Zhengde Emperor

The Zhengde Emperor (正德) (26 October 1491 – 20 April 1521) was emperor of China between 1505-1521 in the mid ming dynasty. Born Zhu Houzhao, he was the Hongzhi Emperor's eldest son. His era name means "Right virtue" or "Rectification of virtue".

Early years

Zhengde was created crown prince at a very early age and because his father did not take up any other concubines, Zhengde did not have to contend with other princes for the throne. (His younger brother died in infancy.) Zhengde was thoroughly educated in Confucian literature and he excelled in his studies. Many of Emperor Hongzhi's ministers expected that Zhengde would become a benevolent and brilliant emperor like his father, but this was not to be.

Reign as Emperor

Zhengde ascended the throne and was married to the Empress at the age of 14. Unlike his father, Zhengde was not interested in ruling or his Empress and disregarded all state affairs. His actions have been considered reckless, foolish or pointless. There are many instances where he showed a lack of responsibility.

He took up a luxurious and prodigal lifestyle and indulged himself in women. It was said that he liked to frequent brothels and even created palaces called "Pao Fang" (豹房; literally "The Leopards' Chamber") outside the Forbidden City in Beijing initially to house exotic animals such as tigers and leopards for his amusement and then later used to house beautiful women for his personal enjoyment. On one occasion he was badly mauled while hunting tigers, and could not appear in court audiences for a month. On another occasion he burned down his palace by storing gunpowder in the courtyards during the Lantern Festival. His harem was so overfilled that many of its women starved to death due to lack of supplies.

For months at a time he would live outside the Forbidden City or travel around the country with heavy expenditures being paid from the empire's coffer. While being urged to return to the palace and attend to governmental matters, Zhengde would refuse to receive all his ministers and ignored all their petitions. Zhengde also sanctioned the rise of eunuchs around him. One particular Liu Jin, leader of the Eight Tigers, was notorious for taking advantage of the young emperor and squandered immense amount of silver and valuables. The corrupted wealth is about 36 million pounds of gold and silver. There was even rumor of a plot that Liu Jin had intended to murder the emperor and place his own grandnephew on the throne. Liu Jin's plot was ultimately discovered, and he was executed in 1510 however the rise of corrupt enunchs continued throughout Zhengde's reign. There is also uprising led by Prince of Anhua and another uprising led by Prince of Ning. Prince of Anhua was Zhengde's great-granduncle, while Prince of Ning was his granduncle.

In time Zhengde became notorious for his childish behaviour as well as abusing his power as emperor. For instance, he created a staged commercial district inside his palace and ordered all his ministers, eunuchs, soldiers and servants of the palace to dress up and act as merchants or street vendors while he walked through the scene pretending to be a commoner. Any unwilling participants, especially the ministers (who viewed it as degrading and an insult), would be punished or removed from their post.

Then in 1518 Zhengde declared himself General Zhu (鎮國公朱壽) and personally led an expedition to the north to repeal raiding expeditions several tens of thousands strong led by the Mongol General nicknamed "The Little Prince". He met the enemy outside the city of Yingzhou and defeated them in a major battle by surrounding them. For a long period of time after this battle, the Mongols did not launch a raiding expedition into Ming territory. Then again in 1519, Zhengde Emperor led another expedition to Jiangxi province to the south to quell a rebellion by a powerful baron who had bribed many people in Zhengde's cabinet. He arrived only to discover that the revolt had already been put down by Wang Shouren, a local administrative officer. Frustrated at not being able to lead his troops to victory, Zhengde's advisor suggested the release the baron in order to capture him again. In January 1521, Zhengde had the rebel Prince of Ning executed in Tongzhou, an event that was recorded even by the Portuguese embassy to China.

