Empress Dowager (皇太后)

Overview

The translated histories identify Empress Dowager as a consort and ruler. This record brings together 4 passages from 1 chapter across 1 history, with names, dates, relationships, offices, and events preserved as source-backed claims.

Names

Type	English	Chinese
Personal	Empress Dowager	皇太后
Title	empress dowager	皇太后
Title	Empress Dowager	太后

Identity

Historicity: Historical
Identification: Title only
Sex: Female

Sex: female
Explicit · qingshigao:423:s0178

Roles

Consort
Ruler

Life and dates

Attested activity

Source Date: Text: 十二年 · Western Year: AD 1873
Explicit event contextual date · qingshigao:423:s0208
Source Date: Text: 同治四年 · Western Year: AD 1865
Explicit event contextual date · qingshigao:423:s0178

References in the histories

Open any source group to read the Chinese and English passage in context.

Draft History of Qing, Chapter 423Volume 423 Biographies 210: Zong Jichen, Yin Gengyun, Wang Zheng, Mu Jixianga, You Baichuan, Shen Huai · 4 passages

Open chapter

今皇太后垂簾聽政，洞悉其弊，杜漸防微，有鑑於前，不使宵小蒙蔽。 The empress dowager now ruled from behind the curtain, understood these abuses, and guarded against petty men who might mislead the court.

請皇太后選忠正老成者為我皇上朝夕侍從，庶將來親政，必不致受其欺矇蠱惑，而無疆之聖德，基於此矣！」 I beg the empress dowager to choose loyal, upright, mature men to attend the emperor day and night, so that when he rules in person he will not be misled—and his boundless virtue will rest on this foundation!"

十二年，上親政，命葺治圓明園，奉皇太后駐蹕。 In the twelfth year (1873) the emperor assumed personal rule and ordered repairs to the Old Summer Palace for the empress dowager's residence.

御史沈淮疏請暫緩修理，上特諭宣示孝養兩宮之意，專修安佑宮供奉列聖御容，暨皇太后駐蹕之所，治事之地，量從節儉，不事華靡，此外均不必興修。 Censor Shen Huai asked to defer repairs. The emperor proclaimed his filial duty to both palaces: only the Palace of Imperial Peace would be restored for ancestral portraits and the empress dowager's residence and offices, with strict economy and no extravagance elsewhere.