The Emperor's Concubine Selection Criteria reveal the rules and standards for the selection of concubines by ancient emperors
We usually use:"Seventy-two concubines in three palaces and six courts"To describe the emperor's harem, the history of the emperor's harem is indeed extremely brilliant, but how did the emperor choose his concubines? What are the criteria for choosing a concubine? Before the Ming and Qing dynasties introduced certain standards and procedures for selecting concubines, the procedures and standards for selecting concubines were very simple.
Before the Ming Dynasty: the process was not complicated, and the standards were relatively simple.
In fact, before the early years of the Western Han Dynasty, the scale of the emperor's harem was not large, until after Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the number of people began to increase rapidly, to the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the number of people began to exceed 1,000 people, Emperor Huan of the Han Dynasty reached five or six thousand people, Emperor Wu of the Jin Dynasty began to exceed 10,000 people when Sima Yan, and even reached 40 in the early years of the Tang Dynasty, the early years of the Yuan Dynasty, and the Tianbao period000 people, but then the number began to decrease, and the Ming and Qing dynasties more or less always remained at about 10,000 people.
Before the Western Han Dynasty, harem women were mainly from prisoners of war. With the expansion of the size of the harem and the abolition of slavery, the imperial court began to select women from the people to enter the palace in order to preserve the court. However, until the Ming Dynasty, this selection was never perfect, and strict standards were never established.
Before the Ming Dynasty, the emperor's concubines consisted of two parts, one chosen by the widow of the previous emperor or empress, and the other by his elders. Most of these concubines came from ** and eunuch families, meritorious relatives or influential nobles, but there was also an element of political connections. A large number of relatives can often help the emperor to sit on the throne, which is also the main reason for the repeated phenomenon of foreign relatives interfering in politics in the early Ming Dynasty. For example, Empress Bo Liu Qi, the first empress of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, was the distant great-granddaughter of Empress Dowager Bo Ji, who was elected to the palace from her mother's family; Tang Gaozong Li Zhi's queen Wang, born in the Taiyuan Wang family, was married to her by Tang Taizong; Empress Pan of Song Zhenzong was the eighth daughter of Pan Mei, the envoy of Zhongwu Jiedu, and was canonized by Zhao Guangyi of Song Taizong.
The second part is a folk beauty pageant, and the selection criteria are simple and crude. Before the Ming Dynasty, beauty contests were generally simple and rude, as long as they met"Good home"With this basic condition, a good-looking woman can easily be elected to the court. It needs to be emphasized that here"Good home"Not to be guilty or innocent, but to be"Good people and untouchables"Those who did not serve as soldiers or doctors in the Seven Branches of Penal Colonies, the children of shamans, merchants, and laborers. For example, "Hanshu - The Biography of the Empress Dowager Xiaowen Dou":"Empress Dowager Xiaowen Dou, the mother of Emperor Jing, and the Empress Dowager Lu, should choose the son of a good person to enter the palace. "Another example is "The History of the New Five Dynasties - The Later Shu Family - The Biography of Meng Chang":"Chang is good at forging plates, and he also chooses a good family to fill the harem for Fang's room! "Another example is contained in the "General Guide to Information Governance"."In the tenth year of Jin Yuanding (274 years), more than 5,000 women were selected to have a good family and a small general, and the mother and son cried in the palace, and the crying outside the palace could be heard. "
In short, before the Ming Dynasty, the emperor's choice of wife was relatively loose and standardized, in addition to the above-mentioned elders widely selected marriage, there were often ** and people who took the initiative to send their daughters into the palace, such as Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty's biological mother Wang Wan was sent into the palace by her mother. Another example is Wu Zetian, because"Beauty"was sent to the palace by Tang Taizong.
Ming Dynasty: The election process is more complicated and the selection criteria are stricter.
In order to prevent the harem and relatives from interfering in politics, thus giving up the ancestral system, Zhu Yuanzhang, the Taizu of the Ming Dynasty"Carefully choose the women of good families, after those who are discordant, after the son of heaven, and after the wives and concubines of princes", The concubines of the Ming Dynasty were often selected from the people, so people often called the process of selecting concubines for the emperor"Xiuquan"。.
Ji Yun gave a more detailed account of Ming Xi's selection of concubines in "The Biography of Empress Ming Yi'an", and he pointed out that this "Choosing Concubines" has a detailed understanding of the process of selecting concubines in the Ming Dynasty and the criteria for selecting concubines.
