Origins

The name Hešeri was first recorded in the Thirty Common Surnames of Jurchen during the later Tang dynasty (c. 800-850), and is said to be derived from the name of an ancestral river (šeri loosely translating to water-spring in the Manchu language). Alternatively, some have suggested that the name may stem from that of an ancient tribe. During the Tang dynasty, the Hešeri lived on the northern outskirts of the empire, co-existing to some degree with the then extant Khitan and the Liao dynasty they founded (which dynasty the Jurchen ultimately conquered and destroyed in 1125[3]); while the bulk of the clan maintained their ancestral residencies, the (second) ascendancy of the Jurchen (renamed by this time to Manchu) during the Qing dynasty and the administrative and military appointments clan Hešeri enjoyed as a result saw moderate diffusion of Hešeri throughout the more interior northern and central provinces.

After the Xinhai Revolution of 1911 and the resulting 1912 collapse of the Qing dynasty, the vast majority of Hešeri saw fit to distance themselves from their Manchu origins. To accomplish this, the more Han-sounding diminutive He (Chinese: 赫/何) was adopted as a replacement surname (commonly spelled Ho in Hong Kong and several other Cantonese-speaking regions); a few Hešeri went further and changed their surnames completely to Gao (高), Kang (康), Zhang (张), Lu (芦), He (贺), Suo (索), Ying (英), Hao (郝), Hei (黑), Pu (普), Li (李), or Man (满).

Notable people

In Jin dynasty

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In the 119 year history of the Jin dynasty, at least 52[4] people from this clan were powerful enough to affect the government's decisions. Their names were recorded in the History of Jin.

In Qing dynasty

[5][6]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Jonathan D. Spence (16 December 2002). The Cambridge History of China: Volume 9, Part 1, The Ch'ing Empire to 1800. Cambridge University Press. pp. 127–128. ISBN 978-0-521-24334-6.
  2. ↑ Jonathan D. Spence (25 July 2012). Emperor of China: Self-Portrait of K'ang-Hsi. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-307-82306-9.
  3. ↑ Michal Biran (2005). The Empire of the Qara Khitai in Eurasian History: Between China and the Islamic World. Cambridge University Press. pp. 29-30. ISBN 0521842263
  4. ↑ 《金史·列传》
  5. ↑ 清史稿
  6. ↑ http://manchusky.blog.sohu.com/22823959.html
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 http://baike.baidu.com/view/1289096.html
  8. ↑ Pamela Kyle Crossley (1990). Orphan Warriors: Three Manchu Generations and the End of the Qing World. Princeton University Press. p. 45. ISBN 0-691-00877-9.
  9. ↑ Pamela Kyle Crossley (1999). A Translucent Mirror: History and Identity in Qing Imperial Ideology. University of California Press. p. 188. ISBN 978-0-520-92884-8.

External links