Kangxi Emperor
The Kangxi Emperor ruled China for sixty-one years, the longest reign in its history. Born in 1654, he was the third son of the Shunzhi Emperor, was chosen as heir partly because he had survived smallpox and was therefore immune, and acceded at seven under four regents. He took power at fourteen by arresting the dominant regent Oboi, having trained a group of young wrestlers in the palace ostensibly for sport. He then faced and defeated the Revolt of the Three Feudatories, an eight-year civil war from 1673 in which former Ming generals who had helped the Manchus conquer China turned against them and at one point held the whole south. He annexed Taiwan in 1683, ending the last Ming resistance, and campaigned three times in person against the Dzungar Mongols. The Treaty of Nerchinsk with Russia in 1689 was the first China signed with a European power on equal terms, and fixed a border that held for a century and a half. He governed a Manchu conquest dynasty ruling a vastly larger Han population, and did it by patronising Chinese scholarship rather than suppressing it: he sponsored the Kangxi Dictionary of 47,000 characters, a complete edition of Tang poetry, and the compilation of the Ming history, and took the examinations seriously. He employed Jesuits as astronomers, cartographers and mathematicians, learned Euclid from them, and issued an edict of toleration in 1692 — then restricted the missions after the papacy condemned Chinese rites. He cut taxes and froze the land levy permanently. He died in 1722.
- Lived: 1654 CE – 1722 CE
- Nationality: Chinese
- Roles: ruler, military_leader, scholar
