Ming Dynasty Eunuch Research Mission

There existed a huge and special group-eunuch in Chinese history for a longtime and they did play an important role in our domestic politics, economics, cultureand even the foreign affairs. There did happen that the eunuchs visited other countriesas the diplomatic envoys. However, before Ming Dynasty they just went along thecourtiers as assistants and their number, scale or effects on the society are all greatlylimited. Whereas, it had been normal for the eunuchs to visit other countries asdiplomatic envoy and it was the prime time of the eunuchs as diplomatic envoys inMing Dynasty especially in the early time, during which appeared the famous“eunuch diplomacy”.Nonetheless, there hasn’t been a systemic research about the special diplomaticformat “eunuch diplomacy” yet, which needs further studies. The author adopt thehistorically researching methods such as the comparative method, statistics methodand so on to summarize the characteristics of “eunuch diplomacy” and deeply analyzethe reasons why the “eunuch diplomacy” is prevalent and the effect it produced bywidely collecting and criticizing the relevant historical data, which is based on theancient books and data such as “The Memoir of Ming Dynasty”,“The history of MingDynasty” and “The Historical Recorded Events of Ming Dynasty”.The author thinks that the characteristics of “eunuch diplomacy” are as following:firstly, Ming Dynasty is the prime time of the “eunuch diplomacy” among the pastfeudal dynasties throughout the whole history of ancient China; secondly, as far as theMing Dynasty’s history is concerned, there is the obvious unbalance of time on the“eunuch diplomacy”. The early Ming dynasty was the prime time of the “eunuchdiplomacy”, however, there was the declining tendency in the middle of MingDynasty so that the eunuchs gradually edged out of foreign affairs; in addition, as forthe visiting regions, there is obvious difference in the visiting regions and the mostfrequently visited regions is those that has the closely geographical relationship withChina like North Korea and Mongolia etc. Finally, there is certain uniqueness of the“eunuch diplomacy” whether in the visiting mission, requests, or their behavior in theway of visiting, compared with the courtiers.The eunuch as the royal servants had an important effect on the diplomatic affairsfor a long time. As for the reasons, the author thinks that it resulted from both thesubjective and objective conditions. On one hand, it is not only the realistic need of foreign affairs in the early Ming Dynasty from the subjective point, but also the urgentdemand of the emperor to intensify the imperial power and satisfy personal desirefrom the objective point. On the other hand, at that time the eunuchs were qualified tomake it whether their loyalty, educational level or handling capacity as diplomaticenvoys.The “eunuch diplomacy” as an important diplomatic format, not only directlyinfluences the relationship between the Ming dynasty and the vassal states, but alsogot deeply involved in the domestic affairs. The author adopts the dialectic methodanalyzing the effects of “eunuch diplomacy” which includes both the positive andnegative effects. The positive effect is mainly embodied in manifesting the nationalprestige, reinforce the system of vassal state, and also strengthen the economic tiesbetween China and other countries, maintaining the continual commercial trades. Thenegative effect is mainly reflected on the accumulated political capital and financialresources, which gradually become the hotbed of interfering with domestic affairs,moreover, the maladies reflected from the personal qualities also greatly damaged thenational image, especially their greed without restraint.