The History of China - #284 - Qing 23: Frozen Ashes

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

Galdan is dead. Kangxi's victory is total. It's all over but the crying. ... and the executions via slow-slicing... and the crushing of his bones... and the punishment of his family... and the writing him out of history... Please support the show!: patreon.com/thehistoryofchina Time Period Covered: 1697-8 CE Major Historical Figures: Qing Dynasty: The Kangxi Emperor (Aisin-Gioro Xuanye) [r. 1654-1722] Jean-Francois Gerbillon, Puritan Missionary Tómas Pereira, Puritan Missionary Gen. Fiyanggu Gen. Sunsike Dzungar Mongols: Galdan, the Boshugtu Khan [r. 1679-1697] Lamist Tibetans: The Sixth Dalai Lama, Tsangyang Gyatso [1683- after 1706] sDe-pa Desi Sangye Gyampo [1653-1705] Major Sources Cited: Perdue, Denis. China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia. Spence, Jonathan D. Emperor of China: Self-Portrait of K’ang-hsi. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to an Airwave Media Podcast. Four hundred years ago, a trio of tiny kingdoms were perched on some damp islands off the coast of Europe. Within three short centuries, these islands would become the centre of an empire which ruled a quarter of the globe and on which the sun never set. I'm Samuel Hume, a historian of the British Empire, and my podcast Pax Britannica follows the people and events that built that empire into a global superpower. Learn the History of China. Episode 284, Frozen Ashes. Now Galdan is dead, and his followers have come back to our allegiance.

My great task is done. In two years, I made three journeys, across deserts combed by wind and bathed with rain, eating every other day in the barren and uninhabited deserts. One could have called it a hardship, but I never called it that. People all shun such things, but I did not shun them. The constant journeying and hardship has led me to this great achievement. I would never have done such a thing had it not been for Galdan. Now heaven, earth, and ancestors have protected me and brought me this achievement. As for my own life, one can say it is happy. One can say it is fulfilled. One can say I have what I wanted. In a few days in the palace, I shall tell you all about it myself.

It is hard to tell it with brush and ink. These are just the main points. The Kangxi Emperor, in a letter to Gu Wensheng on the 17th day of the 4th lunar month, 1697. Galdan was now camped in the Altai Mountains, over 1,600 kilometers northwest of Ningxia, and 29 days' march north from Jinyuguan. Because Galdan's forces were so weak, the Qing armies could travel light and fast. Two forces of 3,000 troops each would set out, one from Ningxia and one from Jiayuguan. Only Mongol allies with many horses were allowed to join. Less was more. The force set out in late February and headed on a path inside the Great Wall through the mountainous terrain of Shanxi. The small force of 400 men in

the Imperial Guard struggled their way over the rocky mountains, ravines, and deep sands. Nearly a month later, on March 26th, the Emperor met with his guest, the captive son of Galdan, Sebteng Balger, at a spot between the Yellow River and the Great Wall called Shenmu. Kangxi wished to know from the Mongol prince whether, in his estimation, Galdan could be induced to surrender, and if so, how? Quote, The terrified boy could not give a definite answer,

but hoped that his father would give in to the imperial might. Kangxi regarded the boy as a small, inferior person, lacking his father's courage. Gerbion, however, found him to be well-built, triste et étonné, sad and surprised, and thought he held up well under questioning. The boy was sent on to Beijing. Kangxi had big plans for the boy after all, and it wouldn't do to have him mistreated before his big, big day of getting publicly executed for the crimes of his father. No, that simply wouldn't do at all.

In making this decision, Kangxi would soon learn that he faced some surprising pushback from a wholly unexpected source. None other than Galdan's cousin and mortal enemy, Tsao-ang-rab-dan, who was himself currently making war on the Jungar lord in support of the Qing campaign, contacted the Beg of Hami that had captured Seb-tong Belger, who was his nephew, and demanded custody of the boy. The bag of Hami, in desperation, turned to Beijing and formally requested protection from the Qing Empire? Now, this kind of an ask comes with strings attached. Pretty big ones. You are asking a foreign power to take care of your border protection. You are asking to be their protectorate and they your suzerain. And so it was that Hami would become the very first of the Turkic oasis cities

