Philosophers
88-601: This is a list of emperors of the Tang dynasty (618–690, 705–907) of China. Tang monarchs like Emperor Taizong of Tang were also addressed to as the Khan of Heaven ( Tian Kehan ) by Turkic peoples. The Chinese naming conventions is "Tang" (唐)+ temple name (e.g. Tang Gaozu ), except for Emperors Shang and Ai , who are better known by their posthumous name . Emperor of China Throughout Chinese history , " Emperor " ( Chinese : 皇帝 ; pinyin : Huángdì )
176-531: A dynasty , and succession in most cases theoretically followed agnatic primogeniture . The emperor of China was an absolute monarch . During the Han dynasty , Confucianism gained sanction as the official political theory. The absolute authority of the emperor came with a variety of governing duties and moral obligations; failure to uphold these was thought to remove the dynasty's Mandate of Heaven and to justify its overthrow. In practice, emperors sometimes avoided
264-841: A clear transmission of the Mandate from the Tang through to the Song. The scholar-official Xue Juzheng compiled the Old History of the Five Dynasties (五代史) during the 960s and 970s, after the Song dynasty had taken northern China from the last of the Five Dynasties , the Later Zhou . A major purpose of the book was to establish justification for the transference of the Mandate of Heaven through these five dynasties and thus to
352-830: A coup in 1917 but was overthrown again shortly after. Although permitted to remain in the palace, he absconded to the Japanese concession in Tianjin in 1924. In 1934 he was installed as emperor of Manchukuo , a Japanese puppet state. In 1945, he was captured by the Red Army as a prisoner of war, where he was held in the Siberian city of Chita . In 1950, he was extradited to China and imprisoned in Fushun War Criminals Management Centre . He would be formally pardoned and released in 1959, working in
440-637: A few places, eunuchs wielded vast power; one of the most powerful eunuchs in Chinese history was Wei Zhongxian during the Ming. Occasionally, other nobles seized power as regents. The actual area ruled by the emperor of China varied from dynasty to dynasty. In some cases, such as during the Southern Song dynasty , political power in East Asia was effectively split among several governments; nonetheless,
528-652: A justification for rule by divine political legitimacy. In Korea , the kingdom of Goguryeo , one of the Three Kingdoms of Korea , adopted the Chinese concept of tianxia which was based on Mandate of Heaven, however in Goguryeo it was changed to be based on divine ancestry. In the Goguryeo story, Jumong was born to Hye Moss, the son of the Emperor, and Yu Hwa, the daughter of Habaek, the god of water. When Yuhwa
616-528: A large role. The court prognosticator Xu Zhi ( 許芝 ) enumerated in a lengthy memorandum the signs he had located in divinatory and historical texts showing that Cao Pi's Wei should succeed the Han. A sequence of written statements by various officials followed, culminating in Emperor Xian of Han 's formal announcement of abdication and Cao Pi's accession. The announcement of abdication explicitly mentioned that
704-448: A male emperor). The given names of all the emperor's deceased male ancestors were forbidden from being written, and were avoided ( 避諱 ) by the use of synonyms, homophones, or leaving out the final stroke of the taboo character. This linguistic feature can sometimes be used to date historical texts, by noting which words in parallel texts are altered. The emperor was never to be addressed as you . Instead, one used Bixia ( 陛下 'bottom of
792-533: A repair shop and as a researcher of literature and history until his death in 1967. The current head of the House of Aisin-Gioro and hypothetical claimant to the throne is Jin Yuzhang . He has worked for various local councils on China, and has no interest in the restoration of monarchy. Traditional political theory holds that there can only be one legitimate Son of Heaven at any given time. However, identifying
880-402: A sort of victor's justice , best characterized in the popular Chinese saying "The winner becomes king, the loser becomes outlaw" (Chinese: “ 成者爲王，敗者爲寇 ”). Due to this, it is considered that Chinese historical accounts of the fall of a dynasty and the rise of a new one must be handled with caution. Chinese traditional historical compilation methods produce accounts that tend to fit their account to
968-566: A visible sign indicating supernatural approval. Early records, such as the inscription on the Da Yu ding , employ language more descriptive than theoretical: "the great command in the sky" ( 天有大令 ). Although both the Shang and Zhou claimed divine ancestry, the Zhou were the first to use the concept of the Mandate of Heaven to explain their right to assume rule and presumed that the only way to hold
