Restoration of the Great Ming: A Tianqi Timeline

[RexSueciae]

Talisman to ward off plague, excerpted from literature of Gao Lian (reprinted circa 1635)​

Two major events took place in 1635 that still didn’t manage to be the single most dramatic moment of the year. (From the perspective of the court in Beijing, of course. Plenty of dramatic events are happening elsewhere -- a hurricane wrecked some of England's New World colonies, and Shah Jahan down in India has unveiled a truly remarkable throne, following which he ordered the demolition of the Jesuits' headquarters -- but that's another story.)

In central China, Hong Chengchou and Daišan finally move against the Yellow Tiger. They had been sweeping through the countryside putting out fires, but now, at last, they are able to face China’s most notorious bandit leader.

The outlaw army is not caught unawares, seeing as a large Ming force is unlikely to be particularly sneaky. Of course, neither are they; the two armies are doing a very good job of demonstrating how warfare is only really practical in areas with sufficient food supplies. The two armies are also doing a good job of demonstrating how large bodies of men will rapidly deplete even the most fertile farmlands of surplus food.

Hong Chengchou makes at least some attempt to pay for anything that his soldiers “forage,” although undoubtedly this was little more than a token effort. It is entirely possible that later chronicles played up his actions in order to make him look better. Realistically, there is no way that he would have been able to adequately recompense everyone. Still, it’s acknowledged that he tried his best. The fact is that while the Yellow Tiger has made a policy of recruiting disaffected peasants to join his cause (just like every other upjumped warlord), the truth remains that hungry peasants tend to get angry at whomever is currently stealing their food. All armies need food, and the Yellow Tiger’s army is no exception.

This is probably why battle commences early in the year. While the skirmish is usually known as the Battle of Mianshan, it actually occurred a fair distance from the sacred mountain, to the point where some modern historians think that the mountain itself was barely visible (if at all) to the combatants. The results are mostly inconclusive. Hong Chengchou and Daišan jointly claim victory, but the Yellow Tiger slips away in the aftermath. The Yellow Tiger’s supporters claim victory, but they have to abandon the region. Never again will the Yellow Tiger range so far north.

Incidentally, Hong Chengchou and Daišan are getting along just fine. Hong Chengchou is well aware that Ming armies, typically lacking in cavalry, have long recruited from northern steppe peoples, and sees this as an unexceptional continuation of that trend. The fact that Daišan and the Plain Red Banner came to reinforce him just in time is also a good thing. Daišan, for his part, appreciates that Hong Chengchou isn’t a complete dickhead. There will be glory for the victories they will win together, he thinks to himself.

(Those who have read “The Yellow Tiger’s Fury” or viewed any of its modern dramatic adaptations may suspect a deeper relationship between the two. Historians are greatly divided on the subject.)

Up north, Yuan Chonghuan leads a substantial field army against Ligdan Khan (or possibly Ejei Khan, his son; sources aren’t exactly clear on which one was in de facto control at this point, although Ligdan Khan did fall ill several times before his eventual confirmed death in the next year). This battle, again, is inconclusive. The Chakhar mostly fall back in the face of Ming advances and the Ming are not able to pursue them with sufficient speed. Yuan Chonghuan does reassert Ming sovereignty over the contested areas, routing the small units of (usually junior) horsemen who had miscalculated their retreat.

Ajige of the Jurchens does not respond, being very busy fighting off yet another coup attempt. Besides, he had no real sentiment for Ligdan Khan. So Yuan Chonghuan’s expedition is mostly unopposed, and is counted as a success in Beijing for its show of force.

Yuan Chonghuan himself argues for another expedition the following year. He believes that, though the Mongols have been cowed, they need to be well and truly smashed, remembering his great victories against the Jurchens years earlier. Also, so long as everyone gets back in time for the harvest, it might actually be a good idea to take a bunch of peasant levies out where they can’t cause trouble. Win-win.

Knowing the general’s stature, most people at court nod approvingly at the suggestion.

In any other year, the twin victories (or close enough) against the Yellow Tiger and Ligdan Khan would’ve been the most important events in the chronicles. In most worlds, they undoubtedly would have been, for 1635 was by most counts an uneventful year -- for a while.

Later in the year, the emperor’s uncle Zhu Changxun, Prince of Fu (favorite son of the Tianqi Emperor’s grandfather, who would have been heir to the imperial throne if it were not for the rigid traditions of the court) falls ill. He had recently traveled to a part of China where tremendous numbers of peasants had grown sick and died, on business or for some unknown purpose. What is known is that the Prince of Fu was very sick, his body covered with bloody pustules and, reportedly, blood visible in his vomit. He lingers for five days before dying.[1]

It is the first time that this generation of Ming nobility has to grapple with the fact that the plague has arrived. Of course, the plague itself has not yet spread to Beijing; the Prince of Fu, from his estate in rural Henan province, was simply unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. His death alarmed the court, focused minds on an issue that had until then been a distant thing, a problem for the peasantry.

The plague was one disease for which there was no sure remedy. The Prince of Fu had many decent physicians in attendance, who, we are told, tried many cures listed in the Bencao Gangmu to no avail. The best cure was prevention; failing that, luck.

Zhu Yousong, the Prince of Dechang, succeeds his father as Prince of Fu. The emperor’s cousin travels from Beijing back to the family estate to properly mourn his father. According to some accounts, he refuses to even enter the household for nearly a week, until the servants are able to convince him that the place has been thoroughly cleansed and that nobody else was infected.

The resulting delay to the funerary procedures was a trifle unfilial, and some in Beijing clucked their tongues at the prince’s actions. Nobody was so gauche as to actually laugh, but it was a silly little distraction from the ordinary day-to-day.

A pity that it could not have happened a year later.

---

Footnote

[1] As noted in the 1628 update, his death IOTL was not pleasant. That fate has been butterflied away and another one takes its place. Sorry, man.

 

[RexSueciae]

Probable depiction of Zhang Xianzhong, the "Yellow Tiger"​

During the most troubled years of the Tianqi era, occasional peasant armies ravaged entire provinces -- or made very game attempts at doing so -- in search of food, or vengeance, or something else. The Army of the Yellow Tiger is perhaps the best-documented of the group, and tends to occupy an outsized place in both the scholarly literature and popular perception.

Starting around this time, the most influential sources dealing with the subject mostly draw from the writings of Wang Wei, the courtesan-turned-poet who appears to have settled down in the Sichuan area during this time -- which is to say, directly in the path of the rampaging rebels as they recoiled from the army led by Hong Chengchou and Daišan. Wang Wei, along with her husband Xu Yuqing, whom she’d married in 1624,[1] were guests of the noblewoman Qin Liangyu, and appear to have occupied positions of honor at her court.

(Students of history should be reminded that while speculation as to the relationship between Wang Wei, Xu Yuqing, and Qin Liangyu is a popular topic in the genre of historical fiction, much of the popularly accepted “common knowledge” about the trio can be ultimately traced to the Wanzhou Forgeries, a document cache of spurious provenance that was likely composed more than a century after its claimed date. That being said, rumors may have circulated contemporary to these events, especially when noting Wang Wei’s extremely laudatory treatment of Qin Liangyu in her poetry.)

According to Wang Wei, when the Yellow Tiger approached Sichuan, Qin Liangyu did what she was good at doing: she raised an army. Truthfully, she may have been more experienced than most in the Ming military bureaucracy. She’d led armies in Sichuan and Guizhou against rebels before. What was one more collection of rabble to her?

Thus, when the Army of the Yellow Tiger approached Sichuan, they found they were facing significantly stiffer resistance. True, they had never really gotten open cooperation from the locals -- as noted previously, many discontented and hungry peasants ended up attaching themselves to a bandit leader, but people who still had something to lose generally didn’t like the idea of losing it.

But the typical behavior of a peasant farmer facing an approaching army was to hide anything that could be valuable (food, usually, including the seed grain for the next planting season, although modern imagination tends to think of hard currency when they imagine “valuables”) and to melt into the forests. Better to not be there when the army comes.

This time, the bandits faced a hastily-levied army that actively sought to fight them. Despite Wang Wei’s breathless depiction of the events, the clashes that erupted between the two forces were really more brawls than anything else.

On the one hand, you had an irregularly armed, poorly-disciplined mob of peasants. On the other hand, you had...an irregularly armed, poorly-disciplined mob of peasants. Both were fighting, arguably, for survival; the difference was that one side was additionally fighting to protect their homes.

Even so, the Army of the Yellow Tiger might have eventually overwhelmed the locals by sheer force of numbers -- time had taken its toll, of course, but the army was still a threat -- if the relief army led by Hong Chengchou and Daišan had not slammed into their rear.

Wang Wei, in her literary works chronicling the campaign, seems to imply a concerted effort on the part of the various commanders in the region, brilliantly surrounding and decisively defeating a dangerous foe. Recent historical reassessments have tended to demonstrate that luck played a much greater role than previously thought. This is not to diminish the talent that Qin Liangyu displayed in holding together the local levies against their enemies, nor should it diminish the logistical skills of Hong Chengchou and Daišan. However, in an age when the fastest communications technology was “man-on-horse,” there was likely little to no communication between the two Ming forces. The Army of the Yellow Tiger fled from one of its opponents and crashed into another, finding itself broken like a chunk of pottery on a blacksmith’s anvil.

Of course, the victors of the great battle weren’t thinking much of the historiographical implications of recent events. After their victory, they were celebrating -- there was an impromptu festival held in the vicinity of Linshui -- although their soldiers, poking through the bodies of the dead, raised a somewhat disconcerting question.

Where was the Yellow Tiger?

His physical appearance is relatively well-attested in primary sources of the era. (Distinctive complexion, “tiger chin,” impressive stature, fierce demeanor.) And yet none of the corpses recovered from the battlefield seemed to match the description.

There are several plausible theories. The first is that Zhang Xianzhong, the original Yellow Tiger, had been killed in battle years ago and had been replaced by a figurehead or opportunist who made use of his name. The second is that the Yellow Tiger’s body had been overlooked or was disfigured to the point of being unrecognizable, thus escaping notice in the battle’s aftermath.

The third is that the Yellow Tiger, with some of his followers, escaped into the countryside, lying low somewhere (or ensuring silence via intimidation or murder) in order to fight again.

This last theory won immediate acceptance at the time and has, to the present day, majority support in the scholarly community. By some accounts, the Yellow Tiger was at large as late as the 1650s, doing various bandit-type things and causing trouble. But the “Yellow Tiger” who was active in the 1650s was probably a fake; historians have tentatively identified at least five “Tigers” (or False Tigers for the true pedant) in the historical record.

Some of these “Tigers” were easily distinguished because of their physical descriptions, which may have slightly varied from what is known of Zhang Xianzhong. At least one was easily distinguishable from the rest because he was apprehended by Ming forces in 1640 and summarily executed. As for the remainder, who can say? People change in appearance as they age. Maybe the Yellow Tiger -- the real one -- kept at it for years after the battle at Linshui. Maybe he walked away and found peace, somewhere far from the field of blood. Maybe he had been dead all along.

But the Ming armies had (at the cost of considerable bloodshed) restored a temporary order to the region. There would be further unrest, but not quite so existentially threatening. The local garrisons would remain on the lookout for further appearances of the Yellow Tiger (or his imposters). In fact, many members of the victorious armies were eventually resettled in the area, replacing lives lost from war or famine or plague. This is the reason why the dialects and languages of the Sichuan area bear a strong degree of mutual intelligibility with those of North China and, to a degree, with the speech of the Jurchens, owing to the veterans of the Plain Red Banner who had followed Daišan from the northern frontier.[2]

Dutifully, a report was composed for the imperial court, detailing the great victory and the likely mopping-up operations that would be conducted to ensure the Yellow Tiger was well and truly dead. Interestingly, this would be the second time in two years that this part of China would be overshadowed by events taking place elsewhere.

---

Footnotes
[1] This is OTL.
[2] IOTL, the Sichuanese language(s) received tremendous influence from other Chinese populations due to internal immigration following Yuan- and Ming-era depopulation. Zhang Xianzhong was blamed for a lot of the depopulation at the end of the Ming dynasty, although arguably he was a convenient scapegoat for the Qing to use for their propaganda. That being said, relatively impartial Jesuit witnesses agree that he was definitely capable of excessive violence. I should note that IOTL there is some dispute over how Zhang Xianzhong died but it is agreed that he died approximately when people say he did.

 

[RexSueciae]

Mongol horse archer, from manuscript produced during Ming dynasty​

History is rarely made in an instant.

To the popular mind, though, there will always remain a handful of decisive, shocking events upon which human civilization seems to turn. This is, of course, usually an illusion, a simplification which conceals events and trends of more distant origin.

Let’s back up a little.

In 1635, Yuan Chonghuan had led a Ming army against the Mongols and achieved unmistakable, though limited, success. His advocacy brought another Ming army together to do the same thing in 1636. The campaign would get lots of angry young men out of the way, keeping them from causing trouble, while also seeking to humble one of the dynasty’s ancient foes. (The Jurchens, still roiling with civil war, are more or less ignored, but it’s expected that such a show of force will intimidate them as well.)

Yuan Chonghuan and his army had given the Chakhar a tremendous shove, although they had not moved fast enough to completely destroy the Mongol armies. The army of 1636 was probably not going to be significantly faster, although its size (even larger than last year’s) was hopefully enough to contain and eventually destroy those who had raided Ming territory.

(Ming policy towards “northern barbarians” is a complicated subject. Sometimes, emperors attempted to placate raiders with trade goods. Other times, emperors ordered military action. The current leadership of the Ming bureaucracy is not in a negotiating mood.)

