Manchuria under Ming rule refers to the domination of the Ming dynasty over Manchuria, including Northeast China and Outer Manchuria. The Ming rule of Manchuria began with its conquest of Manchuria in the late 1380s after the fall of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty, and reached its peak in the early 15th century with the establishment of the Nurgan Regional Military Commission. With the dissolution of the Nurgan Regional Military Commission the Ming power waned considerably in Manchuria, and it instead adopted a political strategy of divide and rule for different Jurchen tribes. Starting in the 1580s, the Jianzhou Jurchen chieftain Nurhaci (who was originally a Ming vassal) began to take control of most of Manchuria over the next several decades, and in 1616 he established the Later Jin. The Qing dynasty established by his son Hong Taiji would eventually conquer the Ming and take control of China proper.
From the late 14th century to early 17th century, the Ming dynasty ruled over Manchuria. Rebellions by Jurchen tribes were suppressed by the Ming government. The Nurgan Regional Military Commission was set up in Manchuria by the Ming emperors, and Ming guards were placed in the territory to make sure the traditional Chinese foreign relations were kept at peace. Various methods were used to make sure that the Jurchens submitted to Ming and to prevent them from allying with the Mongols and Koreans. Most Jurchens, except for the wild Jurchens, were subordinate to the Ming. The Liaodong Jurchens were governed directly by the Ming, while the Jianzhou Jurchens and Haixi Jurchens accepted vassal status to the Ming. The remaining Jurchens who did not establish constant connection with China were known as the wild Jurchens.
History
The Mongol Empire conquered all Manchuria (including Northeast China and Outer Manchuria) in the 13th century and it was put under the rule of the Yuan dynasty established by Kublai Khan. After the overthrow of the Yuan dynasty by the Han-led Ming dynasty in 1368, Manchuria was still under the rule of the Yuan remnants, known in historiography as the Northern Yuan. Naghachu, a former Yuan official and a Uriankhai general of the Northern Yuan dynasty, won hegemony over the Mongol tribes in Manchuria (Liaoyang province of the former Yuan dynasty). As he grew strong in the northeast, the Ming decided to defeat him instead of waiting for the Mongols to attack. In 1387 the Ming sent a military campaign to attack Naghachu,[1] This ended in Ming victory and also concluded with the surrender of Naghachu and Ming taking over of Manchuria.
The early Ming court did not impose as much control on the Jurchens as the Yuan dynasty did; it did not tax them, and did not set up postal stations in Liaodong and northern Manchuria (as the Yuan dynasty had), which would have promoted further control. Despite this, the Ming court set up guards (衛, wei) in Liaodong under the Hongwu Emperor and in northern Manchuria later under the Yongle Emperor. However, the Jurchen leaders continued to collect the taxes and raise armies for themselves. Jurchen society did not become sinicized; the guards served to reaffirm traditional Chinese foreign relations in which Jurchens show some form of submission to Ming.[2]
By the end of the Hongwu reign, the essentials of a policy toward the Jurchens had taken shape. Most of the Jurchen inhabitants of Manchuria, except for the wild Jurchens, were at peace with China. Yet a suitable relationship between Ming China and their neighbors to the northeast had not been established. The guard system occupies southern Manchuria but had scarcely reached into northern Manchuria, and the regulations for tribute and commerce were still relatively unformed. The Yongle Emperor once again was responsible for devising the framework for Ming-Jurchen relations. He sought peace with the Jurchens and tried to prevent them from allying with the Mongols or the Koreans to pose threats to the Chinese borderlands. One way of winning over the Jurchens was to initiate a regular system of tribute and trade, a boon to these northeastern neighbors, as well as to the Ming, which needed and coveted certain Jurchen products. Finally, the emperor distinguished between Liaodong and the other Jurchen areas farther to the north. Liaodong was to be part of the normal administrative system of the Ming, with the creation of a Regional Military Commission and a commensurate set of military and fiscal obligations which were similar to those imposed upon and generally fulfilled by provinces in China proper. And in northern Manchuria, the Yongle Emperor had created a series of guards and had superseded Korean influence among the Jurchens. He had achieved peace in the Jurchen lands adjacent to the Tumen, Amur, Songhua, and Ussuri rivers, and the Chinese government had developed expertise about the different Jurchen groups and leaders. Chinese cultural and religious influence such as Chinese New Year, the "Chinese god", Chinese motifs like the dragon, spirals, scrolls, and material goods like agriculture, husbandry, heating, iron cooking pots, silk, and cotton spread among the Amur natives like the Udeghes, Ulchis, and Nanais.[3]
