The Livelihood Of Butha Eight Banner’s Nationalities In Qing Dynasty

In the middle of the 17 th century,Tsarist Russia invaded the northeast frontier of China,and the Solun tribe,who lived in the north of Heilongjiang and east of Lake Baikal,moved southward to the Nenjiang River basin under the leadership of the Qing Court.The Qing court organized them into the Buteha Tribe,which was administered under the Lifan Yuan.After that,the heilongjiang general was appointed to be in charge of its affairs.In1732,on the basis of the butha Tribe,the butha Eight banners were established for these tribes.They are soldiers in wartime and people in peacetime,relying on the form of the organization for daily production and life.Their national livelihood plays a central role politically,militarily,economically and socially.On the political level,the Qing Dynasty set up a series of administrative agencies aiming at butha eight Banners,such as butha general manager Yamen,Butha deputy capital yamen and Butha East and West Administration bureaux,adopting the concept of "governing according to ethnic groups and customs".On the military level,the soldiers of The Eight Banners in Butha formed a tradition of being good at fighting in their hunting activities.They were sent to fight on the battlefield,regularly patrol the Sino-Russian border and guard border posts.They were strong troops to defend the motherland’s territory and made the Qing Court attach great importance to them.On the economic level,before the southward migration,the Solun tribe mainly engaged in hunting and fishing industry.On this basis,the Qing Government established the tribute mink system,trade system and salaries and rates system,with the core purpose of paying tribute to the precious mink.After moving south to the Nenjiang River basin,the establishment of Butha Eight Banner changed the hunting motivation and hunting methods of the people in the banner.After butha Eight Banner entered the prosperous period,ethnic livelihood realized diversified development,and then under the background of interaction and communication with manchu,Han and other ethnic groups,the livelihood modes of butha Eight Banner interpenetrated and influenced each other,mainly reflected in the advancement of ethnic agriculture.Overall,the weight of different livelihood modes has changed,with agriculture taking up an increasing share of livelihood modes and hunting not developing as before.With the change of people’s livelihood in Butha Eight Banner,it shows the characteristics of the progress of production tools,the change of hunting power and the development of commodity economy.At the social level,the development of buthar livelihood has brought about social progress such as gender division of labor,social stratification and lifestyle transformation.The livelihood of butha eight Banners constitutes the basic background of its national existence and development.On the one hand,the Qing court focused on livelihood,and set up various management organizations and tribute mink and other economic systems.However,the tribute mink system supplies the ruler’s unlimited desire with the limited source of livelihood of the nation,which to a certain extent leads to the gradual decline of the hunting industry of butha Eight Banner nation.The economic changes of national livelihood make the national characteristics of hunting tradition disappear gradually.On the other hand,the Economic exchanges and social development of the Buthar people have gradually formed a diversified pattern of livelihood,which has been able to maintain their basic survival.On the whole,the livelihood of the ethnic group in Butha Eight Banner shows a rich picture of the economic changes in the northeast frontier of China in the Qing Dynasty,and is also a typical case of the agriculturalization of the hunting ethnic group.