Modern historians sometimes debate Yuan Chonghuan’s motivations and ultimate goals for the 1636 campaign. While a final subjugation of the Northern Yuan was obviously in the cards, some evidence suggests that an even grander objective was intended, including (partially substantiated) boasts that the army would advance as far as the ruins of Karakorum.[1]

The Northern Yuan, at this point, were led by Ejei Khan, who is de jure as well as de facto ruler of his people. (His father, Ligdan Khan, has recently died, reportedly while comatose during his final illness.) He is younger, perhaps a little less experienced, but he is certainly his father’s son. He is not about to give up without a fight.

Still, his warriors fall back before the Ming armies just as they did the previous year. It takes all of his diplomatic skill to accomplish such a thing. It helps that the more querulous types had died the previous year fighting the Ming.

They fall back, and continue to fall back, in the face of the advance. For Yuan Chonghuan’s army is advancing at a relatively slow pace, even accounting for lessons learned the previous year. Moving men across the steppe is difficult, but they must keep up the pace or face even more severe logistical issues. Food must be transported, water must be found. And that’s not to mention the light cannon, smaller firearms, gunpowder, and shot.

If it is able to anchor itself to a secure position, the Ming army will be very difficult to face. A Mongol charge is a terrifying thing, horses thundering towards you, their riders firing off arrows the whole time before swinging around for one final shot: armies that break and run (or who advance in an ill-disciplined charge when they see the horsemen “retreating”) tend to get annihilated. But Yuan Chonghuan has been drilling his soldiers, and they’ve learnt that staying put and blasting away at the enemy is a great boon to morale.

Ejei Khan is reluctant to face the Ming head-on. Perhaps his father would have actively harassed them, forced them to keep alert during the day. But Ejei hesitates.

He does notice, though, that when the Ming army sets up camp for nightfall, there is, potentially, vulnerability. True, the army does its best to dig in, set up firing positions, the works. That’s not easy on the steppe. Wagons can be lined up to make impromptu firing positions, maybe. That’s about it, though. It’s not like there’s trees to be felled for shelter, and the army doesn’t carry digging tools to make earthworks.

An amateur might consider a night attack, when the Ming soldiers are at their most vulnerable, mostly asleep. Ejei considers and rejects this option. His horsemen need to be able to see in order to fight.

He attacks at dawn.

It’s in the grey light of the early morning that his army comes pouring across the steppe, smashing into the Ming. There had been sentries posted, but they mostly died where they stood. Those that got away provided maybe a few seconds of warning.

So the Mongols cut through the Ming lines and swarm into the Ming camp, shooting arrows at anything that moves. Here, their momentum breaks down a little as many riders pause to pillage the camp. (In fairness to them, far more disciplined armies throughout history have been tempted into doing the exact same thing.) This gives the Ming enough time to fall back to prepared positions. When the riders charge at the impromptu redoubt formed by wagons and crates piled into barricades, they are bloodily repulsed, the air thick with gunpowder smoke. The Mongols can keep riding around the place shooting arrows but horses lack the sheer punching power of armored vehicles (still hundreds of years away): there is no way a rider on a horse can smash through a wooden barricade without taking potentially life-threatening damage. (Also, horses like to throw riders who pull stunts like that.)

Ming chronicles assert that a counter-attack from the defenders finally drove the Mongol forces away from the Ming camp; primary sources from the Northern Yuan are a little thin on the ground, but appear to imply that the attackers withdrew of their own accord. The Ming acquit themselves well: their steppe nomad enemies can ill afford the terrible losses that they took this day.

However, that does not mean that the Ming army escaped unscathed. Of the vast host that sallied out from Beijing, approximately one-third is dead or missing. The army eventually returns home, badly mauled even in victory. And they bear with them the body of their commander, Yuan Chonghuan, Marquis of Ningyuan -- slain during the height of the battle, he passes from the mortal realm to the immortal pages of history.

---

Footnotes
[1] Although Karakorum was a major settlement and de facto capital city dating back to the reign of Ögedei, it was later eclipsed by other cities of the Yuan (including Khanbaliq, on the site of modern-day Beijing) and by the 1600s was probably a ghost town, its stones salvaged for the construction of Erdene Zuu Monastery. Occupying the ruins of Karakorum would be a signal that the Ming demand not just the submission of the Northern Yuan remnants, but of the Mongol people in general.

 

[RexSueciae]

The Meridian Gate​

As his servants helped him into his most formal robes, he wondered why he couldn’t feel a damned thing.

His wife, upon hearing of the Marquis of Ningyuan’s death, had burst into tears. The stalwart general had been a dear friend. To think that he was gone...

He promised to return. He promised us that.

And so the general had returned, but in a wooden box carried by his soldiers. All that was mortal of the man who had broken the Jin and who would have done the same to the old foes, the descendants of the Yuan.

Emperors don’t weep. But even if they were allowed, he didn’t think he’d be capable of it. He’d expected to feel sad. Bereft, even. Instead, there’s just a blankness, a void.

The servants looked a little frightened of him. Or maybe worried for him. He couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter.

“This way, your majesty,” someone murmured, and he stalked out of the room. He had duties.

The Meridian Gate was maybe his favorite part of the palace -- besides, of course, the room where he keeps all his woodworking equipment. Its balcony looks out over a great granite courtyard, high up above the bustle down below.

Today, the courtyard was not filled with ordinary passerby, court officials and workers and so forth. Instead, there were battalions of soldiers, clad in fine armor, and each man stood beside a prisoner. The prisoners wore red, as was tradition, and their arms were bound as they were made to kneel before the emperor.

This was an old ceremony, one that his grandfather had done and his father before him, probably all the way back to early times. Back before the Meridian Gate had been built and the capital was another city. It was not new to the emperor. He knew his role.

Zhou Qiyuan, his Minister of Justice, stoop-shouldered with age but still clear-voiced, unrolled a scroll. “August majesty,” he formally began, “these vile enemies of peace stand accused of the following offenses...”

The emperor let his mind wander. His most senior courtiers stood beside him, and many guards beside them. It wasn’t that impressive of a ceremony. None of the more important Mongols had been captured. That so-called Khan was still out there somewhere. Well, this would show him what it meant to pick a fight with the Great Ming.

Minister Zhou read quickly. “And therefore,” he concluded, “I petition that these men be taken to the execution ground without delay and put to death with the sword, for their varied and sundry crimes against all civilization!”

The crowd held its breath, waiting for his response.

And so the emperor said the words that were used in such occasions: “Take them there,” he said quietly. “Be it so ordered.”

“Be it so ordered!” The command was taken up by his courtiers, and then the guards, and soon nearly every Chinese voice was echoing the command. “BE IT SO ORDERED!”

The soldiers down in the square began hauling away their prisoners, heading straight for the execution ground. The crowd roared its approval.

Be it so ordered!

The emperor remained standing at the balcony until the last voice had died away, the last prisoner was gone. Then he turned and allowed his servants to help him away from public view.

He wondered why it was so cold this time of year.

 

[RexSueciae]

Depiction of a drawloom from the Tiangong Kaiwu, published in 1637​

For some months, the emperor refuses to leave his private quarters.

This goes unnoticed by most of his subjects. The ordinary peasant farmer, city-dweller, even low-ranking members of the imperial bureaucracy have gotten used to a mostly distant and impersonal sovereign. The emperor’s grandfather had pretty much codified that practice, although it cannot have been said that emperors were especially hands-on even then.

Still, the extent of the emperor’s seclusion was apparently notable even to his contemporaries. The episode is mostly minimized in official chronicles, but historians are in agreement from other primary sources that the emperor was experiencing a severe depressive episode in response to the death of Yuan Chonghuan in battle.

Meanwhile, outside of the imperial palaces, events continue to turn. The four Oirats are sufficiently impressed by the Ming military expeditions to send embassies to Beijing pledging -- well, not submission, but something closer to friendship and also please don’t kill us. Ejei Khan, despite arguably “winning” the recent battle, takes a good look at the frankly unsustainable casualty figures that result from waging war with the Ming. During the following campaign seasons, he instead falls upon the Manchu, leaving China’s northern frontier mostly undisturbed for now.

In Dongshan, the announcement is officially made that gold has been discovered along the eastern coast. The reaction from the Portuguese, Dutch, and Spanish is one of grumbling at the missed opportunity -- or, at least, it would have been, but those nations are distracted by their quarrels with each other. The Dutch have been fighting the Spanish for generations over freedom and have been fighting the Portuguese for almost as long over colonial possessions. There’s intrigues afoot in Japan (where the conflict sometimes adopts religious overtones). Dutch and English cooperation was probably one of the factors that led to the merchant John Weddell being rebuffed from Chinese ports; he did not, apparently, endear himself to the Portuguese merchants who had already secured a foothold in the region.[1]

Further afield, the great emperor of the Mughals, Shah Jahan, reacts with some bemusement to a letter from the Ming court. Having heard rumors of Shah Jahan’s persecution of the Jesuits in his realm, the Tianqi Emperor had apparently dictated a suitably disapproving response (although historians disagree on the exact wording of the authentic letter). Shah Jahan shrugs his shoulders and continues with his life. After all, his forces have just taken the stronghold of Nagpur and he’s got some neat ideas for building projects. Life is good.

Song Yingxing, an amateur scientist and failed exam candidate (seriously he made at least five different attempts at the jinshi degree before giving up), publishes his Tiangong Kaiwu (天工開物, “Explanation of Works Under Heaven”), one of the more interesting of the Ming-era encyclopedias. The text is very useful to historians, as it provides an extremely in-depth view of all aspects of the Ming economy circa 1637. Song includes an inscription thanking the gunpowder enthusiast Sun Yuanhua for his contributions to the book, although the Tiangong Kaiwu nonetheless includes some curious references to archaic but awesome-sounding gunpowder weapons (e.g. a description which greatly resembles the “thunder crash bomb” invented some hundreds of years earlier).[2]

In Joseon, the king Injo (or, at least, whichever ministers are presently manipulating him) orders a massive offensive against the Manchus to the north.[3] Some figures within the Joseon court dream of pushing far enough to restore the old frontiers of Balhae, one of the predecessor states to Goryeo (which was itself the immediate predecessor of the ruling Joseon dynasty). That’s probably a little bit out of reach, though. Injo finds himself in the curious position of sorta-technically cooperating with the Northern Yuan, who are encroaching on the Jurchens from the west as Joseon’s armies do so from the east. A formal agreement between Ejei Khan and King Injo is nowhere to be had, of course. Injo favors closer relations with the Ming and is not about to get in trouble by negotiating with the wrong people, even if the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

All these things happen, and then, as summer rolls around, the Tianqi Emperor finally emerges from seclusion...

---

Footnotes
[1] John Weddell was a real guy who existed IOTL and who failed to make much of an impression in China on account of the Portuguese already being there. (It’s honestly amazing how little success the English / British had in China literally up until the Opium Wars. Then again, their ambitions were generally focused elsewhere.)
[2] Song Yingxing was also a real person from OTL. ITTL he has managed to get a bit more expert insight on his writing, so his description of gunpowder weapons is a little less anachronistic than IOTL. But only a little bit. Dude really liked his long-obsolete explosives.
[3] This is in sharp contrast with OTL, where Hong Taiji had proclaimed himself founding emperor of the Qing dynasty and then launched another invasion of Joseon, in which (predictably) the Qing won handily.

 

[RexSueciae]

Imperial Palace Complex, Beijing

She was worried about her husband, now more than ever. He would go for weeks at a time without speaking, and when he did speak, it was maybe one or two words. Several times, she’d seen him sitting at his workbench, his woodworking tools in front of them. Sitting perfectly still, not making a move toward any of the tools, not saying a word.

That worried her.

So it was almost a relief when he turned to her, one day, without preamble, and said: “I’ve got to get out.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Out of here. The walls are closing in.” He rubbed his face with his hands.

The emperor had done a good job in all the public rituals. He’d presided over the elaborate funerary arrangements for Yuan Chonghuan, who had died a hero’s death. He’d presided over a service of thanksgiving and repentance, intended to pacify Heaven, and signed a posthumous pardon for Madame Ke.[1] He’d presided over the presentation of war prisoners at the Meridian Gate and, like tradition demanded, had presided over their execution.

He had not enjoyed any of that, but she knew that her husband would have ordered the deaths of far more prisoners if it would bring back Yuan Chonghuan. But it wouldn’t. Nothing would.

The emperor staggered to his feet. “I’ll need to send for Minister Dong,” he said, mostly to himself. “He’ll know how to arrange things.” And he began pacing about the room.

It took some time to locate Minister Dong Kewei, and when he was apprised of the situation he frowned and stroked his beard, surprised but clearly giving the matter some thought. “If the divine emperor wishes to tour his domains, that is well within his purview,” he said slowly. “I will choose, from among my agents, a vast number of reliable guardsmen-”

“One.”

“I-I’m sorry?”

“One. Or as few as possible.” The emperor was quite firm about that. “I will be traveling anonymously. I want as little attention as possible.”

Minister Dong opened his mouth, but before he could say anything Master Jin, the Jesuit, burst through the door.[2]

“Excuse me, your majesty,” he said, breathing as if he’d just run a mile. “Let me...let me catch my breath for a moment.” He slumped over for a moment before speaking again. “Your majesty,” he said, “I overheard Minister Dong being summoned, and -- I would like to come with you.”

Everyone in the room seemed surprised at that, including the emperor. “Master Jin,” he said gently, “I need you to stay here and protect my family.”

Master Jin nodded. “I know, your majesty, but there are others who can do that. All of my compatriots are trustworthy and I would personally entrust my own life to the hands of Masters Luo and Tang.[3] But my place, your majesty, is by your side.” And he knelt on the ground.