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#17327725282821056-400: A way to curtail the abuse of power by the ruler, in a system that had few other checks. Chinese historians interpreted a successful revolt as evidence that Heaven had withdrawn its mandate from the ruler. Throughout Chinese history , times of poverty and natural disasters were often taken as signs that heaven considered the incumbent ruler unjust and thus in need of replacement. The concept of
1144-488: Is epigraphic evidence that, in private, the rulers of the state of Qin (which would go on to conquer everyone else and become the first dynasty of the imperial era) held that their ancestors had received Heaven's mandate. As early as the 600s BCE, multiple inscriptions attest to this idea. It is unclear whether the Qin rulers meant they believed they had celestial approval to replace the Zhou kings, whether they believed themselves
1232-471: Is not coded into any official law. Rather, rebellion is always outlawed and severely punished; but is still a positive right grounded in the Chinese moral system. Often, it is used as a justification for actions to overthrow a previous dynasty after a rebellion has been successful and a new dynastic rule has been established. Since the winner is the one who determines who has obtained the Mandate of Heaven and who has lost it, some Chinese scholars consider it to be
1320-416: The 2014 and 2019 Hong Kong protests . In imperial times , Chinese emperors invoked de by striving to be good influences and performing rituals to benefit their status and keep the Mandate of Heaven. Also, the Mandate could not be given to several emperors or rulers at once. Because of China's influence in medieval times, the concept of the Mandate of Heaven spread to other East Asian countries as
1408-484: The Han and Ming were founded by men of common origins, but they were seen as having succeeded because they had gained the Mandate of Heaven. Retaining the mandate is contingent on the just and able performance of the rulers and their heirs. Corollary to the concept of the Mandate of Heaven was the right of rebellion against an unjust ruler. The Mandate of Heaven was often invoked by philosophers and scholars in China as
1496-820: The Jurchens of the Jin dynasty (1115–1234) , who later ruled the Qing dynasty as the Manchus , and the Mongols of the Yuan dynasty. The orthodox historical view sees these as dynasties as sinicized polities as they adopted Han culture, claimed the Mandate of Heaven , and performed the traditional imperial obligations such as annual sacrifices to Heaven for rain and prosperity. The revisionist New Qing History school, however, argues that
1584-669: The Ming-era Huang-Ming Zuxun ( Ancestral Instructions ). During the Western Zhou dynasty ( c. 1046 BC – 771 BC), Chinese vassal rulers with power over their particular fiefdoms served a strong central monarch. Following a brutal succession crisis and relocation of the royal capital, the power of the Zhou kings ( 王 ; wàng ) waned, and during the Eastern Zhou period,
1672-636: The Nine Ding or the Heirloom Seal of the Realm . As with the First Emperor, it remained very common to grant posthumous titles to the ancestors of the victors. The Yuan and Qing dynasties were founded by successful invaders of different ethnic groups. As part of their rule over China, they also went through the culturally appropriate rituals of formally declaring a new dynasty and taking on
1760-717: The Yuan dynasty . The Qing view, reported to Europe by the Jesuits, was that there had been 150 emperors from the First Emperor to the Kangxi Emperor . Adding the eight uncontroversial emperors that followed the Kangxi Emperor would give a grand total of 158 emperors from the First Emperor to Puyi. By one count, from the Qin dynasty to the Qing dynasty , there were a total 557 individuals who at one point or another claimed
1848-400: The censorate . Paranoid emperors, like Emperor Wu of Han and the Ming's Hongwu Emperor , would cycle through high government officials rapidly, or simply leave top-ranking posts vacant, such that no one could threaten their power. During other reigns, certain officials in the civil bureaucracy wielded more power than the emperor himself. The emperor's position, unless deposed in a rebellion,
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#17327725282821936-456: The political fiction that there was but one ruler was maintained. The title of emperor was hereditary, traditionally passed on from father to son in each dynasty. There are also instances where the throne is assumed by a younger brother, should the deceased emperor have no male offspring. By convention in most dynasties, the eldest son born to the Empress consort ( 嫡长子 ; 嫡長子 ) succeeded to
