Perpetual Happiness: the Ming Emperor Yongle

Perpetual Happiness

Perpetual Happiness The Ming Emperor Yongle

shih-shan henry tsai

university of washington press Seattle and London This publication was supported in part by the Donald R. Ellegood International Publications Endowment.

All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Tsai, Shih-shan Henry Perpetual happiness : the Ming emperor Yongle / Shih-shan Henry Tsai. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 0-295-98109-1 (alk. paper) 1. Ming Chengzu, Emperor of China, 1360–1424. 2. China—Kings and rulers—Biography. 3. China—History—Ming dynasty, 1368–1644. i. Title. ds753.6m43 t75 2001 951'.026'092—dc21 [b] 00–052771

The paper used in this publication is acid-free and recycled from 10 percent post-consumer and at least 50 percent pre-consumer waste. It meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences— Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48-1984. A8 For my wife, Dr. Hsiu-chuan Sonia Tsai

contents

Illustrations follow page 80

List of Maps ix

Acknowledgments xi

Preface xiii

1 / A Day in the Life of Yongle’s Court: February 23, 1423 3

2 / The Formative Years, 1360–1382 20

3 / The Years of Waiting, 1382–1398 37

4 / The Years of Successional Struggle, 1398–1402 57

5 / The Years of Reconstruction: Government and Politics, 1402–1420 77

6 / The Years of Rehabilitation: Society and Economy, 1402–1421 104

7 / The Emperor of Culture 129

8 / Yongle and the Mongols 148

9 / The Price of Glory 178

vii contents

10 / Epilogue 209

Appendix: The Children of Emperor Hongwu 215

Notes 217

Glossary of Chinese Characters 237

Bibliography 245

Index 257

viii maps

1. Yongle’s Empire, 1403–1424 18

2. Beijing and Its Vicinity during Yongle’s Reign 34

3. Ending the Civil War, 1402 68

4. Yongle’s First Personal Campaign, 1410 168

5. Yongle’s Fourth Personal Campaign, 1423 175

acknowledgments

or their help in gathering the source materials for this book, I am indebted to Hoyt Purvis, my student Takashi Yasuda, and my brother FWen-ching. I also had the advantage of relying upon the works of fel- low Ming scholars who have done detailed research in various aspects of history. In particular, I wish to acknowledge my debt to Edward L. Dreyer and Chu Hung for information on early Ming politics, Edward L. Farmer on early Ming legislation, Shang Chuan on anecdotes about Yongle’s childhood, and Terada Takanobu on Yongle’s campaign maps. As usual, my son Rocky was my first editor and critic and has modified my prose, clarified my thought, and given me his unstinting support. I am grateful to Beverly Butcher, who spent five hot summer weeks reading the entire manuscript and gave me some invalu- able suggestions. I also wish to thank University of Washington Press acquir- ing editors Michael Duckworth, who found two very able and thoughtful readers to help me improve my manuscript, and Lorri Hagman, who painstakingly copyedited it. Throughout the project’s duration, colleagues and friends in Asia, America, and Europe have provided inspiration, encouragement, and assistance. They include Chang Tsun-wu, Chen San-jing, Ena Chao, Hsiung Ping-chen (all at Academia Sinica in Taiwan), Tom C. Kennedy, Bill F. Tucker, Cheng Yung- chang, Tan Tianxing, Paul Holbo, Dan Ferritor, Carl Jacobson, Robert G. Finlay, Doug Merwin, Shaun Tougher, and Harry Lamley. I owe much to Ing- chang Jong for teaching me how to use Chinese software, Jenny Xu for proof- reading pinyin transliteration, and Kimberly M. Chenault for printing several di¤erent drafts of the manuscript. I also wish to acknowledge my debt of grat- itude to several dozens of my students who signed up for summer tours with me to study the Yangzi River (1986), the Silk Road (1988), Mongolia and Manchuria (1995), and Tibet and Nepal (1999). Last but not least, I want to

xi acknowledgments thank my physician daughter Shirley Tsai for regularly monitoring my health during the course of my writing this book. I am also grateful to the National Palace Museum of Taiwan for permission to use photographs of several items from its Ming collection. Research was conducted with the aid of a Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences Special Research Assignment from the University of Arkansas, and a grant from the Walton Family Charitable Foundation.

