Qing Shizong And The Old Summer Palace

The Old Summer Palace, used to be the largest imperial garden in reincarnatedregions of Qing Dynasty, is the core of the famous three mountains five gardens in thewest of Beijing. It was built in Kangxi Dynasty. Originally, Qing Shengzu built SummerPalace for the Xiaohui queen to avoid the cold. After Xiaohui died, he gave some of theSummer Palace to his fourth son as house gardens, and called them "The Old SummerPalace". After Qing Shizong inherited the throne, he merged others of the Summer Palaceinto The Old Summer Palace in the first year, and then built palace districts for the dailyaffairs of government. In the third yea（r1725）, Qing Shizong stayed in The Old SummerPalace, which began his decade-long life in The Old Summer Palace.Qing Shizong appeared to have special feelings to The Old Summer Palace, whichwas not only because Shizong used it to cover the truth of his seized the throne, but alsodue to The Old Summer Palace condensed the relationship between Shizong and hisfather. These reasons made Shizong change Spring Park which was the center of KangxiDynasty moved to The Old Summer Palace. Due to Shizong almost all the year roundworked and lived in The Old Summer Palace, except Sacrifice Jiao temple, It lead tostatus of The Old Summer Palace in Yongzheng Dynasty almost more than the ForbiddenCity. It had become the Qing court’s actual center. Moreover, in addition to avoid loudscenes in The Old Summer Palace, Shizong hosted some festive celebrations to receivemessengers of WaiFan or garden banquets. He also established managers and guardbarracks of this palace. Besides, even his secret storage, minister of creation, and manyother measures more or less contacted with The Old Summer Palace. Shizong made thespecial administrative mode--YuanJu governance which was pioneered by his fatherimmobilized and institutionalization. That was not only changed the spatial layout ofadministrative center, also influenced the nearly a century and a half history of QingDynasty.Based on the YuanJu governance of Qing Shizong as the research object, this articleis divided into four parts. The first part mainly explains the background of building theold Summer Palace, and further researches year and scale of the initial construction of the old Summer Palace; The second part through to relate the old Summer Palace andstore a battle of the late Kangxi Dynasty, analyzes and expounds the Qing Shizong’sspecial feelings about the old Summer Palace and its source; The third part mainly statedthe Qing Shizong’s YuanJu life in the old Summer Palace, including politics, daily life,the daily maintenance and management of the old Summer Palace and so on; The fourthpart discusses the influence of the Qing Shizong’s YuanJu governance on the theYongzheng Dynasty political, such as the spatial layout of administrative center in Qingdynasty, the throne inheritance system in the Qing Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty palaceetiquette culture. In a word, this article through to study the Qing Shizong’s governanceand life in the old Summer Palace for ten years, analyzes special position of the oldSummer Palace in the Qing Dynasty palaces, and explains the important role andinfluence of Qing Shizong’s governance on the final formation and development of Qingemperor’s YuanJu governance.