However, the creation of a guard did not necessarily imply political control, it was sometimes used to improve foreign relations. In 1409, the Ming dynasty under Yongle Emperor established the Nurgan Regional Military Commission on the banks of the Amur River, and Yishiha, a eunuch of Haixi Jurchen derivation, was ordered to lead an expedition to the mouth of the Amur to pacify the Wild Jurchens. The reception he was accorded by Jurchen chiefs was cordial, and he responded by providing them with gifts. They, in turn, agreed to the Ming creation of the Nurgan Regional Military Commission and to the dispatch of a tribute mission to accompany Yishiha back to the court. In 1413, the emperor again sent Yishiha to Nurgan to meet with the Jurchen chiefs and to build the Yongning temple in an attempt to promote Buddhism among the least sedentarized of the Jurchens. Nurgan was the site of Yongning Temple (永寕寺), a Buddhist temple dedicated to Guanyin, that was founded by Yishiha (Išiqa) in 1413.[4] There is some evidence that he reached the Sakhalin island[5] during one of his expeditions to the lower Amur, and granted Ming titles to a local chieftain. His efforts were well-received because he was well-informed about Jurchen custom and attitudes. Tribute and trade from Nurgan began to flow into China; the Jurchen chiefs accepted the bestowal of titles by the Ming; Buddhism was promoted among the native peoples, and commerce and communication were facilitated through the postal stations established in Nurgan. Yet, the Ming court did not dominate the political fortunes of the Wild Jurchens. It simply maintained a presence in the far northeast of Manchuria. After Yongle Emperor's death, it became increasingly difficult to do so.[6] According to the Collected Statutes of the Ming Dynasty, the Ming established 384 guards and 24 battalions in Manchuria, but these were probably only nominal offices.[7]
Some sources report a Chinese fort existed at Aigun for about 20 years during the Yongle era on the left (northwestern) shore of the Amur downstream from the mouth of the Zeya River. This Ming dynasty Aigun was located on the opposite bank to the later Aigun that was relocated during the Qing dynasty.[8] Yishiha's last fleet included 50 big ships with 2,000 soldiers, and they actually brought the newly inaugurated chief (who had been living in Beijing) to Tyr.[9]
Nivkh women in Sakhalin married Han Chinese Ming officials when the Ming took tribute from Sakhalin and the Amur river region.[10][11] Boluohe, Nanghar and Wuliehe were Yuan posts set up to receive tribute from the Ainu after their war with the Yuan ended in 1308. Ming Chinese outposts in Sakhalin and the Amur river area received animal skin tribute from Ainu on Sakhalin, Uilta and Nivkh in the 15th century after the Tyr based Yongning Temple was set up along with the Nurkan (Nurgan) outposts by the Yongle emperor in 1409. The Ming also held the post at Wuliehe and received marten pelt fur tribute from the assistant commander Alige in 1431 from Sakhalin after the Ming assigned titles like weizhenfu (official charged with subjugation), zhihui qianshi (assistance commander), zhihui tongzhi (vice commander) and Zhihuishi (commander) from Sakhalin indigenous headmen. The Ming received tribute from the headmen Alingge, Tuolingha, Sanchiha and Zhaluha in 1437. The position of headman among Sakhalin indigenous peoples was inherited paternally from father to son and the sons came with their fathers to Wuliehe. Ming officials gave silk uniforms with the appropriate rank to the Sakhalin Ainu, Uilta and Nivkh after they gave tribute. The Maritime Province region had the Ming "system for subjugated peoples' implementers in it for the Sakhalin indigenous peoples. Sakhalin received iron tools from mainland Asia through this trade as Tungus groups joined in from 1456-1487. Local indigenous hierarchies had Ming Chinese given political offices integrated with them. The Ming system on Sakhalin was imitated by the Qing.[12]
Administrative divisions of Ming dynasty in 1409