2024-600: The "Mandate of Heaven". There has been only one lawful queen regnant in Chinese history, Wu Zetian , who briefly replaced the Tang dynasty with her own Wu Zhou dynasty . Many women, however, did become de facto leaders, usually as Empress Dowager . Prominent examples include Empress Dowager Lü of the Han, Empress Liu of the Song , and Empress Dowager Cixi of the Qing. As the emperor had, by law, an absolute position not to be challenged by anyone else, his subjects were to show
2112-402: The "legitimate" emperor during times of division is not always uncontroversial, and therefore the exact number of legitimate emperors depends on where one stands on a number of succession disputes. The two most notable such controversies are whether Cao Wei or Shu Han had legitimacy during the Three Kingdoms , and at what point the Song dynasty ceased to be the legitimate dynasty in favor of
2200-563: The 300s, and was universally accepted by the much later Song dynasty . The last Wei emperor abdicated in turn to the Western Jin . This dynasty soon lost control of northern China to non-Han ethnic groups, and in the literature of the southern dynasties that followed there began to appear an object called the State-Transmitting Seal . This magical talisman was the physical manifestation of Heaven's mandate, tied up in
2288-544: The Chinese title of Huangdi , in addition to the titles of their respective people, especially in the case of the Yuan dynasty. Thus, Kublai Khan was simultaneously khagan of the Mongols and emperor of China. In 1911, the title of Prime Minister of the Imperial Cabinet was created to rule alongside the emperor, as part of an attempt to turn China into a constitutional monarchy . Puyi , who had reigned as
2376-640: The Five Dynasties, and thus onto the Song Dynasty when it conquered the last of those dynasties. The Mandate of Heaven was thought to emanate from the Dao, especially in the Song dynasty . The Qing dynasty was established by the Manchus who conquered the China proper . Nurhaci , who was regarded the founding father of the Qing dynasty, was originally a vassalage to the Ming dynasty and later rebelled against
2464-468: The Han house to power, the Mandate of Heaven stood on uncertain grounds. Some theorists decoupled judgements of virtue from the mandate, seeing it primarily as inherited through ancestry, while others abandoned the concept altogether in favour of five phases theories. The final Han emperor abdicated to the powerful minister Cao Pi in CE 220, and in this transfer of power the idea of Heaven's mandate played
2552-437: The Han rulers could neither deny their own history as being birthed in rebellion nor embrace the idea that they should themselves be overthrown. The right of rebellion against an unjust ruler has been a part of Chinese political philosophy ever since the Zhou dynasty, and the successful rebellion was interpreted by Chinese historians as evidence that divine approval had passed on to the successive dynasty. The Right of Rebellion
2640-474: The Han, Emperor Taizong of Tang of the Tang, the Hongwu Emperor and Yongle Emperor of the Ming, and the Kangxi Emperor of the Qing. The emperor's words were considered sacred edicts ( 圣旨 ; 聖旨 ), and his written proclamations were called 'directives from above' ( 上谕 ; 上諭 ). In theory, the emperor's orders were to be obeyed immediately. He was elevated above all commoners, nobility and members of
2728-420: The Han, as well as the empress dowagers Cixi and Ci'an during the Qing, who for a time ruled jointly as co-regents. Where Empresses Dowager were too weak to assume power, or her family too strongly opposed, court officials often seized control. Court eunuchs had a significant role in the power structure, as emperors often relied on a few of them as confidants, which gave them access to many court documents. In
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2816-599: The Imperial family. Addresses to the emperor were always to be formal and self-deprecatory, even by the closest of family members. In practice, however, the power of the emperor varied between different emperors and different dynasties . Generally, in the Chinese dynastic cycle , emperors founding a dynasty usually consolidated the empire through comparative autocracy —examples include Qin Shi Huang, emperors Gaozu and Guangwu of Han, Emperor Taizong of Tang, Kublai Khan of
2904-480: The Japanese monarchy, Chinese political theory allowed for a change in the ruling house. This was based on the concept of the " Mandate of Heaven ". The theory behind this was that the Chinese emperor acted as the "Son of Heaven" and held a mandate to rule over everyone else in the world; but only as long as he served the people well. If the quality of rule became questionable because of repeated natural disasters such as flood or famine, or for other reasons, then rebellion