The emperor sighed. “Get up, Jin. Very well. You can come with me. You and one guard that Minister Dong shall name. Minister Dong,” he said, “I entrust you with the safety of my realm. While I am traveling, you are to hide the fact that I am gone. Tell people that I have entered a meditative state or something like that. You can trust Master Jin’s people on household matters. If anything goes wrong -- if I am confirmed dead, or if there are rumblings of discontent in the region -- send for Admiral Zheng and bid him make haste from Dongshan. He probably won’t be able to get here in time, but his men will be able to wreak bloody vengeance. That probably won’t be necessary, though. I’ll be back.”

Turning to his wife, the emperor embraced her. “I’m sorry,” he whispered into her hair. “I just need to get out of here for a while. I keep having bad dreams. But even if I didn’t, if I were sound of mind, I would someday need to go and see the people. As they are, not stuffed into an audience hall. I need to. I don’t want to be like my grandfather. I want to feel human.”

She hugged him back. Kissed him. “It’s okay,” she said. “Go, with my blessing. And hurry home to me. Please.”

He rested his head against hers. “I shall.” Half-turning to Minister Dong. “One other thing,” he said. “My empress speaks in my name when I am gone. If she makes any request of you, I hope you carry it out as if you would for me.” Minister Dong murmured assent.

“Very well,” said the emperor, and he and the empress reluctantly parted. “Now,” he said. “Let’s meet our escort.”

The guard that Minister Dong selected to accompany the emperor was a serious-faced man who looked, at least superficially, a little bit like a Shaolin wushu expert. He brought with him very ordinary-looking robes, which he offered to Master Jin and to the emperor.

“Good idea,” the emperor said. “Keep us nondescript. You know, Master Jin, you could be our teacher and us your loyal students.” For indeed, Master Jin was visibly older than the other two.

The emperor turned to the guard. “What is your name?”

“Shi Chunjing, your majesty.”[4]

“Good man. When we are out there, remember: do not reveal to anyone that I am your emperor. That goes for you too, Master Jin. Not a word. Nothing.”

“But-”

“Glad I could count on you.” The emperor clapped them on their backs. “C’mon. Let’s get out of here.”

They exited the palace under cover of night. Shi Chunjing knew of a decent place in Beijing to hide out; it would be up to them to decide how much time to spend in the city versus traveling the countryside.

The emperor breathed the free air. It was dark, so nobody could see him smile.

---

Footnotes
[1] Believe it or not, IOTL the Chongzhen Emperor was persuaded to posthumously honor Wei Zhongxian as a sort of last-ditch attempt to restore the dynasty’s fortunes -- this despite his deep distaste and fear for the eunuch while he was still alive. ITTL the Tianqi Emperor is not facing quite so severe misfortunes as his brother did IOTL, but he feels he has to do something, and he appears to have genuinely loved his old nursemaid, even if she was a notorious schemer who, ITTL, was put to death for her crimes. Hence, no posthumous ennoblement, but a pardon would be appropriate.
[2] In case you’ve forgotten, this is Nicolas Trigault.
[3] He is referring to Giacomo Rho and Johann Adam Schall von Bell, two Jesuits who were active in Beijing at this time.
[4] 石纯竞. This is a fictional character whom I have invented, just like Magistrate Di’s assistants.

 

[RexSueciae]

A nondescript teahouse, Beijing

Shi Chunjing had led them well. They had a place to stay for a little while. And the food wasn’t half bad.

The emperor’s gaze drifted to the other customers. They were preoccupied with their own issues and didn’t pay him much attention. Some men were playing pai jiu like it was their job, unsmiling and methodical. A handful of common folk exchanged tired stories about rain, the harvest, and the vagaries of the gods. An old man sat by the fire, telling the fortunes of some youths in exchange for a coin.

Against such a backdrop, nobody noticed the little table at the side of the room where the emperor (incognito), Shi Chunjing, and Master Jin were seated, drinking tea.

Shi stood to pour them more tea. “Thank you, older brother,” the emperor said politely. Shi had poured tea for Master Jin first. The emperor was perfectly fine adopting the persona of a junior student, and it amused him whenever his companions stuttered a bit as they caught themselves before they could call him “your majesty.” Everything still had the air of an adventure.

He sipped his tea. It wasn’t bad tea, if a little weak.

Beijing was a city in which to lose oneself. Bustling like a great beehive. (He had never seen a beehive, but he imagined they would be quite busy, what with all the bees.) Nobody ever looked at you twice. There was just too much happening for anyone to be the center of attention for too long. Unless, maybe, they were the emperor. And he was not the emperor.

Their little party had spent the previous day venturing about the city. Not in search of anything, just to observe. He couldn’t help but be impressed by the sheer number of people around. And this was just the one city! There were many others, he knew, all down the coastline and further inland, cities of comparable size and antiquity (although none, he suspected, were truly as grand as the capital). Perhaps he would have to visit them someday.

For now, he felt like continuing to explore Beijing. And then maybe venturing into the nearby countryside. The city was not everything. He remembered, vaguely, that in his youth, his tutors had read to him from various texts whose authors, the great sages, had done things like go up mountains or sit by rivers and do the sorts of contemplative things that, the commentaries suggested, had a lot of double meanings. The only thing that really stuck with him was that there were people going up mountains or sitting by rivers. There were no real mountains or rivers in the imperial palace.

Well. Maybe he could climb a mountain. But for now, he was in the city. And there were a great many things to do and see in the city.

He finished his tea. He noticed that his companions had finished their tea as well. Boldly, the emperor stood, grasping the teapot. “Allow me,” he said brightly, and began to pour tea for them.

Shi’s eyes went wide. Master Jin reacted about a second later. The emperor smiled. By the protocols of court, an emperor pouring tea would be unthinkable! But he had given them specific instructions not to reveal his identity. Even though anyone who received such a high honor from the emperor ought, by long custom, to throw themselves upon the ground in an obsequious display of gratitude.

It was Master Jin who recovered his wits first. Reaching out with his hand, he subtly rapped the table with the knuckles of three fingers. Shi Chunjing quickly did the same.

Well done, the emperor thought, very pleased with his companions’ cleverness. He recognized the gesture as an approximation of the kowtow, the hands and head of a supplicant prostrated upon the ground. That was a deft bit of thinking. But then, everyone knew that Master Jin was an intelligent man.

He poured tea for his companions, and poured tea for himself, and sat back down. Today was going to be a good day.

---

Footnote

Unnumbered footnote. There is a legend about the Qianlong Emperor (who will not exist ITTL), how, when he traveled incognito, he played the same practical joke on his companions by insisting on pouring them tea -- and one of his companions, caught in a dilemma, invented the same ingenious solution. It is, of course, a legend, but I couldn't pass up using it here. Maybe this is simply another legend commonly told ITTL about the Tianqi Emperor. Maybe not.

 

[RexSueciae]

A quiet side street, Beijing

Of course they ran into trouble eventually.

To be fair, his companions were doing an excellent job keeping them out of trouble. He had to practically go looking for it.

But when they stumbled across the scene -- a gang of street ruffians holding cudgels, menacing some merchant -- his companions dragged him back around the corner, out of view.

“Not our business,” Shi Chunjing said. “Not a good idea to get involved.”

Master Jin looked pained but agreed. “We cannot risk your safety.”

The emperor looked from one to the other. A more learned man would have pulled some lofty quote from the aether, drawing from one of the classical commentaries about doing the right thing no matter what. The emperor didn’t have any of that. He just said: “we need to help.”

“But-”

“I don’t like it,” the emperor said. He crossed his arms. “It’s not right. We have to do something.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know.” The emperor squared his shoulders. “But I’m not going to stand by and do nothing.”

His purposeful stride forward was halted by Shi Chunjing. “Wait. Waitwaitwait.” The guardsman pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. Glancing over at the confrontation, he looked back to the emperor and Master Jin. “You two, wait here,” he all but ordered. “If anyone’s going to intervene, I’ll do it. Just keep back.” And he approached the ruffians at a loping run.

The emperor and Master Jin just watched. It was almost frightening to behold. The first ruffian was taken from behind, a sudden blow to the head, and he went down hard. The second similarly had little warning. Shi wrested the cudgel from the man's limp, unresisting hands and proceeded to wallop a third ruffian, who yelled with pain until he took such a hit that he stopped yelling.

One ruffian left. Unnerved by the speed with which his comrades fell, he backed slowly, his cudgel held in front of him like a sword. But Shi was a professional. Almost lazily, he twirled his own weapon through the air, until with a great shout he dashed forward, swinging it around. The ruffian barely brought his own cudgel up in time to parry, and they met in a great clatter.

Shi gave him no time to recover. He was on him again, and again, and again. And then the ruffian yelled out, for Shi had clobbered him on the wrist, causing him to drop his weapon.

The guardsman wasted no time, but kicked the ruffian in the chest, sending him sprawling backwards, then rushed forward, weapon raised for the killing blow-

“Hold!” The emperor’s voice rang out. “Take him alive. I want to speak with him.”

Shi paused. Then he lowered his weapon. He still kicked the ruffian again, though.

The emperor waited until the man had stopped wheezing in pain. “Now,” he said, crouching down next to the bandit they’d apprehended, “what is your name?”

“Fuck you.”

“That’s the strangest name I’ve ever heard,” the emperor said pleasantly. “And why were you and your…currently indisposed associates threatening this fellow here?” He gestured back at the merchant whom Shi had rescued. The merchant, goggle-eyed, was glancing back and forth between the parties, obviously still stunned.

“Why do you think?” The ruffian spat on the ground. “We needed to eat. He looked like he had money. Nobody wants to starve. I’m no exception to that.”

“So you chose to preserve your life by threatening someone else’s,” the emperor said as sternly as he was able. “Where is the justice there?”

The ruffian laughed. “Justice? I gave up on justice within a week of coming here. This city has a way of devouring the meek and the just. I’ve survived this far by not thinking about any of that.”

The emperor thought about what he wanted to learn next. “Where are you from?” But the ruffian did not answer. “Why did you come here?”

“I didn’t have a choice,” the ruffian muttered.

“Explain.”

“I didn’t have a choice.” The ruffian looked him in the eye. “Do you know what the farmers do when they have too many mouths to feed? Too many children in a time of famine?”

Clearly, the emperor did not.

“Some farmers probably just kill them,” the ruffian said bitterly. “Or maybe not intentionally, but when the country starves it’s always the old and the young who die first. They need the strong young men to live long enough to bring in the harvest. Whenever there’s not enough to eat, it’s the harvestmen who die last.”

The ruffian coughed. “But,” he said, “some families want to be merciful. They don’t want their precious children to die. They want to give them a chance. So for the boys,” he coughed again, “they get a certain operation. And then their families take them to the capital and they abandon them. In the city, after all, there’s a chance. Maybe they can get a place with the palace eunuchs. Maybe they won’t starve after all.”

“...what?”

“You heard me,” the ruffian said. “That’s what my parents had done to me. I was still a child.”

The emperor leaned back, face troubled. “Surely, they know that the emperor has not accepted new palace eunuchs in a long time.” Not for the better part of a decade. There were still quite a few, but Wei Zhongxian’s ouster had been followed by Minister Dong making a very careful investigation of his former cronies. They had been quietly purged and replaced by men that Dong trusted.

“Yeah, no shit.” The ruffian sighed. “Didn’t matter that the chances of success had gone even lower. Not that they were high to begin with. My parents wanted me to have a chance. A tiny chance is better than nothing.”

“So they made you a eunuch,” the emperor said quietly. “And they took you here. And you found that working for the palace was just about impossible.”

“Finally, the fool gets it. And when I couldn’t find honest work, I turned to dishonest work. Not that I give a damn for any of the boys.” He motioned in the direction of the other ruffians whom Shi had dispatched. They lay there, unnervingly still. “They’re all bullies and crooks. Same as me, I suppose.”

The emperor passed a hand across his face. “For whatever crimes you have committed,” he said, “you have no doubt been punished for them by now. Get out of my sight. Don’t let me lay eyes on you again. And here.” He produced a coin from his robes, pressed it into the man’s hand. “Take this. You can go now.”

The ruffian looked perplexed, but he accepted the coin, rose unsteadily to his feet, and hurried off.

“Are you alright?” The emperor asked the merchant. “Very well. You can go, too. Forget everything you saw just now.”

And then the emperor was alone with his companions again.

“That was a kind thing you did,” Master Jin murmured.

“It was the only thing to do,” the emperor replied, a little annoyed. “He’d already been beaten. What else could I do, order his death? I suppose I could have, but I’d like to consult with a magistrate first. And even then, it’s my prerogative to grant mercy.”

Shi Chunjing blinked and said nothing. He would have said something like: all this for a petty merchant? But he was well-trained in keeping thoughts like those to himself.

“I tire of this,” the emperor said. “Let’s go somewhere more convivial. I’ve had enough moral dilemmas for one day.”

 

[RexSueciae]

Outskirts of the city, Beijing

Master Jin approved, in principle, of charity, but after seeing the emperor give another handful of coins (indeed, the entire remaining contents of a leather pouch that he carried) to a young beggar at the roadside, he felt obliged to speak up.

“Your maj-” he caught himself in time. “I mean, um, I hesitate to presume,” he said, “but perhaps a more judicious approach is in order?”

The emperor gave him a curious look. “What do you mean?”

“Not to put too fine a point upon it,” he said, “but your life is quite valuable, and-”

“What the honorable master means,” Shi Chunjing interjected, “is that he’s worried that you keep giving money to people who are potentially unstable, diseased, or dangerous.”

The Jesuit spluttered. “That is not precisely what I meant-”

“I mean, think about it,” Shi Chunjing continued, “that last one was coughing his lungs out. You might catch the plague, for all we know.”

“And what,” the emperor asked, “are the symptoms of plague?”

The guardsman paused. “Um. As far as I remember, like, these large bleeding blisters? And a strong fever, and-”

“But no coughing. Therefore, no plague.”

