Ao Bai was an important political figure during the Jiaqing period of the Qing Dynasty, and the cause of his death is still controversial today. Historical records show that Ao Bai died in the 11th year of Jiaqing (1806), but there are several versions of the cause of death, the most widely spread of which is that he was poisoned by order of the Kangxi Emperor. However, exactly how the truth is still a mystery.
During the reign of Emperor Kangxi, Ao Bai was his close confidant and right-hand man, and once performed well in the war and was appointed as a general to guard the frontier. However, when Emperor Kangxi was dying, in order to maintain the stability of his rule, he chose to hide the news that he had died, and Emperor Jiaqing continued this lie after he succeeded to the throne. Emperor Kangxi's trust and preferential treatment of Aobai during his lifetime made Aobai become more and more powerful after Emperor Jiaqing succeeded to the throne, causing dissatisfaction among some courtiers.
There are several theories about the cause of Aobai's death, one of which is that he died of poisoning on the order of Emperor Kangxi, which has also become a widely circulated version. Proponents of this theory believe that the Kangxi Emperor deliberately kept the actual death of Ao Bai in order to avoid the turmoil of his regime during his lifetime in order to maintain the imperial platform. However, this claim also has its skeptics, who believe that this is only speculation by later generations, and there is no conclusive evidence that Emperor Kangxi personally ordered the poisoning of Aobai.
Another theory is that Aobai's death at the hands of someone else may have been the result of power struggles within other courtiers or the court. After Aobai's death, some courtiers expressed dissatisfaction with his power and prestige and may have acted against him for political reasons. This argument holds that Emperor Kangxi did not intervene directly, but secretly acquiesced to this result in the scheme.
In the controversy over the cause of Aobai's death, Emperor Jiaqing became a key player. At the beginning of his reign, Emperor Jiaqing was relatively weak for a time, but later gradually showed his decisiveness and determination. After Emperor Jiaqing succeeded to the throne, there was a sentence that punctured Kangxi's lies and revealed the courtiers' dissatisfaction with the power schemes of the Kangxi era. He may have somehow revealed the true cause of Aobai's death and overturned the lie of the Kangxi era.
Overall, the cause of Aobai's death remains a historical mystery, and different historians and researchers have interpreted it differently. The political intrigues and complex court struggles of the Kangxi and Jiaqing emperors made the truth even more difficult to verify, and the life and cause of Aobai's death still left many questions for people to ponder.
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