2992-430: The Mandate of Heaven also extends to the ruler's family having divine rights and was first used to support the rule of the kings of the Zhou dynasty to legitimize their overthrow of the earlier Shang dynasty . It was used throughout the history of China to legitimize the successful overthrow and installation of new emperors, including by non- Han dynasties such as the Qing dynasty . The Mandate of Heaven has been called
3080-553: The Mandate of Heaven, a ruler's performance had to be just and effective and not excessively expand and maintain power outside the nation's borders. The people retained a right to rebel. Of the political philosophers of the Warring States period , Mencius was perhaps the most radically revolutionary, deliberately eliding any distinction between overthrowing a wicked ruler and punishing a common criminal. The more conservative Xunzi , writing not much later, regarded rebellion as
3168-487: The Ming with the Seven Grievances . But according to the Qing rulers it was the peasant rebels led by Li Zicheng who overthrew the Ming, and so the Qing were not responsible for the destruction of the Ming dynasty. Instead, the Qing argued, they had obtained the Mandate of Heaven by defeating the many rebels and bandits that the Ming had failed to control and restoring stability to the empire. Just as stability
3256-401: The Shang kings has been described as hegemonic. Royal authority flowed from the person of the king, enforced by his military. Neighbouring clans were allied through marriage and adopted into the Shang ancestral temple. A poem about the last years of the Shang dynasty reads "Heaven sends down death and disorder; famine comes repeatedly." Paleoclimatic data show a long-term period of cooling in
3344-494: The Shang ruling house had become morally corrupt and that the Shang leaders' loss of virtue entitled their own house to take over. The overthrow of the Shang Dynasty, they said, was in accordance with the mandate given by Heaven. Even at the time of the inauguration ritual of third-generation King Kang of Zhou , the royal command read out to the new king explicitly stated the belief that Heaven had changed its mandate. In
3432-438: The Song dynasty. He argued that these dynasties met certain vital criteria to be considered as having attained the Mandate of Heaven despite never having ruled all of China. One is that they all ruled the traditional Chinese heartland. However, there were certain other areas where these dynasties all clearly fell short. The brutal behavior of Zhu Wen and his Later Liang was a source of considerable embarrassment, and thus there
3520-592: The Xuantong Emperor, abdicated on 12 February 1912, ending the Qing dynasty as well as the imperial tradition altogether, after more than 2100 years. Yuan Shikai , former President of the Republic of China , attempted to restore dynastic rule with himself as the Hongxian Emperor, however he abdicated the throne on 22 March 1916 after only 83 days. Puyi was briefly restored for 12 days during
3608-437: The Yuan, and the Kangxi Emperor of the Qing. The usual method for widespread geographic power consolidation was to involve the whole family. From generation to generation, the bonds weakened between the branches of family established as local rulers in different areas. After a sufficient period of time, their loyalty could no longer be assured, and the taxes they collected sapped the imperial coffers. This led to situations like
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3696-444: The Zhou dynasty's most important contribution to Chinese political thought, but it coexisted and interfaced with other theories of sovereign legitimacy, including abdication to the worthy and five phases theory. The prosperous Shang dynasty saw its rule filled with multiple outstanding accomplishments. Notably, the dynasty lasted for a considerable time during which 31 kings ruled over an extended period of 17 generations. The rule of
3784-404: The apical manifestation of an unfit ruler's ineptitude, only justified if already inevitable. Meanwhile, the authoritarian Han Feizi rejected entirely the concept of a just rebellion, going as far as denouncing such culture heroes as Tang of Shang and Wu of Zhou , rebels who founded successful empires. By the time of the Han dynasty, the right to rebellion was a politically sensitive topic, as
3872-490: The appointed heirs of the Zhou should the royal line come to an end, or whether their receipt of Heaven's mandate was construed as issuing through the Zhou king to give them legitimate authority over their own lands. When the Zhou dynasty did come to an end, Qin absorbed the remainder of their lands, as well as those of all their competitors . The Mandate of Heaven did not play a direct part in their public relations, going unmentioned in all surviving material. The Qin dynasty