Master Jin winced. “Well, some versions of the plague do spread via the breath,” he pointed out, “and in any case, a bad case of la grippe would still be dangerous to the life of our beloved-”

“If I fall ill, then I am afraid it will be up to you to bear me safely home,” the emperor said. “And besides, I have a responsibility to my people.”

“Yes,” the Jesuit said carefully. “That does you great credit. And you have been responsible for doling out coins to innkeepers, grocery merchants, and miscellaneous beggars since the beginning of our adventure. Please, though, assuage my nerves by telling me just how many bags of coins you have about your person, so that I may rest easy knowing we still have sufficient funds.”

The emperor carefully stowed the sizable but empty coin purse into a fold of his robes. Then he told them.

Shi Chunjing’s eyes almost bulged out. “What! That many?! It’s a wonder you don’t clink when you move!”

“It was a lucky number,” the emperor said. He’d visited Minister Cai and politely asked for a quantity of copper coins in leather bags, which the Minister of Finance had provided without question. It was convenient being the emperor, sometimes.

“Lucky number!” The guardsman pinched the bridge of his nose. “Aaaaa. Okay. Fine. Now I’ll just be sure to worry about yet another risk to your life. If anyone’s following us in this crowd, and they try to rob us, I shall be very, very-” He stopped talking. “Never mind. I live to serve.”

“Cheer up,” the emperor advised. “It’s a lovely day.”

And it was. The sun warmed the earth, but not unbearably so, for there were wispy clouds and a gentle breeze. And as the trio wandered further from the center of the city, it seemed even the smell of the air was better, though that may have been simply imagination. After all, even in the less dense areas, there were still crowds of people. With people came all the scents of humanity -- and not all of them were good.

But it was still pleasant enough, being out in the open, and though his companions worried about him, the emperor was not worried. He was, by now, practically a seasoned traveler. True, he hadn’t traveled much before this. Or at all, really, except in the immediate vicinity of his palaces.

The road, he knew, stretched out to the east, continued down to the coast and to the harbors there. And down the road there was a little commotion.

“Make way!” He could hear people shouting. “Make way!”

A pair of guards were clearing a path through the crowds, which parted in front of a small procession. There were attendants carrying a fashionably ornate litter, one befitting an official of decent rank, which advanced through the mass of people in the street.

The emperor’s party hurried to the side, out of the way. The litter, they could see, was occupied by a distinguished-looking fellow whose bored gaze wandered over the crowd. Then he blinked and shouted a command to his attendants, who stopped.

He clambered out, and when his feet were on the ground walked forward until he stood in front of the emperor.

“Your majesty?” Magistrate Di Renjie asked, surprised. “What on earth are you doing here?”

 

[RexSueciae]

Outskirts of the city, Beijing

The emperor stepped forward to grab the magistrate by the arm before he could bow to him in the street.

“Not so loudly,” the emperor said, although by then heads were already turning throughout the crowd. Ah well. It was fun while it lasted.

The magistrate’s guardsmen were advancing on him, although Magistrate Di waved them off.

“I had seen you maybe once before,” he said to the emperor. “At the ceremony of my appointment. And before that, I think, as I was just attaining my degree.”

The emperor looked close. “I recognize you,” he said. “You’re the magistrate we sent down to Dongshan.” He smiled. “And how are things going over there? I know the Admiral can be a strong personality, but he’s a decent fellow at heart.”

“Things are going well enough,” Magistrate Di said, a bit cautiously. “Although there is one important matter that he wished for me to convey in person. When we landed at the docks, they said that our emperor had gone into seclusion and was taking no visitors, but I figured I might as well arrive and see if one of your ministers would take a message.”

“Well,” the emperor said with good humor, “I suppose you can have an audience with me momentarily. Just as soon as we get back to the palace.” He beckoned Shi and Master Jin closer. “Let’s join their precession, shall we? Before the people notice and start kowtowing all over the damn place.”

The emperor turned back to Magistrate Di. “I’d like to commandeer your litter. I’m afraid you’ll have to walk the rest of the way, but here.” He pulled multiple heavy coin-purses from his robes and pressed them to the flabbergasted magistrate. “This should be suitable recompense, I hope. Do be a gentleman and distribute some of it to the commoners, if you would? Thank you. Alright, c’mon. I’ve got an audience to grant, so let’s step to it.”

He clambered into the magistrate’s litter and they were off. Honestly, it was good to get all that money into someone else’s hands. He could’ve given the stuff away even more generously and still have been at it for weeks. Well, it wasn’t his problem anymore. Idly, he wondered how the people did it. Carrying so much money around was a bother! No wonder that emperors had toyed with paper money, years ago. But that was probably a bad idea. It never really seemed to work out. And of course, the people didn’t seem to usually have such a problem with the weight of coins. Many of them hardly seemed to have enough.

And that wasn’t the only thing that the emperor thought about. He missed his wife, his children. I do feel bad for leaving them. That was my only mistake, he thought, and though going among the commoners was probably the right thing to do at the time, he was glad to be heading home.

It’s funny, he thought. I’ve never come to my palace this way before. I’ve lived within the grounds practically all my life. A brand-new experience, really. The thought cheered him.

Well. Now that he’d done it once, he might well do it again. If things ever got so bad and he needed to clear his head. Although maybe he’d more thoroughly schedule a return plan, rather than leave it up to fate. It wouldn’t do to upset things too much. Even if he was the emperor. Especially since he was the emperor.

He realized, also, that he’d been away from his woodworking for...quite some time. His hands itched for the chance to carve something beautiful again. He’d seen so many things -- not just the polished fineries of his palace, but things that were breathing and real. How had he ever gone without seeing them? Why had he been kept away for so long?

Those were all things to think about. Later, of course. For now, the emperor settled back and thought about what he’d say to his beloved wife.

 

[RexSueciae]

Warship in the service of Admiral Zheng Zhilong, illustration published 1637. Note the junk-rigged sails and two rows of gunports. The cannons of this ship are of relatively small caliber and fire roundshot.​

The Tianqi Emperor’s return to the palace is one of triumph and celebration. At least, to the imperial family. Most people had no idea that he’d left, including his high officials. The venerable old Sun Chengzong, who is capping off his illustrious career with a long spell as Grand Secretary, wrings his hands but doesn’t kick up a fuss; after all, the emperor’s spirits have clearly improved and he was worrying about the lad. Zhou Qiyuan, Minister of Justice, writes a very formal and restrained memorial to the throne suggesting that the emperor kindly not pull a trick like that in the future, couched in very respectful language. Dong Kewai, Minister of Works, pretends that he wasn’t the person to arrange the emperor’s vanishing act in the first place.

Qian Qianyi, Minister of Rites, has some private meetings with the emperor. This may or may not be related to their mutual friendship with Zheng Zhilong, Admiral of the Coastal Seas, and a recently arrived missive from the emperor’s viceroy on Dongshan. Indeed, some historians believe that what followed had already been planned, to some degree, before the emperor’s sojourn among the people.

The Tokugawa family has controlled Japan for three decades at this point. The present shogun is Tokugawa Iemitsu, first of his lineage to be born after his distinguished grandfather, Tokugawa Ieyasu, formally seized power. Iemitsu resembles his counterpart the Tianqi Emperor in many ways; they are both relatively young men (indeed, they were born almost within a year of each other) whose court was dominated by regents until they were able to assume personal control over their respective nations.[1] They differ, however, in one aspect: their tolerance of Christianity.

The Tianqi Emperor, of course, is positively inclined towards Christians, and in particular the Jesuits, who are his friends. Persistent rumors exist concerning his religious affiliation (mostly legends invented by optimistic Europeans) and that of his family (his brother, the Prince of Xin, is rumored to be a Christian[2]). Also, every now and then one of his courtiers gets baptized -- this isn’t exactly common, but when it does happen most people basically shrug and get on with their lives. Their emperor is the greatest emperor in the world -- indeed, is the emperor, so why worry about foreigners and their strange religion?

Tokugawa Iemitsu is not like that. At all. To him, Christians are less “harmless foreign eccentrics who know a lot about astronomy” and more “those assholes in Kyushu who keep importing guns.” Which is to say, he views them as an existential threat. He does not like the renegade daimyos who pretend to be good Catholics so they get favorable deals from the Portuguese and Spanish. He prefers the Dutch, who might be foreigners but at least they’re not those kinds of foreigners, and are more than willing to cooperate with the duly appointed authorities. Iemitsu is not what you’d call a tremendously cosmopolitan fellow. Two years ago, he introduced a bunch of restrictions on foreign trade and has since been directing his men to hunt down any Japanese Christians they can find.

Obviously, word gets out. Foreign trade might be strictly curtailed but plenty of Japanese have experience as overseas merchants, and plenty of foreigners from neighboring areas have made a tidy profit trading in Japan. Some of these individuals have personal connections to Japan. Some have sympathies with the local Christians.

Zheng Zhilong, Admiral of the Coastal Seas, fits all three categories. He started off his career trading in Japan, his wife (the mother of his son) is Japanese, and he himself is a nominal Catholic. And he is not happy.

The Ming court was content to send an angry letter to Shah Jahan reprimanding him for allowing the persecution of Jesuits in his domain -- there was little else they could do, really. But here, Admiral Zheng unleashes all his rhetoric in calling for swift action against the eastern barbarians, who have the indecency to torture missionaries to death in public. The Tokugawa regime, in his eyes, is causing trouble for no reason. Also, swift action would please his Portuguese and Spanish associates, some of whom are resident in Dongshan, and who are important middlemen in regional trade.

Eventually, he acts.

In September 1637, the relatively peaceful atmosphere of Nagasaki is shattered by cannon-fire. A small armada of ships has boldly sailed up to the busy port and unleashed their firepower upon the very surprised inhabitants. Furthermore, two parties are launched in small boats. One targets a Dutch East India Company merchant ship, which they capture in hand-to-hand combat (along with a decent haul of cargo). The other, led by Admiral Zheng himself, descends upon the city, where they smash up some buildings before prudently withdrawing in the face of Japanese reinforcements.

Zheng’s landing party does not leave empty-handed. They do some desultory looting while ashore, which is not particularly profitable but which is symbolically significant. The shore party demonstrates Zheng’s boldness and is additionally able to rescue one Lorenzo Ruiz, a Filipino-born Catholic missionary who had been captured by the Tokugawa regime. Unfortunately, Ruiz is badly injured by the tortures visited upon him and dies onboard Zheng’s ship.[3]

The success of Zheng’s expedition sends shockwaves through Japan. If the Tokugawa court was troubled by Christians before, they’re positively apoplectic now. And on the island of Kyushu, the news just keeps getting worse. A number of rebels in the Shimabara domain, led by an extremely charismatic Christian youth, figure that it’s now or never, and promptly kick off a rebellion which soon swells to foreboding numbers.[4]

Admiral Zheng returns in triumph. This isn’t the first time that he’s beaten the Dutch, but it’s probably the most audacious. Indeed, depictions of the “Descent Upon Nagasaki” will eventually be highly popular in East Asia and in Europe. He receives an official commendation from the emperor, rakes in a tidy profit from the sale of his prize’s cargo, and is warmly thanked by local representatives of the Catholic Church. Giulio Alenio, the foremost representative of the Jesuits in Dongshan, receives the bodily relics of Lorenzo Ruiz from Zheng’s crew and organizes the transfer back to the Philippines. Ruiz had been affiliated with the Dominicans, and it is believed that Jesuit testimony in support of Ruiz’s martyrdom was reciprocated by Dominican support for the canonization of Francesc de Borja. Both individuals are canonized within the decade.[5]

Admiral Zheng wants more action in Japan. Some of the emperor’s ministers have their own plans for internal improvements. The emperor, meanwhile, is just happy to be back with his family and particularly his empress. Soon, it becomes known that he and the empress have conceived another child -- clearly, their reunion was a happy one.

---

Footnotes
[1] This is an accurate description of Tokugawa Iemitsu as he was IOTL. Of course, at this point IOTL the Tianqi Emperor had been dead for ten years.
[2] As noted previously, IOTL the Chongzhen Emperor was rumored to have been very close to converting but then didn’t. Similar rumors follow him here.
[3] Lorenzo Ruiz was a real person IOTL who was tortured to death in 1637. Three hundred and fifty years later, he would be canonized as one of the Sixteen Martyrs of Japan, the first Filipino-born saint.
[4] The Shimabara Rebellion -- in response to religious persecution and more mundane economic reasons -- started in late 1637 IOTL as well.
[5] IOTL Francesc de Borja, or “Francis Borgia” (yes, those Borgias), a Superior General of the Jesuit Order, was beatified in 1624 and canonized in 1670. Lorenzo Ruiz, meanwhile, was not beatified until 1981 and canonized in 1987 as one of the Sixteen Martyrs of Japan, because records of his life had been misplaced for centuries (before eventually being located in the archives of...the Jesuit Order). ITTL, obviously, Francis has been beatified on schedule, unaffected by the POD, and Lorenzo Ruiz is a lot more famous owing to all the extra witnesses, so the two are made saints earlier than IOTL.

 

[RexSueciae]

Dramatis Personae

As the empress gives birth to her third child -- a daughter this time -- let us take a moment and look over the most important figures of the imperial court.

Foremost, of course, are the Tianqi Emperor and the Empress Rong. The emperor is very fond of his empress; sure, she’s a distant relative of the late and unlamented Wei Zhongxian, but she’s also beautiful and intelligent. It is generally unusual for emperors to be monogamous; the Hongzhi Emperor took no concubines, but that was a rare exception to the rule, and would have likely been the only exception if not for the Tianqi Emperor.[1]

The Tianqi Emperor has made no move to acquire more concubines or wives since the death of Wei Zhongxian. His surviving consorts (those who hadn’t been murdered in palace intrigues by scheming eunuchs) stayed on, but the emperor made no move to take any others, and nobody was foisting them upon him anymore. Consort Hui, his last surviving concubine, died of a winter fever, leaving him with no concubines or consorts other than his empress.[2]

All of the Tianqi Emperor’s surviving children are with the Empress Rong. They are:

Zhu Cijiong (朱慈炅, born 1625), Crown Prince Xianhuai (獻懷皇太子). He is a studious lad of indifferent health. His tutors think he’s clever, and indeed, the precocious boy is laboriously attempting to write a commentary on the Zuo Zhuan. It’s not particularly good but he’ll write better stuff in the future.

