The Inundation Of The Yellow River And Henan Local Society In The Jiaqing-Daoguang Periods Of Qing Dynasty

For thousands years, the Yellow River has mothered riverine people bounteously. At the same time, history has seen one after another disaster brought to Chinese nation by its floods. Since beginning of the twentieth century, great academic concern had been shown to the Yellow River. Nevertheless, there were not enough scholars paying their attention to the impact of inundation on social development of Henan Province during the Jiaqing-Daoguang periods in Qing Dynasty. Herein, this thesis tries hard to make up for absent work so as to deepen and enrich relevant research on history of the Yellow River and famine.Under the governance of Jiaqing and Daoguang, the Qing Dynasty fell from the pinnacle of prosperity into decay, which consisted of the social background for frequent floods in Henan Province. The rampant corruption ruined the aspirations of government officials to prevent inundation. As a result, they locked their steps on footprints of Jin Fu in water-controlling measures. Due to the absence of official selection and appointment institution, it was not until the chief called Dong-he-zong-du finished one piece of river affairs that he had been transferred to another irrelevant department. Chaos caused by rebellion of religion organization named Tian-li-jiao and successive Opium Wars made Henan society more turbulent. The fast growing population always scrambled for agricultural irrigation and destroyed river bank in their fights. To compound social disorder, floods of the Yellow River were often triggered by unique landform and climate of Henan Province, too.Inevitably, frequent floods during periods of Jiaqing-Daoguang had a strong impact on Henan society. Firstly, the biological environment and economy situation of riverain cities and towns deteriorated at a rapid pace resulting from water erosion and mud sediment. For the same reason, a famous town called Zhu-xian-zhen in Kaifeng area went down gradually. Secondly, when flood waters finally receded, nothing more was left but vast barren land, followed by yearly famine. In despite of hungry and plague, more taxation continued to be levied, and large numbers of labors on the riverbank died of toil and disease, which forced them to raise the standard of revolt at the cost of leading social order under attack.Confronted by increasingly serious inundation of the Yellow River, Emperors Jiaqing and Daoguang ordered governments at all levels to take positive measures. The standing administrative post of handling river affairs was installed, and various projects were constructed. To make sure the projects run efficiently and smoothly, the chief administrators on inundation and salvation, such as Wu Si-jue and Li Yu-mei, were so dedicated that fag themselves to death. On the basis of practical investigation, Fang Shou-chou and Niu Jian made a systematic and elaborate arrangement to save victims from wound and famine. Whereas, there were a lot of deficiencies coming forth in implement, which provided opportunities for local gentries to engage in salvation. With the exemplary role of Gao Ci-li, Chang Mao-lai and so on, countless nongovernmental rescuers showed their capabilities and had an ever stronger influence.Although government still played a dominant role, its endeavor was barely enough, in virtue of official misdeeds prevailing in the decadent empire. Therefore, the rise of civilian mutual assistance complemented the governmental impotence to some extent. From a specific angle, putting the inundation under control and relieving the people in disaster reflected the political, economic realities and the common's practical livelihood of Henan Province during Jiaqing-Daoguang periods, and threw limelight on the importance of management of civilian forces.