that would be officially incorporated into the Qing sphere. Soon thereafter, sensing which direction the typhoon gale was indeed blowing, the assembled Mongol princes of Kokonor likewise pledged their submission to the Kangxi Emperor and Great Qing, though the region had never before been under imperial control. This is worth pausing at. Kokonor is the Oirat Mongolian name of the body of water as well as the entire region around it that is more commonly known today by its Mandarin name, Qinghai. Qinghai, translating as the Cerulean Sea. It's the largest province in modern China, not counting autonomous regions such as Xinjiang or Tibet,

and clocks in at about 278,400 square miles, making it slightly larger than Texas. Yeah, eat it, Leatherface. From Perdue, quote, This was an unprecedented submission to imperial rule of outer barbarians, as described in former histories, end quote. It must be remembered that one of the central driving tenets that determines whether a Chinese imperial dynasty is doing well or not is whether it's acting as a cultural magnet. A territorial submission like this is something akin to the U.S. annexation of Texas and the Mexican-American war that would happen on the other side of the world about a century and a half later. Noteworthy. In fact, Kangxi let things get a little carried

away in his announcement, going so far as to assert that even Tsewang Rabdon had submitted to him as an imperial subject, when in fact no such thing had taken place. Tsewang Rabdon was only an ally of convenience against their mutual foe, Galdan, not a Qing subject. Even Tibet, the now one region that yet remained outside of Qing grasp, had been notably shaken by news of Galdan's defeat. The revelation of the death of the Dalai Lama and its decade-long cover-up by the Depa now served the Kangxi Emperor's narrative, since he was able to assert that Galdan's stated purpose of defending the honor of the Dalai Lama and acting on his holy orders could be cast as having been merely duped by the untrustworthy Depa. The Depa, now formal regent of Tibet in name of the minor sixth Dalai Lama, understood the rise in Qing fortunes and sought to distance his regime

from its former error-prone stance. Galdan was no friend of Lhasa. Now on the very precipice of victory, the Kangxi Emperor chose the tone of magnanimous benefactor in his letter to Lhasa. Quote, I note that Mongols beyond the borders have always resisted China. No dynasty until ours has exerted authority over Mongolia and made them submit in their hearts. Using troops is cruel. The ruler does it only if necessary.

Since ancient times, those who loved distant expeditions caused losses to the country's spirit. So I value most not creating trouble. End quote. Yet, in a curious inversion of that very veneer of civility and peace-seeking virtue that Kangxi is so very much seeking to put forth here, we also have letters from him expressing the very opposite. He declared at this time that he would cease hunting all game, calling it trivial compared to his true hunt, the human target. Quote, the weaker Mongol enemies become, the closer they

came to the animal order in Manchu eyes. End quote. After a march of 1,400 miles over 51 days, on April 17th, Qing troops at last arrived at Ningxia. It was a, quote, beautiful rich landscape with cheap food supplies and abundant irrigation, end quote. And here, Perdue is careful to note one of the more unsung heroes of this already little-sung-about campaign, none other than the Grain Transport Commissioner, Yu Chenglong. With a skill for logistics approaching the superhuman, Yu oversaw grain shipments of some 3,000 shi, or almost 400,000 pounds of grain, up the Yellow River to its northwestern bend in boats,

then transferring it to camel carts for the rest of the journey all the way out to the Altai Mountains, a distance of more than 1,400 li, or almost 440 miles. This was a logistical nightmare, and yet by the time that June rolled around, Yu had worked out a transportation system so comprehensive that each Qing soldier on campaign could be assured of at least 45 days worth of supplies, all under heavy guard behind six-foot-high walls and nine-foot-deep pits.

It might not be the sexiest role to play in a war, but it certainly is one of the most necessary. Without proper provisioning, Achilles never makes it to Troy at all, much less a good breakfast before fighting Hector. And, rather surprisingly and satisfyingly, this time the quartermaster gets his due. According to Wei Yuan, after Galdan's death, a Qing general told Danjila, Galdan's chief general, quote, The man who destroyed your state is the grain transport commissioner Yu Chenglong. Danjila hung his head in shame. End quote.