Zhu Ciling (朱慈靈, born 1628), Prince Sihuai (禠懷王). Younger than his brother by three years, he is somehow taller than him, and indeed shall be taller than his parents someday. It is hoped that he will cut an excellent martial figure when he is grown.

Zhu Shulu (朱淑鹿, born 1638), Princess Yining (儀寧公主). She’s an infant. Someday, she will shape the course of history.

The emperor has other close relatives besides his wife and children. There is his brother, the Prince of Xin, and his first cousin, the Prince of Lu (formerly Prince of Dechang). Their position is not quite as prominent now that the emperor has secured the succession, but as imperial princes, they own land and are occasionally trusted with government duties. His brother mostly keeps to his estates, lives quietly. His cousin -- well, there are still people who remember that the Wanli Emperor would have passed the realm onto that line of the family, if he hadn’t been dissuaded by his courtiers. So while relations remain friendly, the emperor’s men are keeping an eye on the Prince of Lu. Just in case.

The Scholar-Bureaucrats

We should also take a look at some of the top officials in government.

In the Ming bureaucracy, the premier position of power is titled “Grand Secretary,” which through various twists and turns has become essentially the coordinator of the various government agencies. Currently, the position is being occupied by Sun Chengzong, the emperor’s former tutor, who is nearing the end of a long and distinguished career. He’s stayed on in the position for as long as he can, mostly as a favor to his former student.

The pinnacle of the national bureaucracy is divided into Six Ministries. (There used to also be Three Departments but those were abolished. There are also many lesser boards, or smaller agencies which oversee specialized or ceremonial tasks, which I shall not list because then you’d probably stop reading.)

The ministries, and their respective Ministers, are:

Ministry of Personnel: Han Yu (韓爌, born 1565). An old fogey who mostly took the post because nobody else would. Purged by Wei Zhongxian and rehabilitated after the eunuch’s death, he had previous experience as Minister of Rites when he accepted a position as Minister of Personnel. His father was also a jinshi graduate and a distinguished scholar-official. Friendly with the late Yuan Chonghuan and with Grand Secretary Sun Chengzong. Respects the Jesuits, likely has Christian sympathies.[3]

Ministry of Revenue: Cai Maode (蔡懋德, born 1586). Is well-known for publicly snubbing Wei Zhongxian and somehow getting away with it.[4] Something of an ascetic in his personal life, unexceptional in the fulfillment of his official duties but very loyal to the ideals of the Ming dynasty.[5]

Ministry of Rites: Qian Qianyi (钱谦益, born 1582). Minister Qian is believed to have sympathies with the Donglin movement, but is also friendly with Zheng Zhilong, a man whom many Donglin academics disdain as something of a swashbuckling adventurer. Well-respected by all, basically guaranteed to be the next Grand Secretary.

Ministry of War: Wang Zheng (王徵, born 1571). Recently appointed to the position that everybody expects Yuan Chonghuan would have inevitably filled, had the general not unfortunately died in battle. Minister Wang is a diligent, hardworking scholar, who reportedly took nine tries to pass the jinshi exams before finally succeeding in 1622. He is mechanically minded, having assisted in the translation of technical works into Chinese. He is also the only head of the Six Ministries known to be a Christian.

Ministry of Justice: Zhou Qiyuan (周起元, born 1571). A senior figure in the Donglin movement, Minister Zhou is perceived as a rigid doctrinaire. Unlike many of his colleagues, who were martyred, Zhou survived and with the fall of Wei Zhongxian was quietly released from prison. Like Qian Qianyi, he was born in Fujian. He is considered to be a competent Minister of Justice.

Ministry of Works: Dong Kewei (董可威, born c. 1570). Ever since thwarting the alleged plot of Wei Zhongxian and Madame Ke in 1626, Minister Dong has turned his office (traditionally regarded as one of the less prestigious in the upper echelons of Ming bureaucracy) into one of the most influential in the country. A lot of it comes down to his personal accomplishments -- he is still the emperor’s trusted advisor and unofficial liaison to the security services -- but to his credit, he has kept the nation’s infrastructure running more or less smoothly. One of his young deputies, Shi Kefa (史可法, born 1601), is currently overseeing renovations to the empire’s canal system.

So how are these men aligned? Well, obviously, unlike a cabinet or coalition in a representative government, they do not represent constituencies and are not beholden to the popular will. They serve more or less at the discretion of the emperor. Still, they represent important factions or broadly-aligned groups which the emperor would be wise to placate.

The most prominent faction is, of course, the Donglin movement, based initially around a particular scholarly academy but by now grown rather beyond its bounds. The Donglin movement was harshly repressed under the orders of Wei Zhongxian, but with the eunuch’s death has mostly recovered -- indeed, some of their supporters have been appointed to high office. There is, of course, some lingering trauma over how many of them were bloodily executed in the emperor’s name. Also, their survival has emboldened them, and they (and their newer adherents) imagine themselves the designated heroes of the story, always willing to call out malfeasance wherever they see it.

Some scholars draw, more broadly, lines around a so-called “Fujian clique” (the name is anachronistic and dates to many centuries later). This would group many of the Donglin movement with other individuals whose origins can be traced to the province of Fujian -- mostly noting the connections between individuals like Zheng Zhilong and some of his allies at court, assuming that they would share more common interests than they do. This is an artificial construction and not very helpful -- many of the Donglin types are not impressed with Zheng -- indeed, even his friends would admit that he’s a lot to handle. But that’s the cost of being a well-known historical figure.

There isn’t exactly a “Christian faction” at court, although for the past century Jesuits have been wandering around China with greater or lesser degrees of toleration, occasionally converting people. Right now they are enjoying something of a high point in acceptance, but things could always shift the other way -- they are well aware that the emperor’s continued survival is probably their best bet at not getting wiped out. As a result, a lot of Christians at court tend to specialize into mathematical or scientific fields, where they will hopefully be a valued asset and not a foreign menace. This grants them some weight in policy discussions, but not a limitless amount.

Also, a lot of relatively irrelevant people would like the emperor to look into their personal grievances, restore prosperity to this specific province, et cetera. That’s pretty much a constant in the imperial court. These matters are handled by low-ranking clerks who compose form letters in response -- the emperor, remember, can neither read nor write (though he has arranged for his children to have excellent educations).

Miscellaneous / Other

There are numerous other individuals who do not hold high office but whose names are important. We should note the names of various Jesuits: Nicolas Trigault (close friend and confidante of the emperor), Nicolò Longobardo (former head of the China mission, now retired but still active in religious affairs), Johann Adam Schall von Bell (skilled in astronomy, mathematics, and military science), and Giulio Alenio (formerly resident in Fujian, followed Zheng Zhilong to Dongshan where he assists in much of the mundane bureaucracy).

We should also note individuals that, while they appear in the narrative, also exercise outsized influence due to their effect on the historical record.

Nicolas Trigault, incidentally, is one of them. His journals and his letters tend to provide a sizable corpus of text for any interested researcher -- and, for many Europeans, tended to be the most accessible source for a great many years. In his writings, he tends to emphasize the contribution of himself and his Jesuit colleagues over those of others. His is not necessarily a “pro-Christian” bias -- some later historians believe that he may simply have been jealous of anyone with a similar degree of access to the emperor, of whom he was very fond.

Wang Wei is another common source for a contemporary view of events. Her poems tend to document the lands through which she traveled. During the days of her religious wanderings, she traveled a great deal. Later, she and her husband settled down at the court of Qin Liangyu in Sichuan, where she dedicated herself to a series of historical epics and poems on historical events. Wang Wei’s patronage by Qin Liangyu may have allowed her greater leeway to express skepticism of the accepted way of things. While she is not an actively hostile source, she has long been regarded as a slightly heterodox thinker, at least to the extent that her work was not officially commissioned by any party.

Zhong Hecao is the pseudonym of a chronicler who is believed to have been one of the official redactors of the Official History of the Ming.[6] While he likely did not personally experience the events that he describes -- although some scholars believe that he genuinely lived during the Tianqi era, the time period covered most thoroughly by his writings, that is a minority view -- he is near-omnipresent as a learned authority. He appears to have had an agenda to avoid embarrassment of the “official” position, quietly glossing over any episode or incident which tends to show the emperor or the emperor’s inner circle in a bad light. Often, later historians will provide the official Zhong version of events, followed by a quote from Trigault or Wang to illustrate alternative perspectives.

And with that background out of the way, let’s get back to the action...

---

Footnotes
[1] IOTL, the partially-recognized Longwu Emperor of the Southern Ming ended up also being monogamous.
[2] IOTL Consort Hui (范慧妃) managed to survive the fall of the Ming dynasty and lived peacefully as a pensioner of the Qing court along with Consort Rong.
[3] IOTL he died of heart failure in 1644 after Li Zicheng kidnapped his grandson.
[4] He refused to visit Wei Zhongxian on the grounds of illness, something which was probably a blatant lie.
[5] IOTL he committed suicide in 1644 upon Li Zicheng’s victory in battle. Isn’t it neat that Li Zicheng was killed off by butterflies ITTL?
[6] Zhōng Hécǎo (鍾河草), fictional character. Based on a dear friend.

 

[RexSueciae]

Qian Qianyi (circa 1638)​

The Descent Upon Nagasaki sends ripples through the imperial court. On the one hand, Admiral Zheng’s partisans have been riding the high for months. The Admiral is rapturously popular among his followers in Dongshan, obviously, and the city of Luoyang enters a bit of an economic boom, fueled by foreign trade and foreign “trade” (they’re smart enough not to pillage the Spanish or Portuguese, but the Dutch? or anyone else who looks shifty? at this point, that’s fair game).

Less impressed are some of the more somber members of the bureaucracy. Zhou Qiyuan patiently writes another memorial to the throne, explaining how foreign adventurism may have unintentional consequences. His message is read to the emperor and politely received. Some more junior officials also try their hands at writing criticisms of Admiral Zheng, with mixed results. One particularly infamous memorial is couched so abusively that its author is flogged and fined a month’s salary.

In other news, Sun Chengzong is feeling like it’s high time he retired as Grand Secretary. He’d held onto the post for years beyond when he could’ve stepped down, out of respect for the emperor, but he’s now in his seventies, and keeping the bureaucracy in order is a job for a more vigorous man. He applies for, and receives, permission to return to his hometown of Gaoyang, where he intends to live out his remaining days in peace (although he’s open to consulting unofficially on policy topics).[1]

He is replaced as Grand Secretary by Qian Qianyi, who up until now had been serving as Minister of Rites. Qian’s former post is filled by Kong Zhenyun (孔貞運), an immensely distinguished scholar (he was assessed second nationally out of all jinshi candidates in the forty-seventh year of the Wanli era, which is to say 1619). Minister Kong is also a direct agnatic descendant of Confucius, albeit by a junior line.[2]

Many students, when reading about this era, wonder why Admiral Zheng Zhilong did not attempt more long-term actions like invading Japan itself, going toe-to-toe with the shogun, et cetera. The simplest answer is: that sounds like a lot of work for questionable profit. Raiding Dutch merchant ships was more fun, anyhow. That doesn’t mean that he and his supporters are averse to playing a part in the bloodshed now breaking out in Japan. In the Shimabara domain, the mostly-Christian uprising is eventually suppressed by government forces during the early summer. Occasional resupply runs from Zheng-affiliated captains had allowed the rebels to hold out in several strongholds, and eventually a large portion of the rebels are successfully evacuated by sea. Among those transported from Japan to Dongshan is Amakusa Shirō, a.k.a. Geronimo, the charismatic youth who had led the rebellion. His followers think he can work miracles. The religious makeup of Dongshan is only getting more cosmopolitan by the day.

On their way home, Zheng’s fleet pays a visit to the Ryukyu Kingdom, where the officials, after some prompting, reaffirm their submission to the Great Ming and disclaim any and all loyalty to other sovereigns (particularly to the Japanese). Shō Hō, who has now reigned as king for almost two decades, is not entirely opposed to the move, even if it is negotiated practically at gunpoint; he’s been pushing for more tribute missions with China (an important source of trade for any imperial tributary), and Zheng’s merchant empire looks like a useful partner to have.[3]

Tokugawa Iemitsu is practically seething. Not so much about the Ryukyu thing -- the Ryukyuans paid tribute to the Satsuma daimyos, not to the shogun, and quite frankly he’s got bigger issues than Shimazu Tadatsune (appointed daimyo of the Satsuma domain by Iemitsu’s grandfather) getting a bloody nose. (As it turns out, Tadatsune soon dies and is succeeded by his son Mitsuhisa.) The Shimazu clan are technically loyal, more loyal than some of the crypto-Catholics on Kyushu, but they hold significant power, and right now, the shogun is convinced that his agents need to really bear down hard on any potential sources of dissent. Don’t want another rebellion like the one in Shimabara, which was pretty bad. Don’t want any of the other daimyos getting ideas. Needless to say, his opinions on foreigners, Christians, and traitors are quite negative.

In the Tianqi court, there are celebrations over the birth of Princess Yining. The Emperor now has two surviving sons and one daughter. Daughters obviously are not particularly useful for inheritance purposes, but that’s fine. Nicolas Trigault writes approvingly that the princess is a healthy babe, so far as the medical practitioners can tell, is somewhat quiet but has a clear spark of intelligence in her eyes. Did we mention she’s a newborn infant? Obviously, this is just the Jesuit’s rose-tinted view of the emperor shining through. Still, in this he’s more than a little bit prescient.