The first step is pre-selection. At the beginning of the conscription, the imperial court first sent internal supervisors to select 5,000 unmarried girls between the ages of 13 and 16 across the country. The criteria for preselection are relatively relaxed, except for compliance"The door is right"In addition to the requirements, it is also required to be dignified and free of any major flaws. Once the girl is chosen, the eunuch pays a certain fee for the bride. After the girl is registered, the eunuch will ask her family to send the daughter to the capital at some time.
The second step is a physical examination. On the first day, 5,000 women were divided into groups of 100 women, sorted by age, and visually measured by eunuchs, tall, short, fat and thin, and those who were slightly inferior immediately withdrew from the selection. The next day, there were still a hundred unsuccessful women in a group, and the eunuchs were responsible for supervising the facial features, hair, neck, and back, but if there was a little mistake, it would be corrected. Selected women must also name their age and place of origin, which is used to check their voices, and if their voices are muffled, heavy, hoarse, or flustered, they are immediately eliminated. On the third day, a closer examination was carried out by an internal supervisor, who first measured the women's arms and legs with a ruler and then asked them to walk dozens of steps.
The third step is an in-depth review. The women who were not eliminated were brought into the inner palace by the older concubines, and first the stable woman took turns to caress them, touch their chests, smell their armpits, touch their muscles, etc., and then they were eliminated again from the three hundred. The three hundred people who passed the examination had to go through a period of trial, and according to their temperament, style, wisdom and the emperor's wishes, they lived in the palace for more than a month, and then from fifty"Beautiful, intelligent, and assertive"of candidates to choose concubines.
The fourth step is the final selection. After a period of time, the Empress Dowager Cixi (i.e., the Empress Dowager Cixi) would summon the fifty women one by one, talk to them individually, study their calligraphy, paintings, poems, arithmetic, etc., and finally select the best three. After layers of selection, the Zhang family of Kaifeng, Henan Province was finally selected as the queen, and the Wang family and the Duan family were selected as concubines.
In the Qing Dynasty, most of the concubines were Manchurians, and the selection process and criteria were extremely complex.
The Qing Dynasty's concubine selection process differed from that of the Ming Dynasty, and in order to ensure royal blood, candidates had to be Manchurian women of pure blood, thus maintaining the prestige and privileges of the Manchurian nobility. As a result, most of the concubines in the Qing Dynasty were selected from among the women of the Qiren family.
In the Qing Dynasty, all female soldiers had to pass conscription, and if they did not want to, they could not participate in conscription. In accordance with the established regulations, all women between the ages of 14 and 16 must be included in the flag, and must participate in a conscription every three years, and if they do not participate in the next conscription for any reason, they must make up for it, and it is stipulated that a woman who has not participated in the conscription is strictly prohibited from marrying a woman who has not participated in the conscription. After the extraordinary marriage, the big **, the political officer, Zuo Zhuang and his family members were all punished as criminal offenses.
Pick the year. In the year of the draft, the household department first issued a document to the president of each banner, and then the generals, leaders, Xiao cavalry school, Zitong, and elders of each banner elected the president, and then the household department summarized, and the emperor set the date of the draft, and selected them one by one according to the qualifications of the show girls. Then the household department issued a document to each flag, and each flag personally sent the general, the head, the general, the general, the urging officer, the elder and his parents, or the uncle, sister-in-law, parents, and relatives to the Shenwu Gate Forbidden City according to the list of show girls, and the household department arranged to inspect the list and read out the list.
Pre-selection of the Emperor or Empress Dowager. The girls who participate in the Shenwumen draft are brought into the palace by the eunuchs, and are generally drafted in the Imperial Garden, Tiyuan Palace, Jingyixuan and other places. At the same time, five or six people are chosen, read by the emperor or queen mother, and if they are visible, the roster is required to remain on the card; If you don't get the choice, you put the card on the ground. After that, the singers who left their name tags were re-selected regularly, and the singers who were re-selected but did not leave their name tags were also called singers who left their name tags.
The inductees are appointed by **. After two selections and final promotion, there are still two fates waiting for them: one is to give it to the emperor's son or clan, and the other is to stay in the palace, serve the emperor, and become a candidate for concubine. When they become candidates for concubines, the process is much more complicated, after the first time"Hold up the card"and go through a few more times"Resumption of trading", they chose"Name"will remain on the cards; , they chose"Name"will remain on the cards; "The emperor himself chose to stay on the card"Name"。Finally, in"Stay in the palace and stay behind"While being reviewed, they chose a certain number of Xiucai to stay in the palace, and the rest were placed on the memorial plate.
After the draft, women who are not selected can marry themselves. After the selected show girls enter the palace, they will be rewarded by the general, and their future promotions will depend on themselves.