3960-434: The centuries, it has not been uncommon to have numerous claimants to the title of "Son of Heaven". The Chinese political concept of the Mandate of Heaven essentially legitimized those claimants who emerged victorious. The proper list was considered those made by the official dynastic histories ; the compilation of a history of the preceding dynasty was considered one of the hallmarks of legitimacy, along with symbols such as
4048-402: The classic Book of Documents . The Zhou dynasty was marked by early success and expansion until the death on campaign of King Kang's successor, King Zhao of Zhou . During the ensuing centuries, central authority waned overall, driven by socioeconomic pressures. This culminated in a succession crisis which saw the aristocracy split between two competing candidates for a number of years. When
4136-435: The confidence of the multitudinous people will be Emperor... When a local lord endangers the altars of soil and grain, he should be replaced. When the sacrificial animals are sleek, the offerings are clean and the sacrifices are observed at due times, and yet floods and droughts come [by the agency of heaven], then the altars should be replaced. Thus, the Mandate of Heaven does not confer an unconditional right to rule. To retain
4224-426: The crisis resolved, the royal house retained only a tiny amount of land and no real military power. This marked the beginning of the Eastern Zhou . During the decline of the royal house, although real power was wrested from their grasp, their divine legitimacy was not brought into question, and even with the king reduced to something of a figurehead, his prestige remained supreme as Heaven's eldest son. However, there
4312-533: The emperor was referred to in the third person simply as Huangdi Bixia ( 皇帝陛下 'His Majesty the Emperor') or Dangjin Huangshang ( 当今皇上 ; 當今皇上 'present emperor above'). Under the Qing, the emperor was usually styled 'His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of the Great Qing Dynasty, Son of Heaven , Lord of Ten Thousand Years ', though this varied considerably. In historical texts, the present emperor
4400-538: The emperor, while still living, often designated a crown prince ( 太子 ). Even such a clear designation, however, was often thwarted by jealousy and distrust, whether it was the crown prince plotting against the emperor, or brothers plotting against each other. Some emperors, like the Yongzheng Emperor , after abolishing the position of Crown Prince, placed the succession papers in a sealed box, only to be opened and announced after his death. Unlike, for example,
4488-500: The emperors were known with a temple name given after their death. Most emperors were also given a posthumous name which was sometimes combined with the temple name (e.g. Emperor Shengzu Ren 圣祖仁皇帝 ; 聖祖仁皇帝 for the Kangxi Emperor). The passing of an emperor was referred to as Jiabeng ( 驾崩 ; 駕崩 'collapse of the imperial chariot') and an emperor that had just died was referred to as Daixing Huangdi ( 大行皇帝 'the emperor of
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#17327725282824576-446: The fortunes of ruling families, allowing the exiled southern aristocracy to retain their sense of cultural superiority and maintain the validity of Heaven's mandate in the face of counterfactual political reality. During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period, there was no dominant Chinese dynasty that ruled all of China. This created a problem for the Song dynasty that followed, as they wanted to legitimize their rule by establishing
4664-508: The great journey'). The imperial family was made up of the emperor and the empress ( 皇后 ) as the primary consort and Mother of the Nation ( 国母 ; 國母 ). In addition, the emperor would typically have several other consorts and concubines ( 嫔妃 ; 嬪妃 ), ranked by importance into a harem , in which the Empress was supreme. Every dynasty had its set of rules regarding the numerical composition of
4752-526: The greatest respect in the palace and was the decision maker in most family affairs. At times, especially when a young emperor was on the throne, she was the de facto ruler. The emperor's children, the princes ( 皇子 ) and princesses ( 公主 ), were often referred to by their order of birth—e.g. Eldest Prince or Third Princess. Princes were often given titles of peerage once they reached adulthood. The emperor's brothers and uncles served in court by law, and held equal status with other court officials ( 子 ). The emperor
4840-441: The harem. During the Qing dynasty, for example, imperial convention dictated that at any given time there should be one Empress , one Imperial Noble Consort , two Noble Consort , four Consort and six Concubine , plus an unlimited number of Noble Lady , First Class Attendant and Second Class Attendant . Although the emperor had the highest status by law, by tradition and precedent the empress dowager ( 皇太后 ) usually received