The Tianqi Emperor issues a proclamation concerning the creation of eunuchs. A large part of it may have been ghostwritten: the officially published text goes into detail about the Hongwu Emperor and his condemnation of castration and other foreign innovations introduced by the Yuan. The wise patriarch of the dynasty had insisted on standardizing the penal system and had drafted a legal code to guide the people. There was even a section prohibiting people from adopting children from other families and making them eunuchs. Well, it obviously wasn’t enough! From now on, the Tianqi Emperor declares, all castration of children is to be prohibited, and the punishment for doing so increased. Parents who are unable to feed their children are not to send them to Beijing in the hopes they will become an imperial eunuch; the palaces, after all, have scaled down such usage over the past decade and are not presently accepting more. As alternatives, the emperor suggests military service or construction projects to be imminently announced, for those youths unable or unwilling to sit the civil service exams. Minister Dong Kewei is directed to see how the Ministry of Works would be best able to use the manpower.

The plague, which has been killing peasants in Shanxi for quite some time, is now being reported consistently in the villages of Hebei. Travel to some of the worst-affected areas is being restricted, and locals hurry to buy anti-plague remedies of dubious efficacy. The imperial court hosts ceremonies invoking heaven’s power to turn back the plague; only time will tell if heaven responds.

---

Footnotes
[1] IOTL by 1638 Sun Chengzong had already retired from national politics. In that year, he led his family and personal retainers in a last stand against a Qing military incursion, during which he perished.
[2] He was a real person who existed. The fact that he’s a descendant of Kongzi isn’t really relevant but I thought it was cool.
[3] Shō Hō was previously mentioned in the 1628 update.

 

[RexSueciae]

A diplomatic procession led by Joseon officials​

In the parts of the world that aren’t China, things are happening.

Pope Urban VIII, he of the anti-tobacco papal bull, has just published another papal bull prohibiting slavery. It’s a nice gesture which is likely to have about the same long-term impact as the tobacco ban.

England, Scotland, and Ireland are tearing each other apart in war. The causes are complex; religion, monarchy, freedom. English merchants are still present in east Asia, particularly in India, sometimes in the same circles as the Dutch -- just because there’s war at home doesn’t mean there isn’t money to be made.

Speaking of the Dutch, they’re complying with the Tokugawa demands to limit their activities in Japan. Consequently, they’re some of the only Europeans in Japan right now. They do have to withdraw many of their personnel and especially their families -- they are transported by ship to Batavia. The ships are sometimes harassed by Zheng’s privateers. It should be noted that the Dutch ships are mostly capable of taking care of themselves, especially now that they’re on their guard. Dutch fleets win naval victories against the Spanish, back in European waters, and oust the Portuguese from their foothold at Trincomalee. For the East India Company, pirate raids are pretty low-priority compared to all the cool stuff they’re doing right now.

Speaking of the Spanish and Portuguese, while the two kingdoms have been in personal union for a century, tensions are rising back home. Their overseas colonies (including the Spanish foothold at the northern tip of Dongshan) have gotten a little bit mingled over the years, but people are starting to get nervous when considering the future. Nobody’s looking forward to the day when, for example, an armada out of the Philippines might try raiding Macau.[1]

That’s about as close as European affairs have gotten to affecting China so far.

Nobody in Beijing is thinking much of Europe, just as most people in Europe are not thinking much of China (save, perhaps, some very enthusiastic young Jesuits, such as Martino Martini, who has just been made a priest). No, Beijing is mostly interested in a recent visit from one of its tributaries. King Injo of Joseon, unusually, has made an appearance in person. And he brings with him an emissary from the Northern Yuan.

The king of Joseon and the khan of the Northern Yuan have quietly been coordinating their campaigns against the remnants of the Later Jin. Ajige, who has thus far eliminated most of his competitors and thus finds himself with precious few bannermen to resist the invasion, flees further north into even more marginal areas of the steppe. Joseon’s armies advance in furtherance of the dream that the lands of Balhae shall once more be theirs. The Northern Yuan are less interested in land than in men; they had taken substantial losses during Yuan Chonghuan’s campaigns against them, and the low population densities of steppe nomad societies are poorly able to absorb such losses. More men must be acquired, whether by adoption or enslavement.[2]

Now that the military forces of both polities have finally met -- their enemies are on the run -- they have decided to make their...relationship, for lack of a better word, public. So Injo of Joseon and his counterpart from the Northern Yuan (not Ejei, that much is clear from the chronicles, but probably a close relative) bring lavish tribute, and bow very low, and explain that Yuan Chonghuan’s death was deeply unfortunate, even though they were technically at war, and that they respect the man a great deal, and that they hope they will be allowed to honor his memory -- since, of course, it would do everybody good to join hands in friendship so that they can deal with the real enemy, which is, of course, the Later Jin -- and also being a tributary of the emperor is nice and please don’t get mad and kill us.

The Tianqi Emperor, stone-faced, gets up and walks out of the audience hall. The remainder of the tributaries’ visit is handled by intermediaries. (Minister Dong understands the emperor’s reaction. He, himself, is a little bit annoyed that these foreigners have come in and hogged all the attention. He was about to announce the first of his infrastructure projects, starting with an effort to dredge the harbor of Hangzhou.)

Eventually, a deal is hashed out. (It helps a little that the Northern Yuan and the Joseon have done their best with this year’s tribute.) The Northern Yuan will pay a substantial indemnity, spread out over the next decade, and will officially acknowledge the suzerainty of the emperor in Beijing. In exchange, the Ming will defend the Northern Yuan against foreign invaders and will take no further action against them for any past hostility. Violations of this agreement will, of course, be met with swift retribution. The Northern Yuan will send a number of hostages (technically, they are honored guests being hosted at the Ming court for purposes of education / networking / etc) to live in Beijing. The Joseon state will be personally responsible for any violation of the agreement on the part of the Northern Yuan. And Ming armies will officially join the campaign against Ajige, with further military cooperation to be decided at a future date.

The Ming court does not offer particularly lavish gifts to its tributaries this year. Relations will probably be a bit frosty for a while. However, before the Northern Yuan emissary leaves, a servant presents him with an unusual item -- it is a wooden horse, hand-carved, unadorned but of unusually fine craftsmanship.

The emissary, once the item’s context is explained, solemnly accepts the gift with every indication of respect. Things could have gone a lot worse.

---

Footnotes
[1] Everything in Europe is happening more or less as it did IOTL. Charles I of England, Scotland, and Ireland is in big trouble, the Iberian Union is starting to fray (with many Portuguese nobles plotting revolution), and the Dutch, despite having to deal with Admiral Zheng’s men, are doing pretty well on the naval front. Also, the Pope is trying to ban slavery. And tobacco.
[2] This is a common theme of historical steppe nomad societies IOTL. Men being admitted as foster-brothers or slaves, women typically being made concubines or wives -- not pleasant, when you start to think about the details, but you can see how such patterns would develop. Incidentally, George R. R. Martin’s depiction of the Dothraki has many flaws, but this is perhaps one of the greatest -- his Dothraki do little more than kill, on a scale that should be unsustainable in a steppe nomad population, and do not seem to absorb smaller tribes or do anything to preserve their population levels. Indeed, the Dothraki appear united around the personal rule of the khals, with little in the way of cultural or political institutions holding them together into long-term polities. Steppe nomads may have been relatively decentralized compared to sedentary agrarian empires, but they engaged in trade and diplomacy when it suited them, not just rampaging in senseless violence. For all his snark about “Aragorn’s tax policy,” George R. R. Martin owes a lot to Tolkien and his actual knowledge of how fictional and historical societies worked.

 

[RexSueciae]

John, Duke of Braganza (later to be John IV of Portugal), a person who is somehow affecting events in China circa 1640​

Wang Wei, the courtesan-turned-poet, is on a trip to Kaifeng (for Buddhist reasons) when she is attacked by a street gang. Fortunately, a young man comes charging to the rescue (or so say the storybook versions of this tale). His name is Gao Xuan; he is the scion of one of the prominent families in the Kaifeng Jewish community.[1]

Qin Liangyu, whose bannermen helped put down the Yellow Tiger in 1636, is mostly retired at this point (although she is occasionally asked for advice in suppressing other rebels, including the “False Tigers”). But she’s very happy to learn that her friend Wang Wei was saved from harm. Thus, she does Gao Xuan a favor by writing him a letter of recommendation so that he might travel to Beijing and make a name for himself, as is his desire.

In Beijing, Nicolas Trigault has finished his latest project: a translation of the play Mingfeng ji, “The Phoenix’s Cry,” from Chinese into French. It is the first work of Chinese theater to be translated to a European language, and will soon inspire European adaptations of varying levels of quality.[2] Certainly, the musical interludes are very likely a French invention.

Meanwhile, in one of the small twists which prove the world is smaller than one thinks, events in Portugal have spilled over into war. The Portuguese nation has, for years, seethed under the Spanish yoke. Though they accepted Philip II (who did have a decent claim to the throne) and tolerated Philip III (who was something of a nonentity), resentment has slowly grown during the reign of Philip IV (the Planet King, whose lands stretch from one end of the world to the other).

The Portuguese and Spanish kingdoms were joined in personal union, but not politically or economically. Merchants who traveled from Lisbon to Madrid (or from any part of the Portuguese colonial empire to the Spanish -- or among the nominally distinct crowns of Spain) faced logistical hurdles almost as bad as going from, say, Lisbon to London.[3]

Speaking of London, the personal union between Spain and Portugal has wrecked a lot of Portugal’s foreign relations, including the severing of its centuries-old alliance with England. True, the Portuguese do enjoy the benefit of not having to fight Spain anymore -- theoretically their colonies should be cooperating instead of competing -- but in practice, the monarchs who rule Spain have largely neglected the Portuguese parts of the empire. This is why the Dutch have been able to take bits out of Portuguese India.

Thus, in the later months of 1640, a small group of Portuguese noblemen put the finishing touches on their conspiracy to oust the Spanish from their kingdom. They declare for John, the Duke of Braganza, who accepts the throne. The conspiracy is successful, although fighting between Spain and Portugal will continue for many years to come.

António Teles da Silva, Captain-Major of the Portuguese Indian Armada, is among the conspirators.[4] He had found his commission extended several times and has had to watch in frustration as the Dutch continued to make inroads on the Portuguese colonial empire. He’s appealed several times to Sebastián Hurtado de Corcuera, (Spanish) Governor-General of the Philippines, for assistance. Hurtado, a notoriously prickly man, refused point-blank.[5]

So, when a bunch of people in Portugal are busy assassinating Spanish nobles and raising men to fight the inevitable war, Captain-Major Teles is leading a bunch of Portuguese to the Spanish colony on the tip of Dongshan, which they capture after a bit of sharp fighting.

Governor-General Hurtado, from his base in the Philippines, is furious when he finds out. (So are plenty of other people in Spain. When Hurtado is eventually recalled, he finds himself standing trial for negligence in allowing the loss of their outpost on Dongshan.[6])

But how, exactly, did the Portuguese under Teles succeed? The answer is -- well, obviously, it’s Admiral Zheng again. According to rumor (and this is never quite confirmed), the Admiral had heard whispers of the Spanish-Portuguese disputes and had all but invited Teles to invade, giving him comprehensive information on the fortifications of the Spanish outpost. In return, Captain-Major Teles (in the name of the Portuguese crown) recognizes Zheng Zhilong as “Lord Protector of Formosa” (although by now, the Chinese name of “Dongshan” is starting to see increasingly common use in learned European circles). Zheng’s men will protect the Portuguese on Dongshan from Spanish reprisals, but will also have access to the land near the outpost for things like mineral exploration. (There’s gold in them thar hills.)

Obviously, there will be repercussions. The Portuguese are celebrating their little coup. The imperial court in Beijing will probably have something to say about everything that happened. And the Spanish in the Philippines are bracing for what might end up being another war.[7] If there’s one group of people who can be said to be happy with all this chaos, it’s probably the Japanese -- but then, the formerly dormant Komagatake volcano just blew its top, and now the crops are failing all over Japan.[8]

One thing’s for sure. Things are far from boring right now.

---

Footnotes
[1] IOTL Gao Xuan made his name in 1642 by repeatedly diving into floodwaters in order to retrieve part of the community’s Torah scroll. Why was Kaifeng flooded in 1642? Because someone breached the Yellow River dikes during Li Zicheng’s siege of the city. A lot of people died and the Kaifeng Jews lost pretty much everything. That isn’t happening ITTL!
[2] See the 1630 update. To recap, “The Phoenix’s Cry” is a history play where a virtuous character gets executed because an enemy surreptitiously adds his name to another man’s death warrant. This is in contrast with OTL, where the first Chinese play to be translated into a European language was “The Orphan of Zhao,” a history play where a virtuous character gets executed because an enemy surreptitiously adds his name to another man’s death warrant.
[3] I’m exaggerating here -- the years have smoothed over some differences -- but de jure, Portugal is still a separate country and besides the king himself, there is very little holding the Iberian Union together.
[4] Everything I’ve described until now about Portugal, Spain, and the House of Braganza is pretty much how it went IOTL. António Teles da Silva was one of the Forty Conspirators who supported John of Braganza. IOTL, though, it appears he was back in Portugal when the shit hit the fan.
[5] Up until now, Hurtado has become notorious as the guy who led soldiers into a church to arrest a murderer who had been trying to claim sanctuary, then exiling the Archbishop of Manila for daring to criticize him. Yes, this is all OTL.
[6] IOTL the Spanish held onto their part of Formosa until the Dutch captured it in 1642. Hurtado had made a bunch of enemies, who had him arrested a few years later for failing to prevent this.
[7] IOTL Zheng Zhilong’s son, Zheng Chenggong, better known as Koxinga, was outright threatening to invade the Philippines, and might’ve even gotten away with it had he not suddenly fallen ill and died in 1662.
[8] The Komagatake eruption happened IOTL and led to years of famine.

