From the portraits of 12 emperors from Nurhachi to Puyi, we can see the traces of the Manchu dynasty from prosperity to decline.
Nurhachi and Huang Taiji lived on the grassland before entering the Central Plains, eating high-protein foods such as goat's milk and mutton, and their bodies were relatively strong. He had a hard time at the beginning of his business. He adopted the principle that "those who disobey are armed with soldiers, those who obey are convinced by virtue, and those who obey are accompanied by kindness and prestige". In order to meet the needs of social development, he established the Eight Banners and Manchu system, which laid the foundation for the establishment of the Qing Dynasty.
With his literary talent, Huang Taiji conquered Korea twice, Mongolia three times and the Central Plains five times. In terms of literature, he established the Eight Banners of the Han Dynasty, reused scholars and talents of the Han nationality, learned the rules of the Han nationality, and consolidated centralization. Under his rule, the Qing Dynasty became stable.
Huang taiji is also a workaholic. He has always loved his job since he ascended the throne. 1643 He "sat dead without illness". He was still working before he died. He died of overwork.
After the death of Huang taiji, the eldest son Haug and his younger brother Dourgen were the most powerful competitors to the throne, and neither of them allowed anyone. Finally, Dourgen proposed to let Huang Taiji's 6-year-old son Shunzhi succeed to the throne and become the regent himself.
Shunzhi is too young to be in power personally, and the imperial power is in Dourgen's hands. In order to keep the throne, his mother, Da Yuer, did not hesitate to betray her sex and have an affair with Dourgen. When Shunzhi grew up, he learned that adults hated Dourgen and Da Yuer very much. 1650 Dourgen died and came to power by himself. During his tenure, he moved the capital to Beijing to protect the Forbidden City and captured Nanjing to unify the Central Plains.
Shunzhi died of smallpox, and Xiao Zhuang was afraid that the next emperor would have the same problem again, so he found Kangxi's succession to smallpox. Kangxi ascended the throne at the age of 8, and Da Yuer once again assisted the young master. She learned the lesson of Shunzhi's disharmony between mother and son, taught Kangxi in a gentle way, and asked him to be an upright and wise monarch. Kangxi had a good relationship with his grandmother since childhood, and took over power from her at the age of 14.
During his reign of 6 1 year, he levied three taxes on galdan, put down the rebellion in San Francisco, reduced the corvee tax, encouraged reclamation, and turned the Qing Dynasty into a world power. After being in office for so long and doing so many things, the whole person is tired and thin, which is in sharp contrast with the former emperor.
There are rumors that Kangxi passed the throne to Yongzheng because he liked Qianlong when he was a child. In order to make Qianlong an emperor in the future, Yongzheng succeeded to the throne. Anyway, Yongzheng defeated the other eight princes and became the final winner.
He was the busiest and most tired emperor in the Qing Dynasty. He works harder than Huang taiji, sleeping only four hours a day, boasting that he is "diligent in telling the world". Yongzheng worked so hard and did a lot of useful things, put down the northwest rebellion, rectified the corrupt officials in the last years of Kangxi, abandoned the low ethnic groups, and allowed people who originally belonged to the low ethnic groups to participate in the imperial examination.
Thanks to the efforts of Kangxi and Yongzheng to lay the foundation for the prosperity of Qianlong, Qianlong also did a lot of practical things, compiled cultural classics, reduced farmers' taxes, unified the western regions, realized the great unity of all ethnic groups in China, and pushed the prosperity of Kangxi and Qianlong to the peak.
In the late Qianlong period, people began to be confused. A closed-door policy slowed the development of China for hundreds of years, which laid the groundwork for the invasion of China by western powers.
The biggest problem encountered by Jiaqing is the anti-Qing White Lotus Sect. In order to eradicate the white lotus religion, it suppressed 12 years and spent more than 100 million taels of silver. The white lotus religion was eradicated, and the national strength of the Qing Dynasty turned from prosperity to decline.
18 16 years, the British sent a mission to cooperate with him. If he can seize this opportunity, he may be able to make the Qing Dynasty strong again. But he was obsessed with the problem that foreigners could not kneel down and refused to trade with Britain. In order to reverse the huge trade deficit between China and Britain, Britain sold opium to China.
Daoguang caught up with the first Opium War that broke out in 1840. The cold weapons of the Qing army were defeated by the hot weapons of Britain, and China was forced to sign the unequal treaty "treaty of nanking", which led to modernization.
Xianfeng also caught up with the opium war. During the Second Opium War, the British and French allied forces burned the Yuanmingyuan and destroyed or lost many China cultural relics.
Tongzhi is the shortest-lived emperor in history of qing dynasty. He ascended the throne at the age of 6 and died at the age of 19. He really ruled the country for only three or four years. Empress Dowager Cixi and Ci 'an appeared in the palace.
Tongzhi has no children. In order to stay in power, Cixi made his nephew Guangxu emperor. Guangxu succeeded to the throne as young as Kangxi, but he didn't have such a good imperial grandmother as Da Yuer. Cixi wanted to govern the country more than he did, and she refused to delegate, which led him to be a puppet emperor all his life. The above four emperors caught up with the most humiliating period of the Qing Dynasty, and their bodies changed from the size of Nurhachi to emaciated, just as the powerful Qing Dynasty suddenly became weak.
Guangxu died childless. Cixi found 3-year-old Puyi from Chunwangfu to continue to be a puppet emperor, but she died in 1908 before she could control Puyi, and Puyi succeeded to the throne under the leadership of Yulong.
There were cameras in Puyi's time, and his portraits were all photos without portraits of the emperor. He is the only emperor with photos in China.
Puyi was only three years old when he ascended the throne, and he didn't know how to govern the country at all. Outside, the smoke of the Revolution of 1911 was burning everywhere, and the Qing Dynasty died in 19 12 in February, 12. From the photo, Puyi is also thin and small, in sharp contrast with Nurhachi.