The Empress Dowager Cixi at court. Cixi, a consort of Emperor Xian Feng (reigned 1850–1861), was a powerful and manipulative force in Qing dynasty politics for nearly half a century. When her son, Xian Feng’s successor, died without an heir, Cixi named her three-year-old nephew Guang Xu (reigned 1875–1908) to the throne.
Through her regency Cixi held power over Qing dynasty political life for almost half a century. She supported officials who encouraged the anti-foreign Boxer movement and accepted the humiliating treaty, the Boxer Protocol.
Nee Yehonala of the Manchu Blue Banner, also known as “Cixi,” held power over Qing dynasty (1644–1912) political life for almost half a century. She was a consort of Emperor Xian Feng (1831–1861, reigned 1850–1861) and bore his successor, Tong Zhi (1856–1875, reigned 1862–1874). After Xian Feng’s death in 1861, Cixi seized power by removing eight conservative regents from the court and setting up her own regent over the boy emperor. In 1875, after Emperor Tong Zhi died with no heir, Cixi named her three-year-old nephew Guang Xu (1871–1908, reigned 1875–1908) to the throne.
In 1898 Cixi resumed the regency as a result of a coup in which she crushed the emperor’s attempt to push through a number of radical proposals designed to modernize the Chinese government. In 1900 Cixi supported officials who encouraged the antiforeign secret-society Boxer movement. A coalition of foreign troops soon captured the capital, and Cixi was forced to flee from Beijing to northwestern China, where she accepted the humiliating treaty, the Boxer Protocol, in 1901. Returning to Beijing in 1902, she finally began to implement a number of the innovations that the reformers had sought in 1898, including the inception of China’s constitutional establishment. Cixi died on 15 November 1908, one day after the emperor’s death.
Further Reading
Der Ling, P. (1929). Old Buddha (Empress Tzu His). New York: Dodd, Mead & Company.
Haldane, C. (1965). The last great empress of China. Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill.
Source: Chen, Shiwei. (2009). Cixi Empress Dowager. In Linsun Cheng, et al. (Eds.), Berkshire Encyclopedia of China, pp. 417–418. Great Barrington, MA: Berkshire Publishing.
The Empress Dowager Cixi. In 1898 Cixi resumed the regency as a result of a coup designed to crush the emperor’s radical proposals in the effort to modernize the Chinese government.
Cixi Empress Dowager (Cíx? Tàihòu ????)|Cíx? Tàihòu ???? (Cixi Empress Dowager)
