The Legend of the Fragrant Concubine
Part of A Better Guide to Běijīng
There are several versions of the Xiāng Fēi’s story, but in all of them she is a beloved concubine of the Qiánlóng emperor, a member of the Turki Uighur people. She was named Iparhan in her own language, and is usually claimed to have been from Kashgar in what the Qīng named Xīnjiāng — ‘New Territories’.
Hàn versions of her story have her naturally emitting a pleasant fragrance, but Uighur ones have her fond of wearing a sprig of oleaster in her hair.
Born in 1734, she was chosen to be an imperial consort at the age of 22 but was sent to the court only on certain conditions, including that at her death her remains be returned to Kashgar for burial.
Alternative versions depict her as the wife of a rebellious Kashgar chieftain and part of the spoils carried off for the emperor by his general Zhàohuì after the quelling of a Muslim uprising in 1759.
Yet others say her elder brother helped to quell the rebellion and, being summoned to the Qīng court to be created Duke, he took his younger sister with him.
She was talent-spotted while there, subsequently rising rapidly up the hierarchy of concubinage, from Distinguished Lady through Junior Imperial Consort to Imperial Consort.
All accounts have Qiánlóng heartbroken at her death, despite her supposed iciness towards him. She either committed suicide rather than sleep with the emperor, or committed it at the age of 29 on the instruction of the emperor’s mother, or died naturally of old age at 55.
One hundred and twenty guards are supposed to have accompanied her remains back to Kashgar for burial in the Hoja family tomb, as a sign there claims, but the official story is that she was buried at the Eastern Qīng Tombs outside Běijīng. Her coffin was supposedly found to contain papers with Arabic script and strands of fair hair.
A few grey ones reportedly found among them suggest she survived to old age. Modern communist myth-makers take this view, promoting her as making a major contribution to the ‘unity of the nationalities’. Back in Kashgar, however, they prefer to believe that she stood up to the Manchu rulers of the Qīng empire in the same way that modern Uighurs resist Chinese overlordship of Xīnjiāng, which they prefer to call East Turkestan.
See also ‘Old’ Summer Palace.
Next in Běijīng Suburbs and Beyond: Western Qīng Tombs
Previously: Eastern Qīng Tombs
Main Index of A Better Guide to Beijing.
For discussion of China travel, see The Oriental-List.
