Chapter 11 2. Empress Jiajing

Emperor Jiajing was a restless emperor. He made a lot of construction projects and worshiped Taoism. He almost died in a palace disaster.He reigned for 45 years and died at the age of 60, second only to Hongwu Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang (71 years old) and Yongle Emperor Zhu Di (65 years old).Emperor Jiajing had four queens successively, the emperor with the most queens among the sixteen emperors of the Ming Dynasty.However, these four queens were all unfortunate in the end. The first Empress Chen was born in Yuancheng (now Daming County, Hebei Province).In the first year of Jiajing (1522), the 16-year-old Emperor Jiajing named Chen as queen.One day in October of the seventh year of Jiajing (1528), Emperor Jiajing was sitting with Empress Chen, and Concubine Zhang and Concubine Fang were having tea. The 22-year-old young emperor Jiajing looked curiously and affectionately at the slender and tender hands of Concubine Zhang and Concubine Fang.Empress Chen was jealous, jealous, and angry, "tossed a cup and stood up"—put the teacup on the table and stood up.Emperor Jiajing was furious and scolded loudly.Empress Chen was frightened and trembled all over.Empress Chen, who was pregnant, died of a miscarriage due to shock.This Empress Chen is too small-minded. Since she is married to the emperor's family, she has to face the reality of "seventy-two concubines in three palaces, six courtyards", how should she deal with it?Or patience, or resistance - even resistance without words or deeds, will or may encounter dire consequences!The ministers of the court accompany the king like a tiger, so why not the concubine accompanying the king!Recently, there was a saying in the newspaper: The best way to maintain love is patience—whether this statement is right or wrong, I will not comment on it for the time being. Empress Chen of Emperor Jiajing would not have heard these words at the time.Empress Chen, the majestic Emperor Jiajing, tragically died with two lives in her body!

The second Empress Zhang was the concubine Zhang Shun whom Emperor Jiajing looked at her hand when tasting tea.After Empress Chen's sudden collapse, Concubine Zhang Shun was registered as empress.At this time, Emperor Jiajing was following the ancient etiquette. He asked the empress to lead the concubines to the first silkworm altar to perform the silkworm ceremony.Empress Zhang served as empress for five years before she was dismissed from office—abandoned to live in another palace.Where is Empress Zhang from, and why she was abolished, there is no record in "History of Ming Dynasty: Biography of Concubine".The fact that Queen Zhang was abolished made people know that being a queen is not easy, nor is it an "iron job".Empress Zhang was abolished and sent to the cold palace. She was depressed and had nothing to say. She died two years later.The "post" left by Queen Zhang in the middle palace was taken over by Queen Fang.

The third Empress Fang was born in Jiangning (now Nanjing, Jiangsu Province).How could Fang become the queen?There are two opportunities here: the first opportunity is that Emperor Jiajing has been emperor for 10 years, he is already 26 years old and has no son.Therefore, a scholar named Zhang Cong, who changed his name to Fu Jing, suggested to Emperor Jiajing: "The ancient emperor established a queen, and built six palaces, three wives, nine concubines, twenty-seven wives, and eighty-one royal wives. So Guang Si also. Your Majesty is in the prime of life, and it is appropriate to seek ladies for his heirs." He suggested that Emperor Jiajing should marry more than 120 "ladies" in the country-young, beautiful, smart, and virtuous, in addition to the queen. The beauty went to the harem to give birth to more sons for Emperor Jiajing.Emperor Jiajing was very happy with this flattery, so he followed suit and issued an order to "follow it"!Afterwards, the Fang family and other nine people were canonized as one of the nine concubines, and soon promoted to concubines.When Empress Zhang was deposed, she became the master of Kunning Palace and Empress Fang who was in charge of the Sixth Palace.This Empress Fang saved Emperor Jiajing's life when her husband was "in trouble at Renyin Palace" (as mentioned earlier).However, Queen Fang's bad luck came: in the twenty-sixth year of Jiajing (1547), she died of illness.Although Emperor Jiajing deeply felt the kindness of Empress Fang for saving the crisis, he issued an edict: "The empress is more dangerous than saving me, and she will be buried in the empress of the Yuan Dynasty." Queen funeral treats.However, what happened later was full of ups and downs, so I won’t say much. For those who are interested, read "History of Ming Dynasty: Biography of Empresses"!After the death of Queen Fang, the vacancy of Queen was filled by Queen Du.

The fourth Empress Du, from Daxing (now Beijing), was originally a concubine, but later became a concubine, but she was lucky and gave birth to a son, who was later Emperor Longqing of Emperor Muzong of the Ming Dynasty, and she became the grandmother of Emperor Wanli.However, the fate of human beings has ups and downs and is unpredictable.Empress Du died in the first month of Jiajing thirty-three years (1554).There were still twelve years before her son became emperor, so Empress Du did not see her son become emperor, nor did she enjoy the happiness of the empress dowager herself. The four empresses of Emperor Jiajing either died tragically, were deposed, took risks, or died early, and none of them enjoyed a complete and fulfilling life.

So, what about the queen of the Qing Dynasty?