Macartney Embassy

Also called: Macartney Mission

In 1793 Britain’s Macartney embassy met the Qianlong Emperor at Rehe and asked for wider trade and a resident envoy; the emperor refused everything, declaring that the Celestial Empire “possesses all things in abundance”.

Hoping to loosen the restrictions of the Canton system, the British government sent a large embassy under George Macartney in 1792. Nominally come to congratulate the Qianlong Emperor on his birthday, it brought gifts meant to display British technology — a planetarium, telescopes, cannon — and met the emperor at the Mountain Resort at Rehe in September 1793. There was a dispute over the kowtow, the ritual of three kneelings and nine prostrations, and Macartney is said to have gone down on one knee as he would before his own king.

Britain asked for a resident envoy in Beijing, more open ports such as Ningbo and Tianjin, and an island near Zhoushan as a trading base. In his edict to George III, Qianlong rejected every request: “Our Celestial Empire possesses all things in prolific abundance and lacks no product within its borders; there is no need to import the manufactures of outside barbarians.” The embassy is seen as the first great clash between the tribute order and European demands for equal diplomacy and free trade; after the Amherst embassy also failed in 1816, the conflict led on to the Opium War.