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The Palace Museum - Six Palaces of East Road

Residences for Concubines

Jingren Palace, Chengqian Palace, Zhongcui Palace, Yanxi Palace, Yonghe Palace and Jingyang Palace, collectively known as the Six Palaces on the East Road, are the living spaces of concubines of the Inner Court, the history of the Qianlong Emperor's mother Chongqing Empress Dowager, East Empress Dowager Ci’an, Emperor Guangxu's favorite Consort Zhen, etc. have lived here once.

In ancient times, The emperor’s inner court is often called “Three Palaces and Six Courtyards”, the former half of which refers to the Palace of Heavenly Purity (Qianqing Palace 乾清宮), Hall of Union (Jiaotai Hall 交泰殿) and Palace of Earthly Tranquility (Kunning Palace 坤宁宮). The Six Courtyards are actually divided into east and west groups, adding up to a total of twelve.

In order to reduce the conflicts of concubines, each group of six independent courtyards was built on the east and west sides of the inner court of the Forbidden City, each courtyard had one main hall and a rear hall, wing halls and other facilities. According to its original design, each courtyard was assigned to one concubine, but when the number of concubines rose, there were surely not enough courtyards for them, so one courtyard usually contains several concubines.

The Six Palaces on the East Road are located in the east of the three main halls, with East 2nd Long Street as the axis, is divided into left and right groups, the left side is Jingren Palace 景仁宫, Chengqian Palace 承乾宫 and Zhongcui Palace 钟粹宫, the right side is Yanxi Palace 延禧宫, Yonghe Palace 永和宫 and Jingyang Palace. Unlike the Six Palaces on the West Road, the East ones have no large-scale alterations, and are basically maintained as they were at the beginning of the Ming Dynasty.

Jingren Palace situated in the southwest corner of The Six Palaces, closest to the Qianqing Palace. It was here that the Kangxi Emperor was born in 1654, the eleventh year of Shunzhi’s reign. Historically, Empress Dowager Chongqing 崇庆太后, mother of Emperor Qianlong, and Empress Dowager Tong 佟太后, mother of Emperor Kangxi, and Consort Zhen 珍妃, the favorite of Emperor Guangxu, all lived in the Jingren Palace, but their fates were very different.

The Empress Dowager Chongqing enjoyed an 86-year lifetime of glory. The Empress Dowager Tong died shortly after Emperor Kangxi’s accession to the throne at the age of 24. The most tragic of the three was Consort Zhen, who offended Empress Dowager Cixi 慈禧太后 and Empress Longyu 隆裕皇后by supporting Emperor Guangxu’s coup d’état. Before fleeing the Forbidden City in 1900, when the Allied Forces of the Eight Powers invaded Beijing, Cixi had Consort Zhen pushed into a well and drowned, and the well can still be seen today in the Ningshou Palace 宁寿宫 of the Forbidden City.

The five-room wide Zhongcui Palace 钟粹宫 was the residence of the Crown Prince during the Ming Dynasty. Emperor Xianfeng 咸丰皇帝 of the Qing Dynasty lost his mother at an early age and lived in the Zhongcui Palace for more than ten years. After Xianfeng ascended the throne, he installed Lady Niugulu 钮钴禄氏 as his Empress, and placed her in the Zhongcui Palace, where she lived with him day and night, and later became the Empress Dowager Ci’an 慈安皇太后. She was also known as the “Empress Dowager of the East” because she lived in the Zhongcui Palace for so long. Empress Dowager Ci’an and Cixi reigned together behind the curtain and controlled the power of the Qing Dynasty for decades.

Yanxi Palace 延禧宫 is located in the southeast corner of the six palaces and suffered a fire in 1845, all the buildings in the yard were burned down. In the first year of Xuantong 宣统 (1909), Duankang Taifei (Former Consort Jin of Emperor Guangxu 瑾妃) proposed the construction of a Western-style palace at the original site, using modern materials such as glass and iron, and named it the Water Palace for fire prevention. The palace was commonly known as the “Crystal Palace”. But the construction was never finished due to the emptiness of the national treasury.

Owners of the six palaces on the East and West Roads changed over the years, countless princes were born here, and triggered countless power struggles. But in the end, losers lose everything, and winners take it all.

So let’s relax and stroll around the most beautiful place in the Forbidden City: the Imperial Garden:

The Palace Museum - The Imperial Garden

Royal Gardens Stories

The Imperial Garden is located in the northernmost part of the Forbidden City, originally named "Palace Rear Court", which was renamed in the Qing Dynasty. It is the largest royal garden in the Forbidden City. Qin'an Hall is the center of the garden, which now has more than 20 pavilions, towers and other buildings, and more than a hundred ancient trees.