Anu

Overview

Anu was a bannerman under the Zhalali clan in Volume 51 of the *Comprehensive Genealogy of the Manchu Clans of the Eight Banners*, belonging to the Plain Blue Banner, and his family had lived in the Warka region for generations. The genealogy records that at the beginning of the dynasty, he led fifty Manchu households to surrender. The court organized this population into a zuoling (military unit), and appointed his son, Alka, to lead it. This is the original book's preserved record of the scale of surrender and the organizational structure within the banner; "fifty households" refers to family households and cannot be directly converted into a fixed number of soldiers.

The same genealogical entry also records the granting of the title of Qiduwei and its subsequent multiple hereditary successions. These hereditary titles involved relatives such as Dobe, Obai, Ordo, Dorji, and Heshang. During this period, a Yunqiwei (a military rank) was added due to imperial decree, but this addition was later removed in subsequent successions. The zuoling was an organization for managing the population and military service within the banner, while the Qiduwei and Yunqiwei were hereditary military ranks; their natures are different, and Alka's management of the zuoling cannot be interpreted as him and Anu automatically sharing the same title.

The genealogy also records that Anu's younger brother, Wudeng'e, surrendered to the Qing dynasty at the beginning of the dynasty, and his descendants also have their own records of official positions and military achievements. The most important part of Anu's story is that in the early Qing dynasty, a branch of the family led their households to surrender and be incorporated into the banner organization, as well as the process of inheritance and adjustment of hereditary positions among multiple generations of relatives; the military achievements of each relative should still be verified separately.