6 - The Conquest Elite of the Ch'ing Empire

Summary

The conquest elite of the earlier Ch'ing underwent marked changes as expansion transformed the geographical contours, cultural content, and political dynamics of the empire. Prior to the Ch'ing invasion of north China a Ch'ing elite already existed, but its qualities and its proportional components were deeply altered between 1644 and the end of the century. From the time of the conquest of north China to the completion of Ch'ing control of south China, the conquest forces were contained in or under the control of the Eight Banners, the Ch'ing sociomilitary organization. Within the Eight Banners, “Manchu” (itself a complex matter of definition) combatants composed only a modest percentage of the conquest force, in absolute numbers somewhere between 110,000 and 140,000. It also included a large number – perhaps as many as 340,000 at the time of the conquest of Peking in 1644 – of sinophone, agriculturally or commercially employed residents of Liao-tung and Chi-lin who were referred to, with greater or lesser precision, as Han-chün bannermen. Others in the conquest elite were members of the populations of eastern Mongolia, northern Liao-tung, and western Chi-lin who became the foundation of the Mongol Eight Banners and certain former Ming officials who joined the Ch'ing. As the venues, methods, and pace of Ch'ing conquest shifted again in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, the effects were soon seen in the function and fortunes of the Ch'ing conquest elite. The nineteenth century saw the massive displacement of a major portion of the remnant conquest elite, with comparatively few aristocratic survivors.