4928-416: The interaction between politics and ethnicity was far more complex and that elements of these dynasties differed from and altered "native Chinese" traditions concerning imperial rule. Mandate of Heaven Works The Mandate of Heaven ( Chinese : 天命 ; pinyin : Tiānmìng ; Wade–Giles : T'ien -ming ; lit. 'Heaven's command') is a Chinese political ideology that
5016-427: The mandate of Heaven was not permanent, and no one argued that the virtue of the house of Han had not been in decline for some time. In the eyes of these authors, Heaven's mandate followed virtue. While the idea that Cao Wei was Heaven's legitimate successor predominated for several centuries, the alternate theory that Heaven's mandate instead fell to the rival state of Shu Han was first articulated by Xi Zuochi in
5104-529: The mandate was to rule well in the eyes of Heaven. They also stated that the Shang came into power because the Xia had lost their mandate, which had then been bestowed upon the Shang, leading to the fall of the Xia and the rise of the Shang. The Xia gave precedent and legitimacy to the Zhou's own rebellion. No Western Zhou bronze inscriptions mention the Xia, or any other dynasty preceding the Shang. The Zhou believed that
5192-472: The northern hemisphere, which reached its maximum right around the fall of the Shang. In 1059 BCE, two unusual celestial phenomena took place: in May, the densest clustering in five hundred years' time of the five planets visible to the naked eye could be seen in the constellation of Cancer, and a few seasons later Halley's Comet appeared. One or more of these was interpreted by the powerful Lord of Zhou as
5280-456: The original Chinese first-person singular pronoun arrogated by Qin Shi Huang, functioning as an equivalent to the royal we . In front of subjects, the emperor may also refer to themselves self-deprecatingly as Guaren ( 寡人 'the morally-deficient one') or Gu ( 孤 'lonely one'). In contrast to the Western convention of using a regnal or personal name (e.g. George V) to refer to a sovereign,
5368-428: The political theory of the Zhou, legitimate authority flowed directly from Heaven to their founding dynast , King Wen . Although he did not live to see the Zhou conquest of Shang , his legitimacy passed to his heirs. Early on in the dynasty, there was some debate as to whether Heaven's mandate had fallen to the senior sons of King Wen's line, or to the house of Zhou as a group, as exemplified by an exchange surviving in
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#17327725282825456-494: The preceding Qin in a deeply unfavourable light, emphasising tyrannical policies, the incompetence of the second emperor, and giving an account of illegitimate birth for the first emperor. In this portrayal, it is clear the Qin had lost the Mandate, if they had ever possessed it to begin with. It was an uncomfortable fact that Han founder Liu Bang rose to power from a background outside the aristocracy, and achieved victory through military accomplishments. To accommodate this, Liu Bang
5544-542: The present Silla. the earliest records are from Joseon Dynasty , which made the Mandate of Heaven an enduring state ideology. The ideology was also adopted in Vietnam, known in Vietnamese as Thiên mệnh ( Chữ Hán : 天命). A divine mandate gave the Vietnamese emperor the right to rule, based not on his lineage but on his competence to govern. The later and more centralized Vietnamese dynasties adopted Confucianism as
5632-458: The regional lords overshadowed the king and began to usurp that title for themselves. In 221 BC, after the King of Qin completed the conquest of the various kingdoms of the Warring States period , he adopted a new title to reflect his prestige as a ruler greater than the rulers before him. He called himself "Shi Huangdi", or the 'First Emperor'. Before this, Huang ( 皇 'august', 'sovereign' )
5720-479: The reign of Emperor Wu of Han , who disenfranchised and annihilated the nobilities of virtually all imperial relatives whose forebears had been enfeoffed by his own ancestor, Gaozu. Apart from a few very energetic monarchs, the emperor usually delegated the majority of decision making to the civil bureaucracy (chiefly the chancellery and the Central Secretariat ), the military, and in some periods
5808-518: The ruler was unworthy and had lost the mandate. It was also a common belief that natural disasters such as famine and flood were divine retributions bearing signs of Heaven's displeasure with the ruler, so there would often be revolts following major disasters as the people saw these calamities as signs that the Mandate of Heaven had been withdrawn. The Mandate of Heaven does not require a legitimate ruler to be of noble birth, depending instead on how well that person can rule. Chinese dynasties such as