Kangxi spent almost three weeks in Ningxia before seeing his troops off from Baita on the great bend of the Yellow River. Yet in spite of his prior vow to march 20 days across the desert in pursuit of Galdan, he now opted to turn back and return to Beijing, this time via a much shorter route than his outward procession. It had by now been more than two months since he'd been at the capital, and already he was beginning to feel apparent pangs of distrust over the regency of his son, perhaps a foreshadowing

of the two's later falling out toward the end of the Kangxi reign. Finally, after 129 days of travel, the Kangxi Emperor re-entered the Forbidden City on July 4th, 1697. It had been his longest campaign to date, though in truth, it had been almost all, quote, "...conducted not in the steps of the frontier, but promenading through the myriad city streets nestled within the at least perceived protection of the Great Wall." And yet, for all his sound and fury, Kangxi could not possibly have known that it was all signifying nothing. For Galdan had strut and fret his hour

upon the stage, but by now had died and was heard no more, even before the emperor had first arrived at Ningxia. Reports began trickling back from his own emissaries soon after his arrival. They indicated severe dissension within Galdan's camp. Drinking with Galdan in his tent, began trickling back from his own emissaries soon after his arrival. Quote, they indicated severe dissension within Galdan's camp. Drinking with Galdan in his tent, Danjila and another Jungar leader, Arjanjab, denounced Galdan for bringing about the destruction of their state and failing to defend the way of Buddha. They told him, quote, we have followed you until the end, but now we cannot bear it anymore. The road divides us in two.

End quote. There could be only surrender or death. For the perhaps 300 men still following, bedraggled, skeleton-thin, riding skeletal horses with the arid waists of the Mongolian outback, surrender was the obvious option. It meant survival, even if little else. Yet for Galdan, it held no such comfort. He knew that his life, and likely those of his family, would be forfeit if he surrendered. So it wouldn't be surrender or death for him, but surrender and death. He simply could not.

Kangxi's envoy offered further inducements to Galdan's general, Danjila, promising not only him, but even Galdan himself their lives, positions, titles, and unimaginable wealth if they surrendered, letting slip as well that the emperor himself headed an army that even now camped in the Ordos and was well-provisioned to attack at any time. Don Gelius saw which way the tide was swirling, and advised his lord Khan to accept these unbelievably good terms, yet Galdan was unmoved.

Perhaps he'd simply come too far. Maybe he just smelled the stink of lie wafting off the honeyed promise of leniency and reward. At length, the envoys had no choice but to leave their mission incomplete. Galdan, it seemed, would not surrender. At this, even his own royal envoy, Galei Guying, quit Galdan's service and deserted his camp in disgust and despair to join the cascade of refugees joining the Qing. Soon thereafter, some of those same refugees reported to Qing officers hearing cannon fire near Galdan's encampment.

Scouts would come to find that the Jungar Khan had moved the remainder of his forces, now numbering as few as a hundred, further northwest into the rugged Altai Mountains. Then, on April 4th, 1697, on the shores of Lake Kara-Usu, where the modern Mongolia city of Kovdu sits, Galdan, the Bashuktu Khan of the Jungars, descendant of Esen Taishi and the legitimate scion of Genghis Khan, last of the steppe conquerors, died at the age of 52 or 53, under what is very generously put as mysterious circumstances.

From Fort Sumter to the Battle of Gettysburg. From the Emancipation Proclamation to Appomattox Courthouse. From the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Compromise of 1877. From Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman. To Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. The Civil War and Reconstruction was a pivotal era in American history. I'm Rich. And I'm Tracy.

And we're the hosts of a podcast that takes a deep dive into that era, when a war was fought to save the Union and to free the slaves. And when the work to rebuild the nation after that war was over turned into a struggle to guarantee liberty and justice for all Americans. Look for The Civil War and Reconstruction wherever you find your podcasts. The Kangxi Emperor learned of his great nemesis' ignominious end some 59 days later, on the night of June 2nd at Bao Tou on his return journey. There had been some prior sporadic reports of gun or cannon fire near where Gao Dan's camp was known to be, and reports that the Khan may have been moving