 

[RexSueciae]

A sketch of Malacca, most remote outpost of the ailing Portuguese colonial empire​

The year that the Europeans call 1641 begins in a most bright and cheerful way. Well, except in the Philippines, where a volcanic eruption on the southern tip of Mindanao showers the land with ash.[1] This doesn’t affect the Spanish much, who are still trying and failing to suppress the Moro sultanates on the island, volcano or no volcano. The colonial government in Manila has established outposts on Mindanao, but most of the island is still independent of their rule. Turns out people don’t really like being colonized.

Going a little bit to the side, the Dutch and the Portuguese are still fighting (when are they not?), this time over control of Malacca. It is a miserable place, albeit extremely well-fortified. The Portuguese had learnt the necessity of fortifications. Their seizure of Malacca more than a century ago had led to war with the Ming (who were furious at the deposition of the sultan), war with their neighbors (the successor states of the old sultanate), and war with pirates (who were very happy to take advantage of any chaos).

Having expended so much blood and sweat to take Malacca, the Portuguese are determined to keep it. And the Dutch East India Company is more than willing to expend blood and sweat to take Malacca from the Portuguese, on the principle that Portugal does not deserve nice things.[2]

The siege does not go well. It doesn’t help that the Dutch keep dying from disease -- their commander died several months into the siege, to be replaced by his second-in-command who died a couple months later, to be replaced yet again by one Minne Caertekoe who spends most of his time in command debilitated by illness.[3] Morale is pretty much at rock-bottom, and when rumors spread that Admiral Zheng is headed this way with a fleet of ships and reinforcements for the Portuguese (mostly adventurers from Ming-controlled parts of Dongshan), the Dutch pack up and return to Batavia.[4]

(The rumors the Dutch heard were mostly true. Admiral Zheng was, in fact, on his way, although less out of the usual desire for profit and more out of the principle that the Dutch East India Company does not deserve nice things.)

Anyways, the whole area around Malacca has been terribly damaged by war and a lot of people are dead. Because of the fighting, obviously, and also disease. Some of the disease is the usual tropical illness that tears through colonial forces operating in southeast Asia. Some of it -- well. The plague is here. In full force, now.

As an epidemic disease, the plague never really went away, but simply wandered off to ravage an untouched population or incubated quietly in its natural hosts. It has been simmering in China for years. However, a combination of increased internal travel, plus the occasional bit of foreign adventuring, means that the plague is now a big fucking deal. By 1641, the plague has reached Beijing.[5]

Now, in some counties and villages, huge swathes of the population die. That is the nature of an epidemic; urban or rural, anyone unlucky enough to get sick either recovers or dies. And a lot of people are unlucky.

Fortunately, most of the imperial court is fine. Princess Yining, the emperor’s daughter and youngest child, falls ill with a high fever but recovers; it’s uncertain whether she got the plague or a less serious disease. Han Yu, Minister of Personnel, falls ill and dies. So now it’s time for another reshuffling in the bureaucracy.

Cai Maode, Minister of Revenue, is moved to replace the late Minister Han. He, in turn, is replaced by Zhou Qiyuan, who until now has been Minister of Justice. (Reportedly, the emperor was thinking of promoting someone else, but Minister Zhou specifically requested his new portfolio, and he gets it.) His spot is eventually filled by Jiang Dejing (蔣德璟, born 1593) who becomes the new Minister of Justice.[6]

So, after this bit of musical chairs, we have our new slate of ministers.[7] The emperor is happy with the line-up -- rather than rapidly rotating through a series of (often ineffectual) bureaucrats, he’s got some decently competent scholar-officials who are accustomed to their respective departments and who are building the kind of institutional knowledge that will prove useful. In other words, they're becoming professionals. Not everybody is happy with this state of affairs -- lower bureaucrats who see the ministerial posts as the natural next step in their career are displeased. That being said, as far as the Tianqi Emperor is concerned, any development that lets his subordinates deal with things -- without bothering him! -- is a positive one. And it leaves him more time for big-picture stuff, like playing with his kids, or woodworking.

Gao Xuan, the hardworking lad from Kaifeng, arrives in Beijing. The recommendation of Qin Liangyu gets him an audience, although his lack of any advanced degree (he has a basic education) hinders him. Eventually, he’s pawned off on Zhou Qiyuan at the Ministry of Revenue. Minister Zhou is skeptical, at first, but eventually warms to his new secretary. The kid’s got guts -- and, at least, he’s not a Christian!

---

Footnotes
[1] Yes, another volcano. This is OTL. Ring of Fire, remember.
[2] IOTL the Dutch and Portuguese signed a peace treaty in 1641 that was supposed to guarantee peace for ten years but which in effect only applied to Europe, since their colonial proxies kept fighting each other.
[3] This is exactly what happened IOTL.
[4] IOTL the Dutch made one last push and managed to storm the citadel. Here, they give up a bit earlier.
[5] This was about when the plague arrived in Beijing IOTL. I figure that even without population displacements caused by large bandit armies, people would still be circulating around -- maybe for more positive reasons ITTL but nevertheless still moving from province to province, bringing with them the plague.
[6] Jiang Dejing is a scholar who IOTL and ITTL was initially sidelined after a conflict with Wei Zhongxian. IOTL he actually made it to Grand Secretary around this time -- although to be fair, IOTL the state was collapsing in the face of the Qing invasion, and so was in completely different circumstances. But he’s a bright fellow, so I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect him to head a ministry in more peaceful times.
[7] The ministers who remain in their positions are Kong Zhenyun at Rites, Wang Zheng at War, Dong Kewei at Works, and Qian Qianyi as Grand Secretary.

 

[RexSueciae]

Interior of mansion owned by Qian Qianyi during the mid-1600s, preserved to present day as a historic residence​

“Qian, old friend!” Admiral Zheng’s booming voice rang out as he swept the older man into a hug. Qian Qianyi accepted it with tolerance. True, he was Grand Secretary and theoretically above all this, but the Admiral had the emperor’s ear, so they were more or less social equals. Besides, this was an informal meeting at his house, and Zheng was an old friend.

“It is good to see you again,” he said politely. “How is your boy?”

“Growing strong. He’s a lad to make me proud.” Qian remembered meeting young Zheng Chenggong, who was by all accounts a bright young man. If I weren’t so busy with government business, I might have taken him on as a student, he thought.[1]

“Still no sons of your own? Not for lack of trying, I assume.” Zheng made a suggestive gesture.

“Lady Liu and I are quite happy, thank you.”[2] Qian coughed. “Listen, old friend, you need to be more careful.”

“Me? Careful?”

“I’m serious, Zheng.” Qian stepped close. He saw his friend’s bodyguards go on the alert, but ignored them. “Listen. I’m doing my best to cover for you, alright? The emperor likes you. What’s more, I like you, and I’ve got some sway here in Beijing. So please, take it from me that you need to be more careful.”

Zheng looked slightly offended. “Who says I’m not being careful.”

“Oh, don’t be a fool,” Qian huffed in exasperation. “As long as we don’t have foreigners marching on Beijing, everything is fine, but might it occur to you that picking fights like you’ve done is a little bit reckless, long-term?”

“I don’t pick fights I can’t win.”

“Sure! Fine! That’s the only problem! Fighting the foreigners might be lucrative, but even now there’s whispers that you’re doing it for your own benefit, and not the emperor’s. And whispers can be dangerous things. I can stamp out that sort of talk for now, don’t worry. But still, you need to watch yourself. Everything you do these days is provocative, it seems. Like you're throwing rocks at every nest of hornets you see. I’ve even heard that you’ve been minting coins.”

“I have permission-”

“Fuck the permission!” Qian rarely lost his temper. “Our beloved emperor, in his infinite wisdom, has told you that you can do what you like. You and I both know that you probably have good reasons for all of this. Just take a moment to think -- how does it look from the outside? Don’t you realize that people will be jealous, if nothing else? Why is this such a difficult concept for you to grasp?”

“The core of my authority,” Zheng said, voice level, “is that I produce a certain amount of profit for the emperor. This business of settling an island is expensive. If I do not render appropriate tribute, my head is on the line. We have been fortunate, for now, since we found gold, but the gold will not last forever, and even as it is, gold is a tricky thing to find, and a far easier thing to take from meddlesome foreigners. We’ve got a steady amount coming in from the rivers and streams, but it would be better if we could get to the source -- somewhere in those mountains, there are rich veins of gold, I know it in my guts. And if I give orders to have it made into the likeness of coins, pressed into regular shapes so that they are easy to transport and to exchange for goods and services, what does it matter?”[3]

“It matters because it looks like you’re asserting more authority than you were given,” Qian said. He was conscious that he was not a young man anymore. This conversation was tiring him out. “It looks like you’re setting yourself up as a king in all but name. Which, in point of fact, is not such an unreasonable assumption.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Zheng shot back. “I am a loyal servant of the emperor and any insinuation otherwise is insulting. It is not your place to comment on how I run my affairs, Qian.”

“Of course it’s my place!” Qian was genuinely angry now. “My priorities are larger than one little island! I’ve got to keep the empire running, putting out fires wherever they break out, coordinating all the departments that think they’re worthy of the emperor’s attention. I’m trying to help you because I can feel the pulse of Beijing!” He forced himself to calm, at least outwardly. “I’m trying to help you, Zheng. Promise me, as a friend, that you will be more careful in the future.”

Zheng looked at him coldly. “Of course,” he said. “I am always careful.”

---

Footnotes

[1] IOTL that’s exactly what happened. Of course, the fall of the Ming dynasty cut short the arrangement. IOTL Zheng Zhilong was executed and Zheng Chenggong’s formal education ended when he became an anti-Qing warlord -- things are obviously different ITTL.
[2] Liu Rushi (柳如是), a courtesan and poet who IOTL and ITTL is Qian’s consort. She was independent-minded, decades younger than Qian, sometimes wore men’s clothing, and evidently loved him very much. IOTL they had a daughter in 1648. Qian may have had children by other women, but they do not appear to have survived infancy -- at least, they do not exist ITTL.
[3] I think I’ve mentioned this previously, but most Chinese coinage of this era was made of copper. Silver and gold were both known, but mostly used as standardized weights of a valuable trade good. Silver coins in particular were probably more common than gold, since the Spanish were extracting a lot of silver from its colonial territories and thus its silver coins became a de facto regional currency in southeast Asia. ITTL the situation is similar, although Zheng’s been able to produce some limited number of gold coins with what he’s extracted from Dongshan.

 

[RexSueciae]

A gold ingot, created at some point during the Wanli era. Some gold ingots like these are the subject of approximately two-thirds of this chapter, because I felt like writing about economic policy today.​

Zhou Qiyuan, formerly Minister of Justice, now the newly-appointed Minister of Revenue, is taking to his assignment quite nicely.

He starts by asking questions. Then he has his secretary, Gao Xuan, write down the answers. Then he and Gao Xuan go over the answers, and later they pay a second visit to anyone whose answers showed...discrepancies.

It soon becomes clear that one would be incredibly unwise to fuck with Zhou Qiyuan.

That being said, his predecessors did their jobs competently, so there’s a relatively limited amount of corruption and incompetence to root out -- and every good scholar-bureaucrat does that sort of thing anyways. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone when, after some time carefully cleaning up the operations of his department, Minister Zhou reveals that he has some ideas of his own.

He submits a lengthy manuscript to the attention of the emperor (and to the imperial bureaucracy at large; this document is more of an open letter than a private memorandum). It starts off innocently enough: taxes are not very high, which is fine for the common people, but not so great for the empire, whose revenues are pretty bad (despite the fact that trade is really picking up). And then there’s the problem of how exactly taxes are to be paid. Ordinary people use copper coinage day-to-day, silver is used in trade, and gold is not very common. Minister Zhou suggests to slightly adjust the conversion rate between the three metals -- essentially, making it so that a village dweller who uses copper to pay the (ridiculously low) taxes on, say, agricultural production will have a lower effective taxation rate, while merchants who pay with silver will be required to pay relatively more, and anyone who pays with gold will pay the most of all. Minister Zhou explains that this system (or rather, refinements upon the existing system, which later generations might call “progressive taxation”) might sound complicated but is actually beneficial, because commoners are taxed lightly anyways (and it’s not like they contribute very much) but more prosperous people, by only a slight increase to their taxes (which they can easily afford), could greatly benefit the imperial coffers. Also, there’s a practical reason why different types of coin should be taxed differently -- it shouldn’t be on the imperial tax collectors to have to manage all the conversion rates and whatnot. If someone’s going to pay in a less convenient medium of payment, they should be the ones to handle the issues. At least, that’s the gist of the argument.

Minister Zhou also suggests setting up some more state monopolies. Right now, iron production is more or less the domain of the state -- this has been true in China since time immemorial -- and there’s also salt production, which is still maybe the largest single source of imperial revenue. Minister Zhou thinks that nationalizing the production of kaolin and at least some of the porcelain industry might be another good idea. This is an old hobbyhorse of his -- back when he was a lowly county magistrate during the Wanli era, he’d tried to do something similar in the Jingdezhen area, but the local magnates had hinted very strongly that there could be a totally spontaneous riot in response[1] -- anyways, Minister Zhou could be persuaded to drop this idea in the interest of national security, but he does think the benefits outweigh the costs, since so much of the empire’s export trade is in porcelain, which has acquired a reputation among foreigners as a desirable luxury good.