5896-472: The son of God. Silla is similar to Goguryeo. According to Silla's founding story, there was no king in the area where Silla was located, but the sixth degree and its sixth degree held a meeting of painters and ruled. They wanted a monarchy in which a king existed rather than the current political system, but one day they found an egg near a well and one was born out of it. It is said that the village chiefs named him Park Hyuk-geose and appointed him king to create
5984-624: The state ideology, which led to the creation of a Vietnamese tributary system in Southeast Asia that was modeled after the Chinese Sinocentric system in East Asia. In Japan, the title "Son of Heaven" was interpreted literally where the monarch was referred to as a demigod , deity , or "living god", chosen by the gods and goddesses of heaven. Eventually, the Japanese government found the concept ideologically problematic, preferring not to have divine political legitimacy that
6072-462: The steps'), corresponding to "Your Imperial Majesty" and originally referring to his attendents, Huangshang ( 皇上 'imperial highness', Shengshang ( 圣上 ; 聖上 'holy highness') or Tianzi ( 天子 'Son of Heaven'). The emperor was also alluded to indirectly through reference to the imperial dragon symbology . Servants often addressed the emperor as Wansuiye ( 万岁爷 ; 萬歲爺 'lord of ten thousand years '). The emperor referred to himself as zhen ( 朕 ),
6160-462: The strict rules of succession and dynasties' purported "failures" were detailed in official histories written by their successful replacements or even later dynasties. The power of the emperor was also limited by the imperial bureaucracy , which was staffed by scholar-officials , and eunuchs during some dynasties. An emperor was also constrained by filial obligations to his ancestors' policies and dynastic traditions, such as those first detailed in
6248-478: The theory, emphasizing aspects tending to prove that the old dynasty lost the Mandate of Heaven and the new one gained it, and de-emphasizing other aspects. In the 20th and 21st centuries, Confucianist elements of student rebellions often claimed the Mandate of Heaven has been forfeited, as demonstrated by their large-scale activism, with notable instances including the 2014 Sunflower Student Movement in Taiwan and
6336-466: The throne. In some cases when the empress did not bear any children, the emperor would have a child with another of his many wives (all children of the emperor were said also to be the children of the empress, regardless of birth mother). In some dynasties the succession of the empress' eldest son was disputed, and because many emperors had large numbers of progeny, there were wars of succession between rival sons. In an attempt to resolve after-death disputes,
6424-435: The title of Emperor, including several simultaneous claimants at various times. Some, such as Li Zicheng , Huang Chao , and Yuan Shu , declared themselves the emperors, Son of Heaven and founded their own empires as a rival government to challenge the legitimacy of and overthrow the existing emperor. Among the most famous emperors were Qin Shi Huang of the Qin dynasty , emperors Gaozu , Han Wudi as well as Guangwu of
6512-446: The utmost respect in his presence, whether in direct conversation or otherwise. When approaching the imperial throne, one was expected to kowtow before the emperor. In a conversation with the emperor, it was considered a crime to compare oneself to the emperor in any way. It was taboo to refer to the emperor by his given name, even for the emperor's own mother, who instead was to use Huangdi ( 皇帝 ), or simply Er ( 儿 ; 兒 'son', for
6600-503: Was divinely appointed to rule. The appellation Huangdi carried similar shades of meaning. Alternate English translations of the word include "The August Ancestor", "The Holy Ruler", or "The Divine Lord". On that account, some modern scholars translate the title as " thearch ". On occasion, the father of the ascended emperor was still alive. Such an emperor was titled as the Taishang Huang ('grand imperial sire'). The practice
6688-407: Was a sign of Heaven's favor, difficulties were a sign of Heaven's displeasure. Thus, emperors in the Qing and earlier dynasties often interpreted natural disasters during their reigns as reasons to reflect on their failures to act and govern correctly. Mencius stated that: The people are of supreme importance; the altars of soil and grain come next; last comes the ruler. That is why he who gains
6776-467: Was almost universally referred to as Shang ( 上 ). Generally, emperors also ruled with an era name ( 年号 ; 年號 ). Since the adoption of era names by Emperor Wu of Han and up until the Ming dynasty , the sovereign conventionally changed the era name semi-regularly during his reign. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, emperors simply chose one era name for their entire reign, and people often referred to past emperors with that title. In earlier dynasties,
