Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-dfsvx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-25T21:07:29.680Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Ortai, the Yongzheng Emperor, and the Multicolored World of China's Southwestern Frontier

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2022

Julie Bellemare Open the ORCID record for Julie Bellemare [Opens in a new window]
Julie Bellemare*
Affiliation:
Department of Asian Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: julie.bellemare@outlook.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

By examining a series of events involving sightings of multicolored clouds and discoveries of colorful minerals in China's southwestern provinces, this article considers the political implications of natural manifestations of polychromy in the Yongzheng period. Through previously unexamined written and material correspondence between governor-general Ortai (1680–1745) and the Yongzheng emperor (r. 1723–35), I argue that physical occurrences of color, both above and below ground, were understood as signs of Heavenly approval of the emperor's governance at a time of questionable military expansion into the Southwest. I also consider how celestial phenomena and colorful stones were translated into design motifs and carved into exclusive items at the Qing court, positing that these objects were understood as signs of the Yongzheng emperor's political legitimacy and concrete evidence of Qing control over the remote reaches of the empire.

Keywords

Qing dynastyYunnanauspicious signsmineral resourcesmaterial culture
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Chinese History 中國歷史學刊 , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , January 2023 , pp. 101 - 124
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

I wish to thank François Louis, Cheng-hua Wang, and the anonymous reviewers for their judicious feedback on previous versions of this article, as well as Chi-Lynn Lin for her assistance with translations. Research and writing were supported by the China and Inner Asia Council of the Association for Asian Studies, the Henry Luce Foundation, and the American Council of Learned Societies.

References

1 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian 雍正朝漢文硃批奏摺匯編 (Beijing: Zhongguo diyi lishe dang'an guan, 1981), 14.149–52.

2 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 14.150.

3 Yunnan tongzhi 雲南通志, 1691 (Kangxi year 30), 28.23a.

4 “Nacreous clouds,” International Cloud Atlas (World Meteorological Organization) https://cloudatlas.wmo.int/en/nacreous-clouds.html.

5 The first comprehensive English-language study on Ortai was by Kent Clarke Smith, “Ch'ing Policy and the Development of Southwest China: Aspects of Ortai's governor-Generalship, 1726–1731” (PhD diss., Yale University, 1971). More recently, R. Kent Guy deals extensively with Qing administration of the Southwest and analyzes the role of the palace memorial system in governing the frontier and in cementing the bond between Ortai and the Yongzheng emperor, while John Herman touches on Ortai's role in the integration of Guizhou minorities, and C. Patterson Giersch examines the violent transformation of Yunnan borderlands from both Qing and indigenous perspectives. Guy, R. Kent, Qing governors and Their Provinces: The Evolution of Territorial Administration in China, 1644–1796 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2010), 326–51Google Scholar; Herman, John E., Amid the Clouds and Mist: China's Colonization of Guizhou, 1200–1700 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007)Google Scholar; Giersch, C. Patterson, Asian Borderlands: The Transformation of Qing China's Yunnan Frontier (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006)Google Scholar. Several Chinese-language articles evaluate Ortai's strategy in the Southwest. See for instance Wang Ying 王纓, “E'ertai yu Xinan diqu de gaitu guiliu” 鄂爾泰與西南地區的改土歸流,” Qingshi yanjiu 1995.2, 32–39.

6 See for instance Wang Cheng-hua 王正華, Yishu, quanli yu xiaofei: Zhongguo yishushi yanjiu de yi ge mianxiang 藝術、權力與消費：中國藝術史研究的一個面向 (Hangzhou: Zhongguo meishu xueyuan, 2011); Lai Yu-chih 賴毓芝, “‘Suzhou pian’ yu Qing gong yuanti de chengli” ‘蘇州片’與清宮院體的成立,” in Wei haowu: 16–18 shiji Suzhou pian ji qi yingxiang 偽好物: 16–18世紀蘇州片及其影響, ed. Chiu Shih-hua 邱士華 (Taipei: Guoli gugong bowuyuan, 2018), 387–409; Xu Xiaodong 許曉東, “Kangxi, Yongzheng shiqi gongting yu difang huafalang jishu de hudong” 康熙、雍正時期宮廷與地方畫琺瑯技術的互動, in Gongting yu difang: Shiqi zhi shiba shiji de jishu jiaoliu 宮廷與地方: 十七至十八世紀的技術交流, ed. Gugong bowuyuan and Max-Planck-Institut (Beijing: Zijincheng, 2010), 277–335.