further off after having split from a large fraction of his remaining men. But the word arrived that the Jungar Khan had been taken with a sudden illness one morning and died the same evening. It was unclear what the illness had been. Further inquiries by the emperor into this questionable set of circumstances revealed that Danjila had not reported this information earlier because he and his men had still been overcome with exhaustion to the point of immobility. But apparently, the final words of Galdan had been heard and recorded and were relayed to the Kangxi Emperor as having been, quote, I believed that the Junghars were a good people. I did not expect them to be so faithless, end quote. So, something is obviously off here,

right? You feel it, I feel it, and the Kangxi Emperor definitely feels it too. He immediately suspected, that's right, the obvious answer, poison. He wrote as much to his son, the Prince Regent back in Beijing, saying that Galdan has either committed suicide or been poisoned by one of his subordinates, of this he was certain. Yet final proof would have to wait for the debriefing of Galdan's own personal physician, Cenbu Sangbu, who reported that he had prevented even the Khan's right hand, Danjila, from offering so much as meat to the ailing lord. So as far as the Qing imperial retinue was concerned, and apparently even Kangxi himself, it must have been suicide, I guess.

Quote, The emperor and his ministers had often predicted that heaven's great rewards to the Qing and Galdan's despair would lead him to kill himself. Once again, these predictions had come true. End quote. It may have been in the interests of the Qing official mytho-historians and the Emperor's vanity alike to accept the answer of Qing divine inevitability as Galdan's effective cause of death. But Perdue is much less certain and points out some very intriguing counter-evidence.

Psychologically, for instance, there's nothing in the personality or general makeup of everything we know about Galdan to indicate that he would have ever seriously contemplated suicide, even at the direst of extremes. Religiously, and again, we must remember how sincerely devout he was, Buddhist commandments likewise forbade suicide in general, but especially one such as he, who was a living Buddha and reincarnation of a high monk. Perdue puts it, quote, It is possible, as some scholars believe, that Galdon died of a sudden natural illness, such as a brain seizure. His illness could certainly have not been a slow degenerative

one like smallpox, the most common and feared cause of death among Mongols exposed to outside influences. Yet he died very shortly after the stormy meeting with Danjila and other top aides reported by Kangxi's envoy. Given the severe disagreements within Galdan's camp and his evident distrust of even his most loyal aides, I think the emperor's first suspicions were correct. Galdan was poisoned by one of his followers, most likely Danjila, who gained credit with the Qing for delivering Galdan's body and saved himself from complete ruin, end quote. Kuibono indeed., a murder mystery, fascinating though it is, didn't wrap itself up in a nice enough little bow for the Qing myth-making imagineers' tastes. Certainly, not after all that hyping they'd been doing about the Kangxi Emperor's war against the Khan

being the embodiment of Heaven's divine will being enacted. The Khan's buddy dropping cyanide in his bowl of eye-rog to save his own hide doesn't exactly make for a compelling hero tale. So, the settled-upon cause of death was suicide, as they'd quote-unquote predicted, and while they were at it, they just went ahead and massaged the date of death a little, just by, like, you know, a month, so that it was in the went ahead and massaged the date of death a little. Just by, like, you know, a month, so that it was in the third lunar month rather than the fourth, and only because

then it wouldn't look like the entire very, very costly and burdensome expedition hadn't been utterly pointless. No reason to embarrass anybody, after all. As later Imperial historical commentators would breathlessly note, quote, the Emperor then, that as thorough as Qing historians were in ensuring that all official accounts of the end of Galdan reflected this official viewpoint, yet would be so careless as to overlook the survival of unharmonized sources such as the personal communiques between the emperor and his son, or the reports contained in the Qinjiang Pinding Shuo Mo Fang Lui, both of which contain significant contradictions to what was eventually agreed upon as the official way things went. Regardless, it would be on July 4th, 1697, that the Kangxi Emperor would make his glorious

return to the imperial capital with a fete of triumph the likes of which surely hadn't been seen since the conquest era half a century prior. Quote, Bannermen, merchants, elders, and women lined the streets of the capital, holding incense and prostrating themselves before the procession. The Grand Counselors listed the Emperor's great feats, defeating the rebellion of the Chahar Mongols, suppressing the three feudatories, conquering Taiwan, and entering it into the registers, or rubantu,

as an overseas territory, or haiwai, collecting tribute from Russia, which never before had had contact with China. Now crowned with the final elimination of the Mongol menace, they boasted, no emperor from the past can compare with this. They boasted, At the Tai He Dian, a great ceremony celebrated Galdan's extermination. Officials reported the victory to the temples of heaven and earth, and Taimiao and other shrines, and the ancestors at the imperial tombs. And now, it was time to rehabilitate the image of Galdan, at least to an extent.

