The Ming and Qing Dynasties were some of the worst times China has ever seen. During these centuries, the Chinese had to put up with countless rebellions and, at the same time, fend off the western "barbarians," whom they feared would take their land and divide it up, as they had done to their other conquests. Their relations really take some interesting turns with the Westerners, especially in terms of religious and diplomatic affairs, both of which will be discussed in this narrative.
In order to get a good idea of this time, let’s start at the beginning. The Ming rulers were busy updating the Great Wall, which originally came from the Qin dynasty. The purpose of this was to defend against the northern barbarians, who had just ruled them for close to a century. Of course, their new "barbarians" came not from land but from sea, on majestic boats and from a faraway land: Europe. Around the same time as Zheng He was sailing on his famous voyages and exploring the world, the Europeans were beginning their age of exploration. When they first ran into China, the two seemed to get off on a good start. The Chinese welcomed Europe, they traded both ideas and material goods, and China even allowed Christian missionaries. Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit missionary, found himself as an advisor the emperor himself.
Sadly, this friendship did not last. During the Qing dynasty, the Catholic Church told the Chinese that their worship of the emperor constituted idolatry, and that this was not accepted by Christians. Emperor Kangxi was swift to react, arguing that the missionaries had not even spent the time to understand their culture, and then banning missionaries from preaching in China, to avoid disturbance. This infuriated the Europeans, but they had no choice but to agree. The Chinese further restricted their rights in China with the Canton System, in which they severely restricted the ports at which the Europeans could trade, restricting the amount of trade the west could do with the east. In addition, the government became wary of the opium that the Europeans were bringing in, assigning commissioner Lin Zexu to crack down on opium, which was where Europe made a lot of money, as many of the Chinese were addicted. All of these things lead to McCartney coming to China to ask for more trade and the ability to preach Christianity. He was denied, the Europeans were angry at the Chinese for not listening, and the Chinese were angry at the Europeans for being so demanding and insensitive. This all came to a climax in 1840, when the British went to war against China and beat them in the Opium War. The resulting treaty of Nanking was dubbed an “unequal treaty” because it hammered the Chinese while leaving the Europeans with no obligations. The Europeans gained treaty ports, including Shanghai, extraterritoriality (immunity to Chinese laws), the cession of Hong Kong, and more. The Chinese were left battered and bruised, in no way ready for what came next…
In 1850, a Chinese man, frustrated with his inability to pass the civil service exams, decided, out of the blue, that he must be Jesus’ younger brother. You know, Jesus’ 3000 year late Chinese brother. He began a perverted form of Christianity and managed to gain enough followers to start his own nation, Taiping. From here, he assembled a military and slowly took over villages, until the Chinese decided to try and stop him. This wasn’t as easy as they has thought, however, as the rebellion went on for 14 years and took the lives of around 30 million Chinese. To put this in context, WWI only killed about 37 million people, putting this rebellion in the same league as a multinational conflict. With the Chinese having suffered through the opium war AND this rebellion, how could it get any worse? Oh, that’s right, with yet another Opium War.
The Second Opium War, or the “Arrow War”, started in 1860 when Chinese patrols shot at a European ship which was trafficking opium into China. When the Europeans won this as well, they instituted another unfair treaty: the treaty of Tianjin. This treaty opened up even more ports, made missionaries legal in all of China, and made opium legal across China. It was around this time that Cixi, the Chinese regent, realized that China had just been humiliated badly and needed to be stronger. Therefore, she started the Self-Strengthening Movement, an attempt to bring China back to power. This attempt was too little too late, however, as the Japanese came back and defeated the Chinese in the Sino-Japanese war of 1894. The Japanese had always been weaker than the Chinese, and this came as a major blow to their pride, as they had to cede Manchuria to the Japanese as part of the treaty of Shimonoseki. Sadly, the battered Chinese still had one thing to go through: the Boxer Rebellion.
The Boxer rebellion was a Chinese movement against both the current government and the splitting up of China by foreigners. However, it merely led to the West’s infuriation of China and more dead Chinese.
All in all, China went through a pretty gruesome time during these few centuries. They had to suffer 3 wars, two rebellions, and over 50 million dead men, in addition to the loss of their position as a global power. It is truly remarkable of the Chinese that they have been able to build themselves back up so quickly after such a thorough devastation.
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