Xu Lingyi wanted to enter the palace, but it wasn’t easy to do so now.
First, the Emperor no longer selected candidates for the imperial concubines.
A few years ago, the Emperor still selected women through a concubine selection process, as he still hoped to have a prince of his own.
But all those hopes were dashed. After so many years, the palace only had one child, Princess Minghua. Six years ago, a concubine did become pregnant, but she miscarried at five months.
The Emperor was furious, thinking that someone had done something to her, but it turned out that it was just a natural miscarriage.
To this day, His Majesty has only one princess.
Without the imperial concubine selection, it became much more difficult for Xu Lingyi to enter the palace.
Wait— Xu Lingyi remembered.
In her past life, there was actually an imperial concubine selection, which was organized by the Empress Dowager.
The Emperor did indeed select several young women from the imperial concubine selection and favored them for a period of time. Unfortunately, a year later, there was still no news of these women, and after that, the Emperor stopped holding such selections.
The reason she didn’t have a strong impression of this selection was that all the women selected were from commoners, and there were no daughters from official families.
It was said that the women chosen by the Empress Dowager were not good-looking, and some were even unsightly.
The reason these people were found was because their mothers were extremely fertile, usually having given birth to six or seven children or more, and most of them were boys.
These women had the ideal figures for fertility according to common standards, which pleased the Empress Dowager greatly. Therefore, she placed high hopes on them.
It was more like a final gamble, hoping to get what she wanted, but unfortunately, there was still no progress. Not long after, the Empress Dowager died in depression.
Although there was a selection, she was not eligible to participate, as the Empress Dowager did not select any daughters of officials.
Moreover, she also did not meet the Empress Dowager’s criteria for choosing a concubine. Her mother had four children, and her father felt that having too many children was not good for a woman. She was an unexpected child.
She was unlikely to succeed through the imperial concubine selection process, and even if she were eligible, the Emperor would certainly not choose her.
She is fifteen years old this year, while the Emperor is thirty-six.
Although it is quite normal for men and women to have such a large age gap nowadays, and some men remarry after their wives die, often to girls who are fifteen or sixteen years old, but she is the daughter of the Xu family, and her father is a trusted brother in the Emperor’s eyes.
The Emperor knew that the Xu family definitely planned to choose a man of low birth for her to marry as his principal wife.
So even if there were a selection, and even if she could participate, the Emperor wouldn’t choose her because of her father.
What should be done then?
Xu Lingyi recalled her past life to see if there were any other opportunities to enter the palace.
She pondered in her mind. Someone actually came to mind.
This person was not favored and had no presence. The only time she had any presence was when she entered the palace.
Because she was a peasant girl brought in from outside the palace by His Majesty. Some people initially speculated that she was His Majesty’s sweetheart and had been kept outside the palace, while others said that she had seduced His Majesty.
However, Xu Lingyi later learned that this person had accidentally had physical intimacy with the Emperor in the temple.
As for what exactly happened, she wasn’t quite sure. Perhaps the Emperor had been poisoned, or perhaps he had drunk too much alcohol.
Xu Lingyi was only guessing.
*****
Translator’s Encyclopedia
Marriage in Ancient Times – Based On The Qing Dynasty (Part 1)
In the early Qing Dynasty (1644–1912), marriage age was governed by a blend of the Great Qing Legal Code (Daqing Luli) and established Confucian rituals.
Legal Marriage Age
According to the Universal Etiquette of the Qing Dynasty (Daqing Tongli), the legal minimum age for marriage was set at:
- Men: 16 years old
- Women: 14 years old
These ages represented the point at which individuals were considered physically and socially mature enough to sustain a household.
It boils down to a brutal race against the clock. When survival is the goal, starting a family at 14 or 16 wasn’t “early”—it was necessary. The reasons are as follows.
- Short Life Expectancy
In the Qing Dynasty, the average life expectancy hovered between 22 and 35 years. High infant mortality and disease meant families needed to start early to ensure at least one or two children survived to adulthood to support the parents in old age.
- Labor and “Human Capital”
Ancient China was an agrarian society where labor was the primary currency.
- For the State: More households meant more taxpayers and soldiers.
- For the Family: A new daughter-in-law provided immediate domestic labor, and her children provided future field labor. Waiting until age 25 to marry was seen as “wasting” a decade of productivity.
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Sam Williams On TYMIMA Chapter 152