The Nurgan Regional Military Commission was abolished in 1435, 11 years after the death of the Yongle Emperor, and although the guards continued to exist in Manchuria, the Ming court ceased to have substantial administrative activities there because the heads of local ethnic groups acted as the local officials, and many of the Jurchen villages and guards became semi-hereditary tribes or low-rank duchy. After that, these guards and the affairs of Manchuria were managed by the Liaodong Military Commission of Shandong Province. Although the Ming government and the Jurchen tribe still engaged in sovereign activities such as paying tribute, the conflicts continued to increase, and the Ming government carried out many encirclement and suppression on the rebellious Jurchen tribe in Manchuria. The most important battles were the two "plowing" operations of Manchuria by Chenghua Emperor in 1467 and 1479, and the suppression of Jurchen Atai rebels in 1583. Li Chengliang, the commander-in-chief of Liaodong of the Ming Dynasty, mistakenly killed Nurhachi's father and grandfather in this battle with Atai. By the late Ming period, Ming political presence in Manchuria had waned considerably, although it continued to give titles to Jurchen chiefs. Ironically, however, it was in fact the peoples in this region that caused the downfall of the Ming dynasty.[13][14] Starting in the 1580s, Nurhaci (1558–1626), a Jianzhou Jurchen chieftain who was originally a Ming vassal and officially considered himself a guardian of the Ming border and a local representative of imperial power of the Ming dynasty,[15] started to take actual control of most of Manchuria by unifying other Jurchen tribes over the next several decades. In 1616, he declared himself the "Bright Khan" of the Later Jin state. Two years later he announced the "Seven Grievances" and openly renounced the sovereignty of Ming overlordship and started to fight against the Ming. In 1636, the ethnic name "Manchu" was formally adopted and the dynastic name Later Jin was changed to Great Qing, with its original capital situated at Mukden (Shenyang) slightly north of the Willow Palisade that defined the border of the Liaodong region ruled by Ming. In 1644, after the Chinese rebel Li Zicheng had overthrown the Ming dynasty, loyalist Chinese general Wu Sangui invited Qing forces to drive Li out of Beijing. Qing ruled north China for 40 years until 1683 when they won a civil war against their former loyal vassals in south China, and thereby gained rule over all of China Proper.[16]
The change of the name from Jurchen to Manchu was made to hide the fact that the ancestors of the Manchus, the Jianzhou Jurchens, were ruled by the Chinese.[17][18][19] The Qing dynasty carefully hid the 2 original editions of the books "Qing Taizu Wu Huangdi Shilu" and "Manzhou Shilu Tu" (Taizu Shilu Tu) in the Qing palace, forbidden from public view because they showed that the Manchu Aisin Gioro family had been ruled by the Ming dynasty.[20][21] In the Ming period, the Koreans of Joseon referred to the Jurchen inhabited lands north of the Korean peninsula, above the rivers Yalu and Tumen, as part of Ming China, and called the Jurchen lands the "superior country" (sangguk), the name by which they called Ming China.[22] The Qing deliberately concealed the Manchus' former subservience to the Ming by excluding from the History of the Ming references and information that showed this former relationship. Because of this, History of Ming did not use the Veritable Records of Ming as a source for content on Jurchens during the period when they were ruled by Ming.[23]
Manchuria refers to a region in Northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day Northeast China or, historically, those areas combined with parts of the Russian Far East. Its definition may refer to varying geographical extents as following: the Chinese provinces of Heilongjiang, Jilin, and Liaoning but broadly also including the eastern Inner Mongolian prefectures of Hulunbuir, Hinggan, Tongliao, and Chifeng, collectively known as Northeast China. Historically included homeland of the Jurchens and later their descendants Manchus, which was controlled in whole by Qing China prior to the Amur Annexation in 1858–1860, when parts of the historical region were ceded to the Russian Empire. The two areas involved are Priamurye between the Amur River and the Stanovoy Range to the north, and Primorskaya which runs down the Pacific coast from the Amur mouth to the Korean border, sometimes including the island of Sakhalin- collectively known as Outer Manchuria or Russian Manchuria.
The Amur, or Heilong Jiang, is the world's tenth longest river, forming the border between the Russian Far East and Manchuria/Northeastern China. The Amur proper is 2,824 kilometres (1,755 mi) long, and has a drainage basin of 1,855,000 km2 (716,000 sq mi). Including its source river Argun, it is 4,444 km (2,761 mi) long. The largest fish species in the Amur is the kaluga, attaining a length as great as 5.6 metres (18 ft). The river basin is home to a variety of large predatory fish such as northern snakehead, Amur pike, taimen, Amur catfish, predatory carp and yellowcheek, as well as the northernmost populations of the Amur softshell turtle and Indian lotus.