A mere rebel, you may remember, could not possibly have justified the extreme expense and manpower Kangxi had required to hunt him down. But a great and powerful, dangerous military leader, a battlefield genius who had scored countless victories across the western reaches, from Bukhara to Hami, and defeated hundreds of thousands of fearsome Khalkha Mongol warriors? Now that was an image that you could sell to the public. And so, that's exactly what they did. Rewards and punishments followed the initial celebratory ceremonies of this absolute event on the scale of what I can only think of comparing to a true Roman triumph of old, in every sense.

Almost all convicts languishing under a verdict of death had their sentences pardoned, with the exception of those convicted of the ten abominations that had been on the books since the Qin Dynasty, and the Manchu Qing had decided to dust off once again, those being betrayal, rebellion, treason, filial disobedience, immorality, irreverence, lack of filial piety, impropriety, unrighteousness, and, of course, incest. Thousands of imperial troops received bonuses of five to six tails annually for three years. Almost all Tibetans and Mongols who'd been captured in the course of the war were pardoned, except for the advisors and High Lama to Galdan himself, Ilagu Kisan,

who had been the one to recite those sutras to the Jungar lord before battles. Yeah, bad call. For him, it would be execution via slow slicing. Surrendered Jungar troops were taken in and reorganized into the Chahar Mongol banners. Muslims who had joined with Galdan's efforts, having been officially deemed as being forced or tricked into it via a previous deal with the Muslim lords of the caravan oasis cities, were released and returned home. Internal officials who'd been sentenced for screw-ups like mismanaging grain transportation or the like

were pardoned, and the long-bedraggled Fiongu was now made a prince of the first rank for his troubles. In all, quote, their probationary ethic in action had kept these officials in suspense until victory, but now it was time for leniency, end quote. At the great banquet prepared for the assembled Khans of Kokonor, the Kangxi court made sure to

put on full display the fully arrayed might of Great Qing. Quote, troops passed by and thunderous cannon roared, shaking the mountains and valleys. These Khans, a crucial link between the Jungars and Tibet, now presented tribute and seemed to submit to the overpowering might and godlike mystery of the Emperor. Gunpowder in the Imperial presence had a symbolic effect. End quote. All such Imperial leniency went right out the window, however, when it came to the actual body of Galdan.

It was not enough to remove Galdan from the human world. Even his corpse had to be eliminated. The prescription would be the same as it had been with Kangxi's last great foe, the thrice-traitor Generalissimo and self-proclaimed emperor Wu Sangui. Burn the body, display it publicly at the capital execution ground, then pulverize the bones into powder and scatter them through Beijing's streets. The head would be mounted at the gate of the city wall and displayed to all comers and goers to the capital, and later sent to all banners of the Kalka Mongols who had surrendered to Great

Qing during the war. Quote, thus the polluting presence of Galdon's spirit could be eradicated. His son would suffer the same fate. End quote. But to this, once again, the Mongols... Yes, the Mongols who had just been Galdon's enemies in life, objected, and strongly. Danjila, as it turned out, had already burned the Khan's body but retained Galdan's head and ashes.

These he was determined to take with him back to Tibet to present personally to the Dalai Lama. Yet, en route, Danjila was intercepted and captured by none other than our old friend and Qing lapdog Tsewang Rabdan,

who took custody of the Zhengar lord's earthly remains. These, the emperor demanded be returned to Beijing forthwith, along with Galadon's wife, son, and daughter, who Ceuang also had in his possession. They would all get to share the fate of their late lord and father. But Ceuang basically just flat out told Kangxi, not gonna happen. We do not take revenge on useless people. The Khan replied flatly, citing ancient Mongolian custom. Neither Galdan's ashes nor his children were targets of revenge, no matter what some upjumped Manchu might think. Godang's ashes would be treated as they should be

