Agostino Sepe BACK TO THE ROOTS: THE IMPERIAL CITY OF SHENYANG AS A SYMBOL OF THE MANCHU ETHNIC IDENTITY OF THE QING DYNASTY ABSTRACT At the UNESCO meeting held in Suzhou on the 2nd of July 2004, the Imperial City of Shenyang was listed as a World Cultural Heritage Site, so that now it is recorded together with the Forbidden City of Beijing as one single item: Imperial Palaces of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Ming Qing gongdian 明清宮殿. Nevertheless, the importance of Shenyang Palace is not at all due to its similarity to the one in Beijing. The part of the Shenyang Imperial City built before the Manchu conquest of Beijing in 1644 mirrors the culture of the Manchu people and the institutions of its rulers in its architectural style. The part built during Qianlong’s reign, on the other hand, is evidence of the devotion of Later Qing emperors (from Kangxi to Daoguang) towards their ancestors and their Manchu origins. At the same time, the palace also reflects the sinicization of the Manchus and the merging of the two different cultures and institutional systems, both in some of its buildings and in its whole. These two aspects clearly distinguish the Palace from the Forbidden City and confer it with immense historical and cultural value. It is, therefore, from these points of view that I will deal with Shenyang Imperial City in this paper, whose purpose is to demonstrate how the palace is a symbol of the origins and the history of China’s last dynasty. The most ancient sources I will base my work on are Qing shilu 清實錄 (I will mainly refer to the sections regarding the Qing emperors from Nurhaci to Qianlong) and Manwen laodang 滿文老檔, which is a source of the utmost importance for the study of Qing history before the conquest of Beijing. Ming Qing Yanjiu XVI (2011) ISSN 1724-8574 Downloaded from Brill.com10/05/2021 08:09:09AM via free access Agostino Sepe 1. The Eight Banners’ Pavilions 1.1 Nurhaci1 conquers Shenyang The second month of the sixth year of his reign (1621), the Eight Banners army led by Manchu leader Nurhaci broke into the two small centres of Fengjibao 奉集 堡 and Hupiyi 虎 皮驛 near Shenyang, opening a passage to invade the city. On the tenth day of the third month, in Sarhū 薩爾滸, near the Hun river 渾河, Nurhaci ordered his troops to convey siege arsenal to Shenyang by river; two days later, his troops encamped seven li to the East of Shenyang’s fortification walls. The battle against Ming forces was about to begin. At the time, the Ming-controlled Shenyang was guarded by generals He Shixian 賀世賢 and You Shigong 尤世功, whose army counted about ten thousand soldiers. The large quantity of cannons and heavy artillery backing the He-You troops led Nurhaci to conclude that an immediate attack would be too dangerous. But soon he learned that two more Ming contingents had just left Liaoyang and Fengjibao and were heading to Shenyang to prevent the Eight Banners from breaking into the fortification. Nurhaci understood that, if he waited until the arrival of the Ming reinforcements, his troops would be confronted by the enemy on two fronts and would have no chance of resisting the attack. An abrupt and decisive assault was therefore necessary. Thus Nurhaci ordered ten members of his selected cavalry to gallop towards the wall surrounding Shenyang, openly challenging the enemy. General You Shigong sent his personal guards to face them. The Ming warriors killed four of Nurhaci’s knights and triumphantly receded behind the defensive wall. 1 The great warrior and leader Aisin Gioro Nurhaci (Chinese: Aixin jueluo Nuerhachi 愛新覺羅努爾哈赤) unified all the Manchu tribes in the Liaodong region and reorganized their society by establishing the ‘Eight Banners System’. So doing, he laid the socio-economic and military basis for the Manchu conquest of China. In 1616, he founded the Later Jin dynasty 後金, whose name would eventually be changed to Da Qing 大清 in 1636. His rise to power, the creation of the Eight Banners and his military campaigns in Liaodong are discussed in detail in Wakeman Jr. 1985: 49-74. 