Relationships with Foreigners

The Zhengde Emperor was fascinated of foreigners, invited a great deal of muslims to serve as advisors, eunuchs, and envoys at his court. His court was reportedly full of muslims, and artwork such as porcelein from his court contained Islamic inscriptions in Arabic or Persian. He was also said to wear muslim clothing and alleged to have converted to islam. muslim eunuchs ran many of his state affairs

According to Bret Hinsch in the book Passions of the cut sleeve: the male homosexual tradition in China, Zhengde had a homosexual relationship with a muslim leader from Hami, named Sayyid Husain, who served as the overseer in Hami during the Ming Turpan Border Wars.

In addition to having relationships with men, Zhengde also had many relationships with foreign women. He sought the daughters of many of his officials. The other muslim in his court, a Central Asian called Yu Yung, sent Central Asian Uighur female dancers to Zhengde's quarters for sexual purposes. The emperor liked foreign women such as Mongols and Uighur.

Zhengde was noted for having a Uighur woman as one of his favoriate concubines. Her last name was Ma, and she was reportedly trained in military and musical arts, in archery, horse riding, and singing music from Turkestan, as well as being able to speak in several languages.

Dark Affliction

Prior to the death of the emperor in early 1521, rumours about a mysterious group of creatures collectively called Dark Afflictions (黑眚) circulated the capital. Their attacks caused much unrest, because they randomly attacked people at night, causing wounds with their claws. The Minister for War asked the emperor to write an imperial edict proclaiming local security troops would arrest all those who frightened other people. The threat brought a sudden end to the spread of the stories.

Death of Emperor

Emperor Zhengde died in 1521 at the age of 30. One day in the fall of 1520 it was said that Zhengde was drunk while boating on a lake. He fell off his boat and almost drowned. He died after contracting illnesses from the Grand Canal waters. Since none of his several children had survived childhood, he was succeeded by his cousin Zhu Houcong. His tomb is located at Kangling of the ming dynasty Tombs.

Contact with Europe

During the reign of Chingtih (Zhengde) (1506), foreigners from the west called Fah-lan-ki (or Franks), who said they had tribute, abruptly entered the Bogue, and by their tremendously loud guns shook the place far and near. This was reported at court, and an order returned to drive them away immediately, and stop the trade.

The first direct European contacts with China occurred during the reign of Zhengde. In several initial missions commissioned by Afonso de Albuquerque of Portuguese Malacca, the Portuguese explorers Jorge Álvares and Rafael Perestrello landed in southern China and traded with the Chinese merchants of Tuen Mun and Guangzhou. In 1513 their king, Manuel I of Portugal sent Fernão Pires de Andrade and Tomé Pires to formally open relations between the main court at Beijing and Lisbon, capital of Portugal. Although Zhengde gave the Portuguese embassy his blessing while touring Nanjing in May 1520, he died soon after and the Portuguese (who were rumored to be troublemakers in Canton and even cannibals of kidnapped Chinese children), were ejected by Chinese authorities under the new Grand Secretary Yang Tinghe. Although illegal trade continued thereafter, official relations between the Portuguese and the Ming court would not improve until the 1540s, culminating in the Ming court's consent in 1557 which allowed Portugal to establish Macau as their trading base in China.

Legacy

Though bred to be a successful ruler, Zhengde thoroughly neglected his duties, beginning a dangerous trend that would plague future Ming emperors. The abandoning of official duties to pursue personal gratifications would slowly lead to the rise of powerful eunuchs that would dominate and eventually ruin the ming dynasty

However, more modern historians have come to view his reign in a new light and debate that his actions along with that of his successors such as Wanli was a direct reaction to the bureaucratic gridlock that the Ming was stuck in its later half. The emperors were very limited in their policy decision and could not really implement any sort of lasting effective reforms despite the obvious need, while they were faced with constant pressure and were expected to be responsible for all the troubles the dynasty faced. As a result, the ministers became increasingly frustrated and disillusioned about their post, and protested in different forms of what is essentially an imperial strike. Thus emperors like Zhengde sneaked out of the palace while emperors like Jiajing and Wanli simply didn't show up at court.

Last update 30-05-2012

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