by Mongol and Buddhist custom, scattered to the waters and fields of the steppes. Qing officials replied sternly. By Chinese custom, they said, quote, all the family of rebels are to be wiped out, corpses captured, all must be entirely swept away, end quote. If he failed to meet this obligation, then his previous terms of tributary relations with Qing would be considered violated, and he and his followers would be cut off from all further economic and diplomatic intercourse. That was a very convincing line of argument, as it turned out. Tsewang at last agreed to give over Galdan's remains to Qing authorities to do with

as they will, but begged that Galdan's family and remaining followers be allowed to stay with him. On this, the Qing partially relented, allowing the followers to join with Tsao-Wang-Rab-Don's forces, but still insisted on the delivery of Galdan's family members. Finally, in the fall of 1698, Manchu's Mongols and Han Chinese alike assembled in the marching grounds of Beijing to officially observe the crushing of Galdan Khan's bones and the scattering of those frozen ashes to the winds. This was not simple cruelty. As evidenced by both Perdue and Evelyn Roski, quote,

Qing legitimation relied heavily on the constant performance of prescribed rituals. These rituals were both public and private, and they combined Confucian, shamanistic, and Tibetan Buddhist practices. End quote. And certainly, one of the most important ritual functions in any society is the rituals surrounding death, whether that's private and in family, or as in the case of Galdan, made public to the maximum possible extent. Quote, These, too, were highly conspicuous performances

by which the dynasty displayed its power and authority. Proper behavior by both the victim and the executioner were expected, end quote. As such, this ritualistic desecration, indeed annihilation, was deemed cosmically important enough by the emperor to justify his extreme measure in recovering the final earthly remains of his already dead enemy. There is no good in anything, someone once said long ago, but not so far away. Until it is finished. But the countervailing principle on display by the Mongols was able to assert itself as

well, if only in part. While Galdan himself would need to face total oblivion, the rest of his family, still kinsmen of the larger Mongol people, who as a matter of questionable principle, quote-unquote, do not make enemies of our kinsmen, were able to assert that even the closest relatives of Galdan

could be explained away as Xie Cong, which is once again the coerced followers, who were to be allowed the same degree of leniency as other such pardoned followers. Incorporation and extreme inclusion each required the other. Once the body and soul of Galdan himself was physically annihilated, removing any potential pollution, all others personally connected with him were purified and could be reincorporated into the human realm. With the successful conclusion of the Great Galdan campaigns began the Qing project to establish a definitive demarcation of the dynasty's position in imperial space and time. Until Galdan's defeat, the character and even prolonged survival of the

dynasty remained uncertain. Would it last for centuries as one of China's great eras, or would it be a relatively short-lived conquest regime, overthrown by another more powerful Mongolian regime like the Jurchen Jin? And would the extent of Qing rule include permanent dominion over the vast areas beyond the wall, or would it end up like the Ming, confined to defensive positions after brief forays into the steppe? The elimination of the Dzungar leader seemed to indicate relative stabilization and permanent control. So the emperor began a great project to map the entire extent of imperial domains shortly after his victory. Similarly, the emperor laid the basis for placing his conquests in historical time by

commissioning an official history of his campaigns, Outline History of the Personal Expeditions to Pacify the Northwest Frontier, or the Qinzhan Pingding Shuomo Fanglui. Began in 1699 under the supervision of top officials and Hanlin compilers, it was published in 1708. In this case and in others of his reign, the emperor and his scholar officials that he patronized moved quickly to set in print a selective and limited spatial and temporal perspective, excluding alternate versions, and designed to last for all time. The late 17th century conquests, however, did not conclude the Northwest story.

Kangxi's later years and the curious reign of his son, the Yongzheng Emperor, indicated that serious challenges to his authority persisted and major underlying constraints on Qing mobilization had not yet been overcome. And so that is where we will pick up next time, as we finally move on past the life and times of Galdan Khan, and get into the opening decades of the 1700s and the final decades of the Kangxi reign. Happy 2025, and thanks for listening. History isn't black and white, yet too often it's presented as such. Grey History, The French Revolution is a long-form history podcast

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