Fleeing Foreign Invasion Amidst the Devastation of Internal Uprisings

Ascending the throne in 1850, the Xianfeng Emperor faced an era of unprecedented domestic and foreign turmoil. His reign was overwhelmed by the massive Taiping Rebellion, which seized Nanjing and threatened imperial survival. Concurrently, conflict escalated into the Second Opium War against Anglo-French forces. When Allied troops invaded Beijing in 1860 and destroyed the Old Summer Palace, the emperor fled to Rehe, leaving negotiations to his brother, Prince Gong. The resulting Treaties of Tianjin and Peking granted extensive rights to foreign powers, deeply damaging Qing prestige and fundamentally altering the court's balance of power.

Other languages