7 Jonathan Schlesinger, A World Trimmed with Fur: Wild Things, Pristine Places, and the Natural Fringes of Qing Rule (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2017); Stephen H. Whiteman, Where Dragon Veins Meet: The Kangxi Emperor and His Estate at Rehe (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2019).

8 See for instance, McCausland, Shane, “The Emperor's Old Toys: Rethinking the Yongzheng (1723–35) Scroll of Antiquities in the Percival David Foundation,” Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society 66 (2001–2002), 72Google Scholar.

9 Sturman, Peter C., “Cranes above Kaifeng: The Auspicious Image at the Court of Huizong,” Ars Orientalis 20 (1990), 36Google Scholar.

10 Sturman, “Cranes above Kaifeng,” 43–45.

11 The 50-meter-long handscroll, now in the Tibet Museum, Lhasa, is almost fully illustrated in Precious Deposits: Historical Relics of Tibet, China 3 (Beijing: Morning Glory Publishers, 2000), 94–137.

12 Patricia Berger, “Miracles in Nanjing: An Imperial Record of the Fifth Karmapa's Visit to the Chinese Capital,” in Cultural Intersections in Later Chinese Buddhism, ed. Marsha Weidner (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2001), 149.

13 Berger, “Miracles in Nanjing,” 150.

14 In 1728, Guangxi came under his purview as the governor-general of Yunnan, Guizhou, and Guangxi.

15 Smith, Ch'ing Policy, 38.

16 Alexander Woodside, “The Divorce between the Political Center and Educational Creativity in Late Imperial China,” in Education and Society in Late Imperial China 1600–1900, ed. Benjamin A. Elman and Alexander Woodside (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 484.

17 Giersch, Asian Borderlands, 43–63.

18 John Herman, “National Integration and Regional Hegemony: The Political and Cultural Dynamics of Qing State Expansion, 1650–1750” (PhD Diss., University of Washington, 1993), 30–31.

19 Zu Binggui 祖秉圭, cited in Herman, John E., “Empire in the Southwest: Early Qing Reforms to the Native Chieftain System,” Journal of Asian Studies 56.1 (1997), 47CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 Cited in Chen Hsi-yuan, “Propitious Omens and the Crisis of Political Authority: A Case Study of the Frequent Reports of Auspicious Clouds during the Yongzheng Reign,” Papers on Chinese History 3 (1994), 84.

21 The letter was transmitted by messenger to Yue Zhongqi 岳鍾琪 (1686–1754), governor-general of Sichuan and Shanxi provinces, who relayed the information to the Yongzheng emperor. For a full account of the incident and the emperor's response, see Jonathan D. Spence, Treason by the Book (London: Penguin, 2002). The relationship between this crisis and the appearance of auspicious clouds is discussed in Chen, “Propitious Omens,” 77–94.

22 In an attempt to reason with those potentially harboring anti-Qing sentiments, the Yongzheng emperor published the Dayi juemi lu 大義覺迷錄 in 1730, which included parts of the treasonous letter, the emperor's counter-arguments, and Zeng Jing's mea culpa. Pamela K. Crossley, A Translucent Mirror: History and Identity in Qing Imperial Ideology (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), 254–57.

23 Ortai responded with outrage in a memorial dated May 12, 1729, six months before the cloud sightings. Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 15.104.

24 Chen, “Propitious Omens,” 78, 84.

25 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 15.858.

26 Amy McNair, “On the Meaning of the ‘Blue-and-Green Manner’ in Chinese Landscape Painting,” in Perspectives on the Heritage of the Brush, ed. Marsha Weidner (Lawrence: Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, 1997), 71.

27 Edict dated to the seventh year, eighth month, and twenty-first day of the Yongzheng reign (equivalent to October 13, 1729). Qing shilu 清實錄, 85.20a.

