Empress dowager cixi biography summary

Empress of the Qing Dynasty (1835–1908)

"Cixi" redirects here. For the city, see Cixi, Zhejiang.

Empress Dowager Cixi (Mandarin pronunciation:[tsʰɹ̩̌.ɕì]; 29 November 1835 – 15 November 1908) was a Manchu noblewoman of the Yehe Nara clan who effectively but periodically controlled the Chinese government in the late Qing dynasty as empress dowager and regent for almost 50 years, from 1861 until her death in 1908.

Selected as a concubine of the Xianfeng Emperor in her adolescence, she gave birth to a son, Zaichun, in 1856.

Empress Dowager Cixi - Penguin Books UK

After the Xianfeng Emperor's death in 1861, his five-year-old son became the Tongzhi Emperor, and Cixi assumed the role of co-empress dowager alongside Xianfeng's widow, Empress Dowager Ci'an. Cixi ousted a group of regents appointed by the late emperor and assumed the regency along with Ci'an. Cixi then consolidated control over the dynasty when she installed her nephew as the Guangxu Emperor at the death of the Tongzhi Empero Empress Dowager Cixi of the Qing Dynasty: History, Major ...

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