INDEPENDENT REFERENCE · MANCHU LANGUAGE, HISTORY & CULTUREManchuCulture.net ↗
EXPLORE MORELearn ManchuManchu ScriptMing YeMain Website
Wiki › People & Biographies › Santai: A Qing President of the Board of Rites
ENCYCLOPEDIA ENTRY   /   People & Biographies

Santai: A Qing President of the Board of Rites

English editorial translation of the Chinese source entry

Santai was a Manchu official who held senior central-government appointments during the Yongzheng and early Qianlong reigns, including posts connected with the Boards of Rites and War and the Censorate. The lists of board and ministry officers in the Draft History of Qing, volume…

Written by MING YEPeople & BiographiesManchuCulture Wiki
Source-based English editorial manuscript · Historical details subject to final source verification.

Overview

Santai was a Manchu official who held senior central-government appointments during the Yongzheng and early Qianlong reigns, including posts connected with the Boards of Rites and War and the Censorate. The lists of board and ministry officers in the Draft History of Qing, volume 182, record his service in the Yongzheng period. Following the death of Changshou, Santai succeeded him as Manchu president of the Board of Rites in the third lunar month of Yongzheng year nine (1731). The office was among the highest ministerial posts in the Qing administrative system, with responsibility for state ceremonies and associated ritual administration.

Historical Background

In Yongzheng year twelve (1734), Santai, still president of the Board of Rites, was ordered to assist the grand secretaries together with Xu Ben, president of the Board of Works. This responsibility reflected his participation in higher deliberative affairs while retaining his ministerial appointment. The Qing shilu continued to identify him as president of the Board of Rites in early Qianlong year one (1736), when an imperial grant of horses was also recorded.

Sources and Interpretation

In Qianlong year ten (1745), Santai petitioned for retirement on grounds of age and illness. The court approved retirement with his existing status and granted him the honorary designation of Grand Guardian of the Heir Apparent; Laibao subsequently succeeded to the presidency of the Board of Rites. Identification requires care because a Chengde Prefecture Gazetteer records another Santai, affiliated with the Plain Red Banner, serving as a deputy commander at Hetun in 1754. Shared names do not establish that the men were identical. The minister's dates of birth and death, lineage, and possible relationship to the second record require further evidence.

Sources and Bibliography

  1. Historical text at Wikisource
  2. Historical text at Wikisource
  3. Digitized historical text
  4. Historical text at Wikisource

Links reproduce references supplied with the Chinese editorial manuscript; they do not establish that every individual statement has undergone independent archival verification.