Person1654 – 1722

Kangxi Emperor (Shengzu of Qing)

Also called: Shengzu of Qing, Xuanye

Fourth Qing emperor (r. 1661–1722), who crushed the Three Feudatories, took Taiwan, signed the Treaty of Nerchinsk with Russia and brought Mongolia under Qing rule

Third son of the Shunzhi Emperor, he is said to have been chosen as heir partly because he had survived smallpox. Four regents governed at first, but in 1669 he arrested Oboi and took power himself. He campaigned in person against Galdan of the Dzungars and made six tours of the south. So keen was his interest in Western learning that he studied mathematics and astronomy with Jesuit missionaries. His 61-year reign was the longest of any Chinese emperor, but his last years were troubled by his sons’ struggle for the succession.

Where they went

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2 related events

  1. 1

    The Kangxi Emperor put down the Revolt of the Three Feudatories, begun by Wu Sangui and others in 1673, within eight years, and in 1683 took Taiwan from the Zheng regime, securing Qing rule over China.

  2. 2

    In 1689 Qing China and Russia signed a treaty at Nerchinsk fixing their border along the Stanovoy Range and the Argun River — the first treaty the Qing concluded with a European state on equal terms.

People who appear alongside

  • Wu Sangui1612 – 1678

    Ming general who opened the Shanhai Pass to the Qing in 1644, became a feudatory prince in Yunnan and launched the Revolt of the Three Feudatories in 1673

  • Zheng Chenggong (Koxinga)1624 – 1662

    Leader of the Ming loyalist sea power that fought the Qing; born at Hirado in Japan, he drove the Dutch out of Taiwan in 1662 and made it his base

Themes this person appears in

  • Ming, Qing and Edo Japan1500 – 1800

    The age when the Ming, shaken by northern raiders, southern pirates and the silver economy, fell to Li Zicheng’s rebels, and the Manchu Qing reached its greatest extent and prosperity under Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong — as Japan was unified out of the Warring States into the Edo shogunate’s bakuhan order and closed country, and Joseon, after two great wars, met its neighbours through embassies to Edo and the Northern Learning

  • Islamic Empires and the Atlantic World1500 – 1800

    Three centuries in which the Ottomans of Suleiman I, the Mughals of Akbar and the Safavids of Abbas I flourished and then faltered, while across the Atlantic the slave trade and colonies transformed the Americas, leading to American independence