28 Da Qing wuchao huidian 大清五朝會典 (Beijing: Xianzhuang shuju, 2006), 5.1019.

29 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui 清宮内務府造辦處檔案總匯 (Beijing: Zhongguo diyi lishi dang'an guan; Renmin, 2005), 3.136.

30 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 2.105, 730.

31 But over 13 cm in height, the chunsheng would have been almost twice as large as most Japanese inrō.

32 Yu Chu Liu, “Hanging Plaque with Enamel Inlays,” in Emperor's Treasures: Chinese Art from the National Palace Museum, Taipei, ed. Jay Xu and Li He (San Francisco: Asian Art Museum, 2016), 169.

33 An entry from the workshop archives dating to the second month of the first year of the Yongzheng reign (equivalent to March 19, 1723) orders the production of a wooden hanging screen with a design of flowing clouds. The entry does not mention enamels nor imperial writing, yet it demonstrates the Yongzheng emperor's longstanding penchant for this motif; Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 1.203.

34 In her work on two auspicious motifs prevalent in the arts of the Yongzheng period, bamboo and magpies (jiejie shuangxi 節節雙喜), and millet and quails (suisui shuang'an 歲歲雙安), Lin Shu argues that workshop supervisors were aware of the emperor's decorative preferences. Lin Shu 林姝, “Yongzheng shiqi de jiyan huoji 雍正時期的吉言活計,” in Liang'an gugong diyi xueshu yantao hui 兩岸故宮第一屆學術研討會 (Taipei: Guoli gugong bowuyuan, 2010), 1–13.

35 “Shizong xian huangdi shangyu baqi” 世宗憲皇帝上諭八旗, in Qing wenyuange siku quanshuben 清文淵閣四庫全書本 (Beijing: Beijing airusheng shuzihua jishu yanjiu zhongxin, 2009), juan 12, passage dated to the twelfth year, first month, and second day of the Yongzheng reign (February 5, 1734).

36 Ortai's campaigns created new prefectures that formed the core of copper mining in Yunnan. See Nanny Kim, “Copper Transports out of Yunnan, ca. 1750–1850: Transport Technologies, Natural Difficulties and Environmental Change in a Southwest Highland Area,” in Metals, Monies, and Markets in Early Modern Societies: East Asian and Global Perspectives 1, ed. Thomas Hirzel and Nanny Kim (Berlin: Lit, 2008), 191–220. Fei Huang has shown how the Qing expansion of copper mining in the region ushered in the transformation of a frontier landscape into one that was conceived as well-ordered and civilized. See Huang, Fei, “The Making of a Frontier Landscape: The ‘Ten Views of Dongchuan’ in Eighteenth-Century Southwest China,” Late Imperial China 35:2 (2004), 56–88CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

37 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 14.452.

38 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.467.

39 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.786–87. The green “Duan” in Qing workshop archives is not a typical Duan stone from Guangdong, but a green Songhua stone. See Dorothy Ko, The Social Life of Inkstones: Artisans and Scholars in Early Qing China (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2017), 39n64.

40 Chi Jo-hsin 嵇若昕, “Pinlie duanshe: Songhua shiyan yanjiu” 品埒端歙：松花石硯研究, in Pinlie duanshe: Songhua shiyan tezhan 品埒端歙：松花石硯特展 (Taipei: Guoli gugong bowuyuan, 1993), 13. I am grateful to Jeffrey Moser for bringing the polychrome nature of Songhua inkstones to my attention.

41 Ko, The Social Life of Inkstones, 40–41.

42 For instance, the Qianlong emperor ordered the creation of large display objects carved using jade quarried in Xinjiang to convey his control over new territories. See Wu, Yulian, “Chimes of Empire: The Construction of Jade Instruments and Territory in Eighteenth-Century China,” Late Imperial China 40.1 (2019), 43–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

43 Wuding stone is mentioned in seven entries: Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.140, 467, 664, 667, 693; 4.345, 383.

44 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.140–41.

45 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.608–9.