6864-518: Was always elevated above all others despite any chronological or generational superiority. Recent scholarship is wary of applying present-day ethnic categories to historical situations. Most Chinese emperors have been considered members of the Han ethnicity , but there were also many Chinese emperors who were of non-Han ethnic origins. The most successful of these were the Khitans of the Liao dynasty ,
6952-553: Was always hereditary, usually by agnatic primogeniture . As a result, many emperors ascended the throne while still children. During minority reigns , the Empress Dowager , the emperor's mother, would usually possess significant political power, along with the male members of her birth family . In fact, the vast majority of female rulers throughout Chinese Imperial history came to power by ruling as regents on behalf of their sons; prominent examples include Empress Lü Zhi of
7040-408: Was ascribed a magical birth, and later a divine ancestry. When Wang Mang took power at the end of the western Han , he used the acceptance of the theory of Heaven's Mandate to his advantage. Auspicious unusual events were said to portend Heaven's choosing a new heir, so Wang fabricated omens indicating that Heaven had changed its mandate, and that it had chosen him. Following the restoration of
7128-433: Was initiated by Qin Shi Huang, who gave the title as a posthumous name to his own father, as was already common for monarchs of any stratum of power. Liu Bang , who established the Han dynasty , was the first to become emperor while his father yet lived. It was said he granted the title during his father's life because he would not be done obeisance to by his own father, a commoner. Owing to political fragmentation, over
7216-474: Was justified. This important concept legitimized the dynastic cycle or the change of dynasties. This principle made it possible even for peasants to found new dynasties, as happened with the Han and Ming dynasties, and for the establishment of conquest dynasties such as the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty and Manchu-led Qing dynasty. It was moral integrity and benevolent leadership that determined the holder of
7304-505: Was most commonly seen as a reverential epithet for a deceased ancestor, and Di ( 帝 , OC : * tˤeks ) was an apical ancestor, originally referring to the deified ancestors of the Shang kings. In the 3rd century BC, the two titles had not previously been used together. The emperor of China, like the Zhou kings before him, and the Shang kings before them, was most commonly referred to as Tianzi ( 天子 'Son of Heaven'), who
7392-475: Was not long-lived: after the death of first emperor Qin Shihuang , widespread revolts by prisoners, peasants, unhappy soldiers, ambitious minor officials, and remnants of the recently defeated aristocracy rapidly downfell the central government. The ensuing Chu–Han contention ended with the success of Liu Bang and establishment of the Han dynasty . Surviving historical documents from the Han dynasty paint
7480-437: Was pregnant, she entrusted her body to the king of Buyeo and laid an egg, and the person who came out of the egg was Jumong. When Jumong, who was born of eggs, grew up and performed various strange tricks, the sons of King Buyeo became jealous, and Jumong eventually fled Buyeo and built a country called Goguryeo. This is a case in which Goguryeo claimed the legitimacy of expelling Buyeo under the command of heaven by setting him as
7568-516: Was pressure to exclude them from the Mandate. The following three dynasties, the Later Tang , Later Jin , and Later Han were all non-Han Chinese dynasties with rulers from the Shatuo ethnic minority. Additionally, none of them were able to defeat the powerful states to the south and unify the entire Chinese realm. However, Xue Juzheng concluded that the Mandate had indeed passed through each of
7656-400: Was the superlative title held by the monarchs who ruled various imperial dynasties or Chinese empires . In traditional Chinese political theory, the emperor was the " Son of Heaven ", an autocrat with the divine mandate right to rule all under Heaven . Emperors were worshiped posthumously under an imperial cult . The lineage of emperors descended from a paternal family line constituted
7744-520: Was used in Ancient China and Imperial China to legitimize the rule of the king or emperor of China . According to this doctrine , Heaven ( 天 , Tian ) bestows its mandate on a virtuous ruler. This ruler, the Son of Heaven , was the supreme universal monarch , who ruled Tianxia ( 天下 ; "all under heaven", the world). If a ruler was overthrown, this was interpreted as an indication that
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