xii preface

he indomitable Yongle has been lionized as the best of imperial China because he was a tireless and restless monarch who laid the agenda not Tonly for fifteenth-century China but for most of Asia during the early modern era. At the same time, he has been criticized as the worst of imperial China because he committed an act of lèse-majesté by savaging his nephew, the incumbent emperor, and because, by keeping a large part of the popula- tion under severe strain for more than twenty years, he personified imperial tyranny. It could well be that he was by nature a fractious man who could read- ily discard sentimentality and loyalty in favor of ruthlessness and brutality. Or, perhaps because he was not the first son born to his parents—Yongle was the fourth of the dynastic founder’s twenty-six sons—he may have been predes- tined by fate and nurtured by circumstances to challenge authority and the establishment. Although he was not the favorite child, he proved himself to be strong, intelligent, and the most capable. He had a deep self-knowledge and a highly sensitive disposition; the slightest a¤ront would cause intense feelings of rejection and anger. After the death of his redoubtable father, it was Yongle who energetically took command of his brothers and nephews and emerged as astute and masterful. By the end of his reign in 1424, he was not just the son of the dynastic founder but the father of a nation that had developed the basic characteristics of what was to become modern China. These outstanding traits and his bifurcated historical personality make Yongle one of the most inviting Chinese monarchs ever to sit for a biography. The important biographical questions involve both the cunning of the man and the cunning of history. Was Yongle truly prepared for something so polit- ically and emotionally fraught as “rebellion” and “usurpation,” which chal- lenged him at the age of thirty-nine? Was he a cynical manipulator, or did he achieve greatness by being forced to deal with crises of enormous scale? Without crises, would he have remained in the league of those who risked lit-

xiii preface tle and achieved nothing notable? How did he reconcile his brand of absolutism with the political philosophy of traditional China? More importantly, did Yongle succeed in transforming the lives and dreams of millions of his subjects and, ultimately, the character of the Ming state and of society? The e¤ort of will, as with many domineering rulers, had its price on his men- tal health. Yongle was no misanthrope, but rather a tormented man, a victim of severe, recurring depression. He frequently complained about acute headaches and insomnia, and his stomach registered with pains that were symp- toms of deeply repressed anxiety. But the steepest price he had to pay was his inability to avoid being recorded in history as an alleged murderer and usurper, for the ghost of his nephew Jianwen (1377–1402) continued to haunt him, not- withstanding the raft of his lifetime achievements. It is certain, however, that after winning the bloody and devastating civil war of 1399–1402, he drove himself even harder. His active and risk-taking leadership leavened a successful, complacent nation with a ferment for change from the top and created a glit- tering era of unblemished prosperity, military expansion, and brilliant diplo- macy. During his reign of twenty-three years (1402–24), China became outward- looking and enjoyed stratospheric prestige throughout the entire Asian world. Peace reigned at home and the economy hummed as Yongle did everything possible to bridge political chasms in his war-torn country as well as to hone a “sage-king” image for posterity. The many policies he adopted and the several o‹ces he either inherited from his father or established on his own encom- passed a significant and formative period in which the newly reconstituted imperial China was consolidated. Consequently, one of the factors contribut- ing to China’s political absolutism lay in the institutional growth engendered during Yongle’s father’s reign and his own. His father was the embryo, but Yongle was the birth of Ming absolutism. A powerfully built man with a strong personality, Yongle was a brilliant, hardworking autocrat and a demanding emperor who personified the idea of active government. He had an enormous penchant for controlling events, and through the display of his burning energy, we learn of his political animal instincts. He also had a knack for calming the fears of others with his own fear- lessness. For Yongle, life meant risk and battle, often against staggering odds. From him we learn the secrets of a master manipulator of power, intrigue, mal- ice, and roguery. This book, then, is about the passions, prejudices, depression, and vision of an early modern Chinese autocrat. It is about the stories of struggle and redemption of a great and potent prince, and it is an attempt to understand the role of birth, education, and tradition in molding the personality, values, and moral sense of one of the greatest figures in Chinese history.

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