46 It is difficult to determine whether parts of today's Kachin state were under Qing control during the Yongzheng period, since much of the Yunnan borderlands themselves were still ruled by local chieftains. The opportunities offered by the borderlands’ mining industry attracted many Chinese migrants, yet Myanmar was never under direct Qing control. Dai, Yingcong, “A Disguised Defeat: The Myanmar Campaign of the Qing Dynasty,” Modern Asian Studies 38.1 (2004), 145–89CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47 Sun Laichen, “From Baoshi to Feicui: Qing-Burmese Gem Trade, c.1644–1800,” in Chinese Circulations: Capital, Commodities, and Networks in Southeast Asia, ed. Eric Tagliacozzo and Wen-Chin Chang (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011), 204–5.

48 Sun, “From Baoshi to Feicui,” 207.

49 Sun, “From Baoshi to Feicui,” 211.

50 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 2.70, 438.

51 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 1.473.

52 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 14.452.

53 Chen Yuxiu 陳玉秀, “Xuanyun feixia: Tan Yongzheng manao de jianshang” 旋雲飛霞：談雍正朝瑪瑙的鑑賞, Gugong wenwu yuekan 319.10 (2009), 84–91.

54 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 15.326. Misidentifications of stones appears to have been common. Take for instance the way in which Ortai paid close attention to the distinctions between the different stones, naming and describing each one in terms of color and patterning. When the stones reached Beijing, their differences were erased and they were all grouped under “Wuding stones,” or even misidentified by the emperor himself, as is the case for “Jingzhou” agates. Similarly, as will be discussed below, Ortai mistook Shoushan stone for agate, perhaps because he was not familiar with this type of stone from Fujian province.

55 On January 23, 1730, the workshops received a tribute of nine more Wuding stones from Ortai. Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.693.

56 Kim, “Copper Transports out of Yunnan,” 191–220.

57 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.613–14.

58 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 4.99.

59 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 18.506–7.

60 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 4.344.

61 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 8.119–20; 10.357–59, 652–53; 12.298; 13.699–700.

62 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.123.

63 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 1.258; 2.539.

64 Chen dates the emperor's receipt of Ortai's memorial to February 3, 1729. Furthermore, on February 6, the Yongzheng emperor ordered the report to be included in the historical record and made public. See Chen, “Propitious Omens,” 83–84.

65 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.436.

66 Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.703.

67 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 14.667–68. Ortai mistakes Shoushan stone for agate. Shoushan stone, mined in Fujian province, is an opaque soapstone that is typically bright yellow or reddish.

68 As mentioned at the beginning of this section, prior to reporting on the clouds, Ortai regularly received gifts as rewards for his work as governor-general, much like other high officials such as Yue Zhongqi 岳鐘琪 (1686–1754), Tian Wenjing 田文鏡 (1662–1732), Li Wei 李衛 (1687–1738), and Nian Gengyao 年羹堯 (1679–1726), before the latter's fall from grace. Yet this set of gifts is particularly sumptuous and unequalled in the gratitude memorials from the period, except perhaps for gifts received by Ji Zengyun 嵇曾筠 (1670–1738), director-general of the Grand Canal in Jiangnan, who in 1733 received a large set comprising an inlaid belt buckle, nine gilt Buddha figures, as well as several pieces of enamelware, glass, and inkstones. Surviving memorials do not point to any extraordinary deeds by Ji in the months prior to receiving the presents, save from the yearly work of controlling the spring floods; Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 24.919–21. The gift set is also recorded in the workshop archives, Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 5.664–65.

69 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 15.589–90; 16.407; 19.535; 19.880; Qinggong neiwufu zaobanchu dang'an zonghui, 3.608 lists an order for the boxing up of the two porcelain vases, one copper-red vase and one pea-green, as presents for Ortai.

70 Edict dated to October 13, 1729. Qing shilu, 85.20a.

71 Yongzheng chao hanwen zhupi zouzhe huibian, 14.452.

72 This relationship between center and periphery is arguably aligned with forms of colonialism. Laura Hostetler argues for the use of the term in light of the Qing empire's shifting administration of the Southwest in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, citing the displacement of indigenous populations of Guizhou by settlers, and the replacement of the native chieftain system by direct government control. Laura Hostetler, Qing Colonial Enterprise: Ethnography and Cartography in Early Modern China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001), 29–30.

73 Herman, John E., “Empire in the Southwest: Early Qing Reforms to the Native Chieftain System,” Journal of Asian Studies 56.1 (1997), 47CrossRefGoogle Scholar.