Finally, Minister Zhou has prepared some reforms to the management of foreign trade. Incidentally, despite having a doctrinaire reputation, Minister Zhou is not an isolationist. He grew up in Fujian, after all. He’s perfectly fine with trading with foreigners, or at least accepts that it’s going to happen anyways. And if it’s going to happen, the emperor is entitled to a cut of the profits, right?[2]

Thing is, Minister Zhou innocently slips in some rough calculations about the potential revenues to be made in levying a modest import / export tax on certain goods being sent to or from a particular island-shaped nation. He lists a bunch of products that would hypothetically be traded by this nation. It is extremely, extremely obvious that he is referring to Dongshan.

After all, if Dongshan is a separate nation akin to one of the empire’s foreign tributaries, any mercantile transactions between Dongshan and the mainland would be taxed at the (higher) rate that foreigners must pay. But if Dongshan is legally not a separate nation, it would require a formal governor to be appointed, right? Not the weird mishmash of customary and bureaucratic structures that currently governs the place, allowing a warlord to assume arbitrary powers. I mean, that just sounds like a mess. Hint, hint.

It’s actually a pretty clever bit of work -- Minister Zhou is trying to rein in Admiral Zheng and his weird little pirate kingdom -- but the drawback is that while the good minister has been doing his best to be thorough (and to not accidentally say something offensive and get himself demoted), he has produced pages upon pages of immensely difficult-to-process jargon which will take awhile to fully discuss. Foreseeing this, he suggests a deadline for doing any of these reforms five years in the future. That should give everyone enough time to process everything and come up with counterarguments, if necessary. And boy, will they ever.

Admiral Zheng, when he gets wind of these machinations, grumbles and tasks his own boffins to take a look at the paperwork and figure out a way to delay things further, if possible, or undermine the proposal entirely. He's also not amused by the proposed adjustments to the taxed value of gold, since gold is a major export good for Dongshan (in addition to fish and agricultural products).

Okay, you’ve read through a whole lot of really dense economic history. Let’s look at something more fun.

The armies of Joseon and the Northern Yuan have not been idle; they’ve spent the last few years harrying the Jurchens further and further north. The “Later Jin,” such that it ever existed, exists no more. Ajige himself, most violent and warlike of the Jurchens, is dead; not in battle, that would be suitably dramatic. No, he died of what was apparently a cold that turned into pneumonia.

With him gone, what’s left of his people (mostly a hardcore fragment of what had formerly been a vast nation) surrenders. Their lands are partitioned between Joseon and the Northern Yuan, both of which are eager to reclaim steppe lands that are theirs by birthright. It’s not bad land. Good for grazing horses (for those parts of your army or society which lives on horseback) or for sedentary agriculture (not as fertile as China’s floodplains but not bad at all).

Daišan, second son of Nurhaci, is still around, but remember, he and his army are in service to the Ming now, and many of his men are marrying local girls and settling down in Sichuan. He’s too busy becoming a regional bureaucrat to say much about Ajige’s death. This marks more or less the end of Jurchen independence.

Ejei Khan and Injo of Joseon celebrate their victory with a solemn ceremony, then a riotous party. It’s agreed to set up a marriage alliance to prevent future disagreements between the two. Injo’s eldest son, Crown Prince Sohyeon, is yet unwed; there had been some talk of marrying him to the noblewoman Minhoe, but that had fallen through. The crown prince thinks that it's just another product of his father's petty machinations; he doesn't think his father likes him very much.[3] Anyways, the Northern Yuan produce a young woman whose exact parentage is uncertain in later chronicles, although it is thought she is the daughter of Doutumen, consort of the late Ligdan Khan, so that's good enough.[4] Time for a diplomatic marriage.

The wedding is a joyous event. Its guest list includes such notables as the Prince of Xin, younger brother to the emperor himself. Even Crown Prince Sohyeon enjoys himself. He’d been reluctant at first -- he’s getting pretty sure that his unease around his duplicitous father is more than paranoia -- but none of that matters once he finally meets his bride. Her name is Erdani, and she has the strikingly dark blue eyes that mark her as a true descendant of the legendary Genghis Khan.

Just maybe, Sohyeon thinks to himself, everything will be alright...

---

Footnotes
[1] This is what happened IOTL; Zhou Qiyuan dropped the matter, continued his work in the bureaucracy, and eventually got into a fight with one of Wei Zhongxian’s cronies over tax matters, with fatal results. ITTL, as has been mentioned multiple times previously, Wei Zhongxian’s rapid fall spared Zhou Qiyuan a premature death in prison, so now he has the chance to put some of his economic ideas into action.
[2] IOTL Zhou Qiyuan wrote about how Fujian merchants should be allowed to continue their business and that restricting contact with barbarians wasted the chance to make money off them.
[3] IOTL Sohyeon ended up marrying Minhoe and had children by her. He did not inherit the throne; he died mysteriously, with the modern consensus being that he was probably poisoned by his own father.
[4] IOTL Doutumen never had children with Ligdan Khan and ended up becoming the consort of Hong Taiji.

 

[RexSueciae]

A sketch of a Beijing church as it would have appeared a little after the events described in this chapter​

Princess Yining, youngest child and only surviving daughter of the Tianqi Emperor, is five years old. Well, she’s five years old counting from the date of her birth, in the manner of the Europeans. Customary age-reckoning practices are a little different in China.

She’s an unremarkable child. A couple years ago, when the plague really hit Beijing in earnest (although it’s still around and people are still dying), she’d fallen ill, either with the plague or something more mundane. Eventually her fever broke and she recovered, but she seems to be quieter now. More thoughtful, perhaps.

One day, she announces to her family that she wants to be a Christian.

This is unusual for some obvious reasons -- regardless of the rumors circulating about the Prince of Xin, brother to the emperor, no scion of the Ming imperial family ever has made such an announcement -- over the years, some members of the literati have converted, but this? Unprecedented. Still, among the upper echelons of the bureaucracy, there’s a largely muted reaction. If she were a prince, that would be different. A prince would have to participate in any number of ceremonies incompatible with foreign superstition. But a princess? Eh. It’s not like China has powerful neighbors to appease with marriage alliances -- its neighbors can wheel and deal among each other, but they are manifestly not peers to the Great Ming. Point is, the King of England might marry his daughters off to, for example, the Prince of Orange and the Duke of Orléans for political reasons, but the Emperor of China feels no such pressure. The whole incident is unusual, sure, a rather curious fancy for a child to have. The girl’s started calling herself a “bride of Christ.” Well, her indulgent father figures, at least this relieves me of having to think about marital plans. He tolerates her youthful enthusiasm.

Nicolas Trigault, for his part, is overjoyed. He immediately writes a bunch of letters about it to his Jesuit superiors back home, only some of which is exaggerated. Due to his friendship with the emperor, he is entrusted with the child’s education insofar as it relates to her curiosity with religion -- the emperor, though unlettered, is keen that his children learn as much as they are able.

Not everyone in Beijing is happy about this.

Meanwhile, the first response to Minister Zhou’s proposal comes from Dongshan. It is authored by Di Yimin, the scholar who was among the first to be sent to that island, and who has since cycled through several magistrate positions over county-equivalent areas before becoming appointed as prefect over...well, technically his prefecture covers the entirety of Dongshan under Admiral Zheng’s control. The office of governor is still officially vacant.

Di Yimin writes a somewhat abbreviated treatise acknowledging Minister Zhou’s text. While he thanks the minister for seeking to reform the tax system, he points out that some of the calculations or assumptions made are not quite correct. See, under the current system, most taxes are paid in silver at the final step. Taxes are still low, but this requirement allows the empire to extract a little more out of the mandated taxes -- paying people in one currency and requiring payment in another was a classic move among medieval European banks to avoid committing “usury,” and in this application is something akin to seigniorage -- however, the price of silver has been subject to severe fluctuation. This is due to most silver being sourced through trade with the Spanish colonial empire, and for some reason the Spanish haven’t been very keen on trade lately.[1] And why penalize people for paying taxes in gold? If anything, because the empire has a new source of gold -- the river operations and mines on Dongshan -- maybe the empire should be more flexible in that regard. Maybe gold could be standardized as the base of a common currency which would hopefully be acceptable to the imperial tax collectors. If future discussions are successful, of course.

He promises to address the other elements of Minister Zhou’s proposals in a little bit, once he finishes some additional analysis.

(Di Yimin’s treatise is received relatively well in Beijing. Even Nicolas Trigault, who is typically jealous of anyone else with influence over the emperor, acknowledges that Di has said many wise things. That being said, he’s predisposed to be a little skeptical of what Minister Zhou is doing over at the Ministry of Revenue, and writes that the man’s secretary Gao Xuan is “half a Saracen in appearance.”)

Anthony van Diemen, the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies, is thinking very hard. He’s been running things in Batavia ever since his predecessor, Hendrik Brouwer, stepped down to return home and explain the whole Dongshan debacle to the Dutch East India Company’s leadership.[2] Now, he’s got some of his captains, including the reliable Abel Tasman, probing south from the lands colonized by the Dutch. They report that there are many large islands to the south -- inhabited islands! -- but the inhabitants are aloof, sometimes hostile, and don’t appear to have anything useful to trade.[3]

Tasman’s willing to go back and take a closer look, but the colonial administrators are less interested -- for all his exploring, he didn’t bring back any gold. So van Diemen and his compatriots turn their attention to the one place nearby where there is plentiful gold.

Yes, he’s thinking about Dongshan.

It rankles, a little bit, that the Dutch could be forced out of the place, and then the newcomers apparently prove that there was gold in them thar hills after all. (True, there’s some question over exactly how honest Admiral Zheng is being about the gold deposits. There is some gold being extracted from the rivers of eastern Dongshan, and Zheng’s men, in cooperation with the Portuguese, are starting to make probing excavations into the highlands, but the overall profitability is not entirely public knowledge.) And van Diemen is worried that he’s left it too long as it is; the hostilities between Spain and Portugal caught everyone by surprise, and in retrospect the best time to make a move on Dongshan would have been right after the Portuguese forced the Spanish out, when things were still super chaotic.

Still, a good hard push might get the Dutch something. His compatriots might be quietly skeptical, but van Diemen’s too busy drawing up plans.[4]

The Dutch East India Company, by the way, hasn’t explored much to the north of Japan -- they have their outpost on Dejima, and some of their captains have navigated those waters, but even with being the only Europeans allowed (tenuous) contact with Japan, there isn’t much that interests the Dutch up there.

Not so for the enterprising captains of Dongshan. Later in the year, a ship is blown off-course by a summer storm. Although it drifts for a time through some northerly currents, its crew manage to bring it back under control, and the craft is beached on the shore of a strange island.

Fortunately, the people there are not immediately hostile. Communication is tenuously established -- a little awkwardly, through intermediaries who speak Japanese -- in any event, nobody gets shot or stabbed, and repairs are swiftly completed. Later ships from Dongshan will make the journey on purpose, trading for furs with these people who call themselves the Ainu.

---

Footnotes
[1] This happened IOTL once the Spanish realized they were losing a lot of silver to foreign trade. ITTL it’s the same, but it really hasn’t helped that Admiral Zheng backed the Portuguese against the Spanish in his power play on Dongshan.
[2] van Diemen was Brouwer’s assistant and succeeded him as Governor-General IOTL, when Brouwer was not reappointed due to his handling of trade disputes. Brouwer’s still around -- the Dutch East India Company is still appointing him to lead various exploratory missions.
[3] This was about the same as what happened IOTL. On the plus side, van Diemen and Tasman got stuff named after them.
[4] IOTL van Diemen was throwing Dutch men and materiel into a war with Cambodia, after King Ramathipadi violently expelled the Dutch from his country. When van Diemen died, his successor shelved his plans to escalate the conflict and mostly left Cambodia alone after that. Right now the Dutch still have access to some of that region but haven’t colonized as much because their attention was focused elsewhere, so tension in Cambodia is much lower. Also, King Ramathipadi converted to Islam and adopted the name Ibrahim. That isn’t relevant, I just thought it was cool.

 

[RexSueciae]

Painting of Joseon royal palaces, c. 17th century​

He coughed wetly but nothing came out this time, which was maybe good, or maybe not. His throat felt raw, scorched. It hurt like nothing he’d ever experienced but he was just glad to be alive.

“Lay back,” his wife soothed him, dabbing a damp cloth across his mouth. No blood. A good sign, hopefully.

He lay back with a sigh. “Thank you,” he whispered. Lady Erdani, his wife, just pursed her lips and kept dabbing away with the cloth.

“It was my father’s doing,” Sohyeon managed through labored breath. “I’m sure of it.”

“I know,” Erdani said. “Rest, please. You need to recover your strength.”

He flashed her a tired smile. “I can do anything, I’m sure, if you’re here.”

Maybe her cheeks flushed a little at that. She didn’t comment. She didn’t need to; it was her, he was sure, who’d saved his life.

He’d taken just a sip of the sweet gamju which had been prepared for him when she’d come in to announce that she was certainly with child. The wine had been forgotten as he ran to embrace her, dancing about the room, for how often did one receive such joyous news! And then he was vomiting hard, the sharp burn in his throat as his body expelled whatever poison he’d ingested, for he’d only drunk a very little.

If he’d had any more, he would’ve been dead.

Erdani, bless her, had taken charge. She’d summoned a physician (who hadn’t been much help) and immediately moved to relocate the family to a more secluded residence, away from the main Joseon court. Even now, her ladies stood watch outside, keeping a careful eye on all of the household’s food and drink.

“He always liked my brother better.” And there had been whispers, he’d half-expected to be removed from the succession, sent to govern some frontier outpost, but murder? “What a father he has been to me. I’m already older than he was when he was pushed to the throne.”

“Dear heart.” His wife put her hands over his. “If your father was a decent man, he would be proud to have such a crown prince. And I can tell you one thing: you’ll be a far better king than your father ever was.”

“How do you know that?” Sohyeon felt so tired. “How do you know that I’ll outlive him, even?”

Erdani’s smile had a razor edge to it. “Trust me on this one.”