Sakhalin is an elongated island in Northeast Asia, located just 6.5 km (4.0 mi) off the southeastern coast of Russia's Khabarovsk Krai, and 40 km (25 mi) north of Japan's Hokkaido. A marginal island of the West Pacific, Sakhalin divides the Sea of Okhotsk to its east from the Sea of Japan to its southwest. It is administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast and is the largest island of Russia with an area of 72,492 km2 (27,989 sq mi). The island has a population of roughly 500,000, the majority of whom are Russians. The indigenous peoples of the island are the Ainu, Oroks, and Nivkhs, who are now present in very small numbers.
The Yongle Emperor, personal name Zhu Di, was the third emperor of the Ming dynasty, reigning from 1402 to 1424.
The Manchus are a Tungusic East Asian ethnic group native to Manchuria in Northeast Asia. They are an officially recognized ethnic minority in China and the people from whom Manchuria derives its name. The Later Jin (1616–1636) and Qing (1636–1912) dynasties of China were established and ruled by the Manchus, who are descended from the Jurchen people who earlier established the Jin dynasty (1115–1234) in northern China. Manchus form the largest branch of the Tungusic peoples and are distributed throughout China, forming the fourth largest ethnic group in the country. They can be found in 31 Chinese provincial regions. Among them, Liaoning has the largest population and Hebei, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Inner Mongolia and Beijing have over 100,000 Manchu residents. About half of the population live in Liaoning and one-fifth in Hebei. There are a number of Manchu autonomous counties in China, such as Xinbin, Xiuyan, Qinglong, Fengning, Yitong, Qingyuan, Weichang, Kuancheng, Benxi, Kuandian, Huanren, Fengcheng, Beizhen and over 300 Manchu towns and townships. Manchus are the largest minority group in China without an autonomous region.
Jurchen is a term used to collectively describe a number of East Asian Tungusic-speaking people, descended from the Donghu people. They lived in northeastern China, also known as Manchuria, before the 18th century. The Jurchens were renamed Manchus in 1635 by Hong Taiji. Different Jurchen groups lived as hunter-gatherers, pastoralist semi-nomads, or sedentary agriculturists. Generally lacking a central authority, and having little communication with each other, many Jurchen groups fell under the influence of neighbouring dynasties, their chiefs paying tribute and holding nominal posts as effectively hereditary commanders of border guards.
Manchuria is a region in East Asia. Depending on the definition of its extent, Manchuria can refer either to a region falling entirely within present-day China, or to a larger region today divided between Northeast China and the Russian Far East. To differentiate between the two parts following the latter definition, the Russian part is also known as Outer Manchuria, while the Chinese part is known as Manchuria.
The Jianzhou Jurchens were one of the three major groups of Jurchens as identified by the Ming dynasty. Although the geographic location of the Jianzhou Jurchens changed throughout history, during the 14th century they were located south of the Wild Jurchens and the Haixi Jurchens, and inhabited modern-day Liaoning and Jilin provinces in China. The Jianzhou Jurchens were known to possess an abundant supply of natural resources. They also possessed industrial secrets, particularly in processing ginseng and the dyeing of cloth. They were powerful due to their proximity to Ming trading towns such as Fushun, Kaiyuan, and Tieling in Liaodong, and to Manpojin camp near Korea.
Möngke Temür or Dudu Mengtemu (1370–1433) was a Jurchen chieftain of the Odoli tribe, one of the three tribes of the lower Sunggari river valley in Manchuria. In the 1380s the tribe migrated southward towards the lower valley of the Tumen River and settled in Womuho.
De-Sinicization is a process of eliminating or reducing Chinese cultural elements, identity, or consciousness from a society or nation. In modern contexts, it is often used in tandem with decolonization and contrasted to the assimilation process of Sinicization.
The Northern Yuan was a dynastic regime ruled by the Mongol Borjigin clan based in the Mongolian Plateau. It existed as a rump state after the collapse of the Yuan dynasty in 1368 and lasted until its conquest by the Jurchen-led Later Jin dynasty in 1635. The Northern Yuan dynasty began with the retreat of the Yuan imperial court led by Toghon Temür to the Mongolian steppe. This period featured factional struggles and the often only nominal role of the Great Khan.