130 Downloaded from Brill.com10/05/2021 08:09:09AM via free access Back to the Roots The following day, upon Nurhaci’s order, other Manchu horsemen headed towards the city walls. Ming general He Shixian, hoping to finally rout his enemy, mounted an assault with his entire contingent. Feigning defeat, the Hou Jin troops let Ming forces break into their ranks. Then suddenly, the Eight Banners selected cavalry split up, surrounding Ming troops and attacking them from both sides. With the last of his strength, General He managed to break through the encirclement and retreat through the West Gate. However, the enemy soldiers followed him and took his life, his troops by now decimated. General You too, rushing to the West Gate to save his companion, was intercepted by the Later Jin cavalry and killed. At this point Nurhaci was aware that he had a good opportunity to burst through the fortification and ordered his soldiers to siege the gates and the wall. The Ming army thus resorted to cannons to try to fend off the assault (a source says that cannonades were so frequent that the cannon pipes became incandescent, causing the balls to shoot out as soon as they were loaded 2 ). Even this incredibly powerful artillery, however, couldn’t stop Nurhaci’s men, who shortly afterwards broke into the wall and took the city. When Nurhaci entered the Ming garrison city of Shenyang, the Ming reinforcements had just reached the Hun River’s shores, so Nurhaci sent the “Four Banners of the Right Wing” troops to receive them, thus ridding himself of his enemies one by one. 1.2 The new capital After the conquest, however, Nurhaci didn’t establish Shenyang as the reigning capital; in 1621, Liaoyang was chosen as the new capital of the Later Jin khanate, a city which was already the largest economic and political center, as well as the most important military base, of the Liaodong region under the Ming. Here Nurhaci built his royal palace and ordered the remains of the Aisin-Gioro clan ancestors be transferred from Hetu Ala 赫圖阿拉3 to Mount Luyang 魯陽山 not far NorthEast of the city. Furthermore, the other leaders of the Eight Banners began construction of their personal residences and buildings 2 Mingshi jinshi benmo 明史紀事本末, 4:1424. 3 Hetuala was the capital of the Later Jin khanate from 1603 to 1619. 131 Downloaded from Brill.com10/05/2021 08:09:09AM via free access Agostino Sepe for political activities. Thus it seemed that the khanate capital was to remain in Liaoyang. 4 Nevertheless, four years later, Nurhaci held a meeting with all the Beile 貝勒 and the Dachen 大臣（Great Counsellors) 5 and announced his intention to transfer the capital from Liaoyang to Shenyang, which was at that time a small frontier town lacking not only a royal palace but also any kind of structure which could serve as basis for the administration of power. Just as had happened with Nurhaci’s earlier relocation of the Later Jin capital,6 his plans met with opposition from princes and counsellors. But just as he had done previously, Nurhaci imposed his will peremptorily. The Manwen laodang 滿文老檔, the most ancient source about the historical facts discussed here, only reports the chronicle of the expedition from Liaoyang to Shenyang; in Qing Taizu gaohuangdi shilu 清太祖高皇帝實錄, which is a more recent (from the Qianlong period) but richer source,7 the description of the journey is preceded by a debate between Nurhaci and his princes and officials about the transfer of the capital. The Beile and Dachen held that, while Liaoyang royal palace had already been built, people’s homes were not yet finished and the harvest had been very poor that year, so setting out on a new journey would be too hard on the people and dangerous for the country. Nurhaci put emphasis on the location of the city of Shenyang, which was extremely favourable from a strategic point of view: to the West was the Ming Empire, which could be reached by crossing the Liao River at Duerbi 都爾鼻; to the North, Mongolian territories could be reached in just two or three days; finally, to the South there was Chaoxian (North Korea), just beyond the Qing River. 4 Wen Shuping, Wang Yanchun 2008: 3. 5 In 1613, Nurhaci conferred his five sons-in-law with the rank of Great Counsellors (Manchu: amban); in 1615 he assigned four of his sons the title Hošoi Beile, ‘Elder Captain’, (Chinese: Da Beile 大貝勒). In the same year he also designated four ‘Young Captains’ so that each banner was under the direct control of a Beile. See Wakeman Jr. 1985: 54. 6 Wu Bin’s work refers to the transfers of the capital from Hetu Ala to Jiefan 界藩, in 1619, and from Sarhū to Liaoyangin 1621. See Wu Bin 2007: 34. 7 See Wu Bin 2007: 38. 132 Downloaded from Brill.com10/05/2021 08:09:09AM via free access Back to the Roots The Khan also emphasized the possibility, afforded by the river, of supplying the city with large quantities of wood, which could be used to build the palace and as firewood; moreover, the surrounding environment was extremely good for hunting and fishing. And finally, Nurhaci declared once for all that his decision was irrevocable.8 This is how Nurhaci expressed himself regarding the economic and military reasons for which the capital was to be transferred.