Military service and death Erjihe , an early Qing officer of the Manchu Plain Yellow Banner and the Šumulu clan, belonged to the extended family of Yanggūri, an imperial son-in-law. According to volume 6 of the *General Genealogy of the Manchu Clans of the Eight Banners*, Erjihe initially held the hereditary grade of *qiduwei*. His service in the Jinzhou campaign earned promotion to third-class *qingcheduwei*, a separate grade in the Qing hierarchy of hereditary military honors.
During an early advance toward Beijing, Erjihe was killed in the fighting at Jizhou. He was posthumously awarded the higher grade of first-class *qingcheduwei*. The verb “awarded posthumously” is important: the promotion followed his death and cannot be described as a later appointment to an office he personally exercised.
Inheritance and collateral lines Erjihe's son Erbihe succeeded to the hereditary dignity and subsequently gained an additional *yunqiwei* honor for service connected with Ningyuan, Jinzhou and the Qing entry into China proper. When Erbihe died without an heir, the honor passed to his younger brother Serbi; later imperial grants raised the family's grade to first-class baron. The sequence therefore includes succession between brothers as well as inheritance across generations.
When Qilina eventually inherited, the added rank conferred through imperial favor was deducted, leaving first-class *qingcheduwei* combined with *yunqiwei*. This compound grade reflected accomplishments and grants across different generations, not Erjihe's individual record alone. Another collateral relative, the grandnephew Shuleng'e, served as vice minister of Personnel and deputy banner commander; he died in fighting at Hetong and received a distinct posthumous hereditary reward inherited by Dersuisong'e. Civil ministerial service, banner command and hereditary awards must remain analytically separate. Some personal-name readings and the long inheritance sequence await verification against an original printing.
Sources and Bibliography
- Source reference 1 — zh.wikisource.org
- Source reference 2 — zh.wikisource.org
- Source reference 3 — zh.wikisource.org
- Source reference 4 — zh.wikisource.org
Source links were inherited from the research manuscript. Individual assertions have not all been independently verified against archival originals.
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