Empress Dowager Cixi, whom we are all quite familiar with, as a concubine of the Xianfeng Emperor and the biological mother of the Tongzhi Emperor, actually manipulated the ruling power of the late Qing Dynasty. At the age of 22, he became a noble concubine, and at the age of 26, he listened to the government, ruled for a total of 48 years, and lived an extremely extravagant and wasteful life, and the degree of exaggeration was outrageous!
In fact, the national treasury had long been empty, the emperor had to save money, but Cixi did not save, when the Eight-Nation Alliance led her to flee for her life, fled to Datong to eat a local chicken casually, and actually spent 5,000 taels of silver from the local prefect, what happened?
We must first see how extravagant and wasteful Cixi usually is. The "clothes" in "food, clothing, housing and transportation" rank first, and beautiful clothes do have a very great attraction for women, and Cixi is no exception.
At that time, Cixi, who held great power, had to bow to the government every day, and she was particularly particular before the dynasty. First of all, she had to dress up in front of her ivory carved mirror, then open the enamel melon-shaped rouge box and pat the fat powder, and the jasper beads must be worn around the neck, and the fingernails were covered with exquisite gold and ancient money pattern armor sets.
This nail cover is not something that ordinary people can wear, and there are regulations on the things inlaid on it, such as the queen's armor cover, each can be set with 3 east pearls, and the concubine is not allowed to use the east pearl, and can only be replaced by ordinary pearls. The clothes were made of the most expensive silk, and folklore says that the clothes worn by Empress Dowager Cixi once will no longer be worn, either thrown away or given to the next person.
In terms of eating, Empress Dowager Cixi is very particular, taste is secondary, and pomp must be done enough. According to historical records, the emperor of the Qing Dynasty ate 22 kilograms of meat, 5 kilograms of soup meat, 1 kilogram of pork, 2 sheep, 5 chickens, 3 ducks, 60 radishes, 100 kilograms of milk, 12 cans of Yuquan landscape and so on.
Empress Dowager Cixi did not have more than that a day, she asked the imperial chef to prepare 100 different dishes for her at each meal, and to include famous dishes from all over the country, the most famous Chinese feast in history, "Full Han Feast", was 108 dishes, and she Wanted 100 dishes a day for Empress Dowager Cixi, and she would throw it away when she couldn't finish eating. Roughly speaking, it costs tens of millions of taels of silver to eat a day. This extravagant and wasteful way of eating and drinking continued until 1900.
In 1900, the corrupt Qing government could not resist the attack of the Eight-Nation Alliance, and Empress Dowager Cixi, who spent so much money, actually embezzled military funds, resulting in the army not being able to afford even a shell! Such a Qing Dynasty is strange not to be destroyed.
Empress Dowager Cixi, who was worried about being caught by the Eight-Nation Alliance, fled for her life all the way, and she was extremely depressed because she paid the most attention to face and pomp, and she was hungry for several days in a row, and she did not want to eat two bites before, but now she could not touch it. Finally arrived in Datong, ready to eat a good meal.
The local prefect was called Qi Futian, and he had long known that the empress dowager would pass by here, thinking that one day Cixi would give him a great reward when she returned to the Forbidden City, and the empress dowager would definitely have to eat the best food, but such a small place, so that she could be worthy of the status of empress? Qi Futian made a clever move.
He arrived early in the most famous phoenix building in the local area and found a chef. It is said that if the chef wants to make a "Eight Treasures Imperial Chicken", he must use 8 kinds of high-grade ingredients such as ginseng, deer antler velvet, Ganoderma lucidum, bird's nest, etc., grind it into powder, feed it to the chickens, raise it up and wait for fat to be made for Empress Dowager Cixi to eat.
The owner of the Phoenix Building sneered in his heart, can raising chickens like this work? The chicken must be dead, remembering what Cixi had done, the boss said: "Of course, these eight treasures can be raised, but it is very expensive, and one only has 5,000 taels of silver." Qi Futian, who was bent on currying favor with Cixi, gritted his teeth and said yes, prepare a few more for me.
When Empress Dowager Cixi came to the Phoenix Building, the boss casually grabbed a native chicken and made her a "Eight Treasures Royal Chicken", all the way bumpy and bitter Cixi, as soon as she smelled this fragrance, where would she distinguish whether it was an earth chicken or an Eight Treasure Chicken, while eating and praising the boss for doing a good job, Qi Futian was very happy, and gave the boss of the Phoenix Building 5,000 silver of two white flowers.
In 1902, Cixi returned to Beijing and wanted to implement a new plan, but was unable to return to Heaven, and in November 1908, Cixi died of illness at the Yiluan Temple in Zhongnanhai at the age of 74.
After her death, of course, she did not forget to take away her favorite treasures, pearls, agate, precious stones, jade, gold and silver utensils and other treasures, everywhere, the treasures buried in cixi coffins were worth hundreds of millions of taels of silver, and the pearls and gems on the crown of the phoenix were as big as eggs, which was really surprising.