T'UNG-CHIH

born April 27, 1856, Peking, China died Jan. 12, 1875, Peking Pinyin Tongzhi (reign name, or nien-hao), personal name (Wade-Giles) Tsai-ch'un, posthumous name (shih) I Ti, temple name (miao-hao) (Ch'ing) Mu Tsung emperor (reigned 186175) of the Ch'ing dynasty (16441911/12), during whose reign occurred a short revitalization of the beleaguered Ch'ing government, known as the T'ung-chih Restoration. Ascending the throne at the age of six, the young ruler assumed the reign title of T'ung-chih (Union for Order). He ruled under the regency of a triumvirate that was headed by his mother, the empress dowager Tz'u-hsi (18351908). The restoration under T'ung-chih followed the examples of the great restorations in the middle of the Han (206 BCAD 220) and T'ang (AD 618907) dynasties. In the first years of the T'ung-chih reign, the Chinese government finally quelled the great Taiping Rebellion (185064), which had been threatening South China, and crushed the Nien Rebellion (185368) in North China. The finances of the imperial treasury were restored, and an attempt was made to recruit good men into the government. The system of civil-service examinations was once again held in areas that had long been under rebel control. The government also made an effort to revive agricultural production by distributing seeds and tools and helping to develop new land. A program was also undertaken to manufacture Western arms, although the effort to adopt foreign technology was only superficially successful because the study of the Confucian Classics, not Western science, remained the only sure path to official advancement. The Tsungli Yamen (Office for General Management) was created to handle foreign affairs, and the government began attempts to understand and deal with the West. T'ung-chih assumed personal control of the government in 1873 when he was 17. One of his first acts was to grant an audience to the representatives of six foreign countries. For the first time in Chinese history, the emperor did not demand the ceremonial kowtowkneeling and touching the forehead to the ground as a sign of supplication. The government concluded a dtente with the Western powers with the treaties of Tientsin (1858) and Peking (1860). T'ung-chih was a weak, uninterested ruler, whose affairs were constantly scrutinized by the empress dowager Tz'u-hsi. He died a little more than two years after assuming control of the government.