| Transcript |
- APPENDIX I
Jade Smuggling during the Qing Dynasty
According to ancient Chinese law, the people, the territory and all the natural re�sources of the Chinese empire belonged to the emperor. The officials of every re�gion in the empire were expected to express their loyalty to the Son of Heaven by paying tribute, in the form of gifts and local products. After the pacification of Xin�jiang in 1759, Qianlong designated the jade region as his official property and ex�pected jade tribute from there. All gathering of the jade material was monopolized by the emperor, and he prohibited anyone else from privately gathering it, making the illicit trade in jade punishable by death. Throughout China, un worked jade was prohibited from commercial transactions, and only carved jade artifacts could be dealt with in the marketplace. This regulation caused a great decrease in the amount of jade material coming on the market. The only legal source of attaining jade material in Xinjiang was by buying unimportant pieces, which were left behind after quarrying. These pieces were sold with the consent of the soldiers, who guarded the mines. The quality of the jade and the prices were determined by the local officials. However, this situation left the door wide open for a dishonest official to abuse his authority. Crooked merchants could bribe the local high officials to collect and transport jade to various markets throughout the country for their own personal profit. Jade was highly desirable and since it was to the Chinese what gold and diamonds were to people in the West, it was inevitable that illegal activities would rise. Much jade was smuggled from Mount Mirtagh, as it was an isolated area that was sealed off and it contained such an abundant supply of jade, that a large amount could be smuggled without it ever being noticed. River jade on the other hand was more difficult to smuggle, as it was scarcer and carefully watched over. The illicit trade in jade could not effectively be controlled, but when people were caught smuggling, they were executed to set an example.
Emperor Qianlong became aware of this illicit trafficking in jade, when he noted on one of his southern expeditions to Suzhou and Yangzhou that the workshops had large supplies of jade. He also noticed that there were many Moslims from the western regions in the cities, and felt that the jade he saw must have been smug�gled from Xinjiang. In one of his poems, he refers to jade smuggling and expres�ses his distaste for it.
The most famous and severe case of the smuggling and illegally selling of jade from a government mine for personal profit involved the high official, Gao Pu.
The Case of Gao Pu1
Gao Pu, an important Manchu official, was the nephew of the emperor Qianlong�s concubine, Huixian, and held the position of senior vice-president of the Board of War from 1775 to 1778. His father, Gao Heng, had been executed in 1768 for corruption and for receiving bribes during his term as Salt Censor in Yangzhou. However, because of his family ties with the imperial concubine, Gao Pu was treated with unusual favour by the emperor, who bestowed various important titles on him, including an important posting in Xinjiang. In 1776 he went to Yarkand to assume his position as the Imperial Resident of that city. Among his duties were keeping the peace and preventing the illegal quarrying of jade.
45
|
|---|
