As the saying goes, "fight the tiger brothers, fight the father and son soldiers", parents and brothers should be the closest people to themselves, but there is a big figure is an exception, he is the Yongzheng Emperor of the Qing Dynasty. The Yongzheng Emperor's name was Yin Chan (胤禛), the fourth son of the Kangxi Emperor, and his biological mother was Princess Wuya of the De Dynasty. In addition to the Yongzheng Emperor, Princess De also gave birth to the fourteenth son of the Emperor, Yin Zhen. But the relationship between the Yongzheng Emperor and his birth mother was very weak, and he even became an enemy with his fourteenth brother.
Let's first talk about the mother-child relationship, according to the historical records, we find that The Princess Wuya and the Yongzheng Emperor do not seem to be mother and son, similar to the enemy. Since the death of the Kangxi Emperor, the Wuya clan has been causing trouble for his son. When she heard the news that her son had become emperor, Princess De's performance was surprising, she said: "To make my son emperor, not only do I dare not hope, but I do not think about it in my dreams", and then began to go on a hunger strike and wanted to be buried for the former emperor.
The Yongzheng Emperor persuaded his mother bitterly, and even said such a thing, if you have to commit suicide, then my emperor will not do it, and die with you, and Princess De will give up the idea of martyrdom. Some people may think that Princess De is "acting", her son is the emperor, he becomes the empress dowager, and it is too late to be happy, but the truth is not so! After the Yongzheng Emperor ascended the throne, he honored his mother as Empress Renshou, but was rejected by Concubine De.
Princess De not only did not accept the title of empress dowager, but also refused to leave the Yonghe Palace and refused to move to the Ningshou Palace, where the empress dowager lived. Yonghe Palace is one of the six palaces in the East and is the place where the emperor's concubines live. Now that the Yongzheng Emperor has ascended the throne, but her mother still insists on living in the harem, the Yongzheng Emperor repeatedly asked for "moving", and Princess De simply ignored it. Later, Princess De created even greater trouble, because she refused to accept the pilgrimage of the hundred officials, which led to the cancellation of the Yongzheng Emperor's New Year's "enthronement celebration".
On May 22 of the first year of Yongzheng, Princess Dewu fell ill and died in the early morning of the next day. Because the relationship between the Yongzheng Emperor and his mother was very poor, and the death of Wu Yashi was very sudden, there have been rumors that the Yongzheng Emperor forced his mother to die. Then he talked about the relationship between the Yongzheng Emperor and his own brother Yin Zhen. After the Yongzheng Emperor ascended the throne, he crowned the eighth brother as the Prince of Lian and the thirteenth brother as the Prince of Yi, but did not pay attention to the fourteenth brother who had distinguished himself in battle.
The Yongzheng Emperor first imprisoned his fourteenth brother in Jingling, and only after his mother's death did he grant him the title of King of the County, but did not give him a title or give him the relevant silver. In the fourth year of Yongzheng, the fourteenth brother was stripped of all titles by Yongzheng and imprisoned in the Jingshan Shou Imperial Palace. It was not until nine years later, when the Yongzheng Emperor fell ill and died, and the Qianlong Emperor took the throne, that the great general Wang was released from confinement. So the question is, why is the relationship between the Yongzheng Emperor and his mother and brother so bad? In fact, this matter has to blame the Kangxi Emperor!
During the reign of the Kangxi Emperor, the system of the harem of the Qing Dynasty was gradually improved, and at the same time, a rule that did not become a rule was established, that is, the system of raising princes. Under this system, all young, lower-ranking concubines were not qualified to raise their sons, and were to be raised by a person of a higher rank or designated by the emperor. The Yongzheng Emperor was born in the seventeenth year of the Kangxi Dynasty, when The Concubine was only 19 years old, and the highest status may have been noble, or lower, and it was by giving birth to the Yongzheng Emperor that she was promoted to concubine in the following year. According to the rules, Princess De was not qualified to raise the Yongzheng Emperor.
As a result, the Yongzheng Emperor was given to the noble concubine Tong Jia to raise. The noble concubine Tong Jia was of prominent origin, she was a cousin of the Kangxi Emperor, and her father was Tong Guowei (the uncle of the Kangxi Emperor), an important courtier of the dynasty. This system of adoption caused the Relationship between the Yongzheng Emperor and his birth mother to be very weak, even very indifferent. When Princess De gave birth to the fourteenth brother, her status had been improved and she could raise a son. Princess De preferred the Fourteenth Brother emotionally, but he was a political enemy of the Yongzheng Emperor.
References: 1. Records of Emperor Shizong of the Qing Dynasty; 2. Records of the Yongxian Dynasty; 3. Manuscripts of The Concubines of the Qing Dynasty