Yishiha was a Jurchen eunuch of the Ming dynasty of China. He served the Ming emperors who commissioned several expeditions down the Songhua and Amur Rivers during the period of Ming rule of Manchuria, and is credited with the construction of the only two Ming dynasty Buddhist temples ever built on the territory of present-day Russia.
The Nurgan Regional Military Commission was a Chinese administrative seat established in Manchuria during the Ming dynasty, located on the banks of the Amur River, about 100 km from the sea, at Nurgan city. Nurgan in the Jurchen language means “painting”.
Identity in China was strongly dependent on the Eight Banner system during the Manchu-led Qing dynasty (1644–1912). China consisted of multiple ethnic groups, of which the Han, Mongols and Manchus participated in the banner system. Identity, however, was defined much more by culture, language and participation in the military until the Qianlong Emperor resurrected the ethnic classifications.
The Qing dynasty in Inner Asia was the expansion of the Qing dynasty's realm in Inner Asia in the 17th and the 18th century AD, including both Inner Mongolia and Outer Mongolia, both Manchuria and Outer Manchuria, Tibet, Qinghai and Xinjiang.
The Later Jin, officially known as Jin or the Great Jin, was a Jurchen-led royal dynasty of China in Manchuria and the precursor to the Qing dynasty. Established in 1616 by the Jianzhou Jurchen chieftain Nurhaci upon his reunification of the Jurchen tribes, its name was derived from the earlier Jin dynasty founded by the Wanyan clan which had ruled northern China in the 12th and 13th centuries.
From 1264 to 1308, the Mongol Empire made several incursions into the island of Sakhalin off the east coast of Siberia to aid their Nivkh allies against the Ainu, who had been expanding north from Hokkaido. The Ainu put up a tenacious resistance, even launching a counter-attack on Mongol positions on the continent across the Strait of Tartary in 1297, but finally capitulated to the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty of China in 1308.
The Jurchen unification were a series of events in the late 16th and early 17th centuries that led to the unification of the Jurchen tribes under the Jianzhou Jurchen leader Nurhaci. While Nurhaci was originally a vassal of the Ming dynasty who considered himself a local representative of imperial Ming power, he also had a somewhat antagonistic relationship with the Ming due to Ming's involvement in events early on in his life that led to the death of his father and grandfather combined with his own increasing ambition. From 1583 to the early 1600s, Nurhaci led a series of military and influence campaigns that led to the unification of the majority of the Jurchen tribes. In 1616, Nurhaci established the Later Jin dynasty and ruled as its founding khan, and he renounced Ming overlordship with the Seven Grievances in 1618. After his death in 1626 his son Hong Taiji proclaimed the Qing dynasty by renaming the dynasty "Great Qing".
The Ming dynasty in Inner Asia was the expansion of the Ming dynasty's realm and influence in Inner Asia between the 14th and the 16th centuries. Wars were fought against the Northern Yuan, which existed as a rump state after the collapse of the Yuan dynasty in 1368, but also against other states in Inner Asia like the Oirats and the khanate of Moghulistan. As a result, Ming China at the height incorporated Manchuria, much of Inner Mongolia and Qinghai, and parts of Xinjiang into its realm, and also had some degree of influence in Tibet during the early Ming dynasty.
References
↑ Harmony and War: Confucian Culture and Chinese Power Politics, by Yuan-kang Wang
↑ The Cambridge History of China: Volume 8, The Ming Dynasty, Part 2, by Denis C. Twitchett, Frederick W. Mote, p260
↑ (Sei Wada, ‘The Natives of the Lower reaches of the Amur as Represented in Chinese Records’, Memoirs of the Research Department of Toyo Bunko, no. 10, 1938, pp. 40‒102) (Shina no kisai ni arawaretaru Kokuryuko karyuiki no dojin 支那の記載に現はれたる黒龍江下流域の土人( The natives on the lower reaches of the Amur river as represented in Chinese records), Tõagaku 5, vol . 1, Sept. 1939.) Wada, ‘Natives of the Lower Reaches of the Amur River’, p. 82. The references in the documents are to a people called the ‘Chi-li-mi’ (the term generally used in early Chinese texts to refer to the Nivkh) living next to the Ku-wu (Ainu).
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
