Guo Jingyi

Overview

Guo Jingyi was a bondservant of the Aha Gioro clan in the Plain White Banner, residing in Saharcha. The year he submitted to the Qing dynasty is unknown. Volume 18 of the official Qing dynasty genealogy, *The General Genealogy of the Manchu Clans of the Eight Banners*, records that he himself served as a Zuo Ling (zuoling (company captain)), his son Daliku served as an Inner Guan Ling (inner-company manager), his great-grandson Fuerhe served as a Xiaoqi Xiao (xiaoqixiao), and his great-great-grandson Aljishan served as a Hujun Xiao (hujunxiao) at the time the genealogy was compiled.

A Zuo Ling was both a basic unit within the Eight Banners and the official in charge of that unit, responsible for matters such as household registration, land ownership, and military records, thus possessing a dual function of social management and military organization. Bondservants (booi (banner bondservant)) were a specific subordinate status within the banners and cannot be understood solely in the modern sense of occupation. The Inner Guan Ling managed the bondservants under his command and their supplies; the Xiaoqi Xiao and Hujun Xiao were respectively within the Xiaoqi and Hujun units, and their descendants' positions differed from Guo Jingyi's own Zuo Ling position. This record thus presents the roles held by several generations of a family within the banner, inner court administration, and military systems. There are still unlisted paternal lineages between sons, great-grandsons, and great-great-grandsons; the surname is determined according to the grouping of the Aha Gioro clan in the volume, and the Han Chinese ancestry is not inferred solely from the character "Guo".