The Last New Year in Bianjing

The first day of the lunar new year in 1127 should have been Bianjing’s most joyous celebration. In previous years, the capital’s Kaifeng prefecture permitted three days of citywide revelry during the Spring Festival. Officials and commoners alike would visit each other’s homes from morning onward, while streets overflowed with food, fruits, and gifts. People sang, danced, and played games to welcome the new year.

Special commercial districts like Maxing, Panlou Street, and areas outside the city gates transformed into vibrant marketplaces under colorful canopies displaying festive goods – hair ornaments, pearls, jade accessories, clothing, flowers, embroidered collars, boots, shoes, and curios. Evening gatherings featured gambling, games, and banquets where even women attended in splendid attire. Even the poorest citizens wore clean clothes to share drinks and laughter.

The imperial court traditionally hosted the grand New Year’s audience in the Great Celebration Hall, where the emperor sat flanked by four towering soldiers known as “Palace Guardian Generals.” Foreign envoys, officials, scholars, and representatives from regional governments across the empire would present tribute gifts.

But this year, celebrations felt hollow. Emperor Qinzong performed only a simple ceremony at his father’s retired residence in Yanfu Palace before dispatching envoys to the Jin military camp with New Year’s greetings. The Jin commanders reciprocated by sending twenty-one men to worship at the Grand Xiangguo Temple – their second visit within four days.

A Capital Under Siege

The Jin forces displayed unexpected fascination with Han customs, particularly the Lantern Festival preparations that typically began after winter solstice. By the seventh day of the first lunar month, Bianjing normally transformed into a luminous nightscape with lantern displays lasting five days from the fifteenth. This year, the Jin demanded these decorations as tribute by the ninth day. Kaifeng officials hastily dismantled lantern displays outside Jinglong Gate and later stripped temples, monasteries, and shops citywide to satisfy the invaders.

The Jin decorated their camps with these plundered lanterns, even permitting city residents to view the spectacle from the walls on the fourteenth – normally forbidden territory under military occupation. These cultural exchanges created false hope that the Jin might withdraw after securing territories north of the Yellow River and war reparations.

The Emperor’s Fateful Decision

On the eighth day, the Jin commanders made a sudden demand: Emperor Qinzong must leave the city again – this time to bestow an honorific title upon the Jin emperor. The Song court initially resisted, but Qinzong ultimately declared: “As ruler, I cannot seek personal comfort. If my suffering can spare my people hardship, I will not begrudge my body.”

On the tenth morning, the emperor departed through Nanxun Gate with minimal fanfare, leaving Crown Prince to oversee the capital with secret instructions to key ministers. Commoners who learned of his departure clung to the imperial carriage, begging him to stay. When guards failed to disperse the crowd, commander Fan Qiong severed fingers and killed several protesters to clear the path.

The Captive Monarch

Emperor Qinzong was confined to a sparse three-room building in Qingcheng’s fasting palace, sleeping on an earthen bed with only a military mat for comfort. His quarters were encircled by iron chains. Sensing impending doom, the emperor secretly ordered officials to protect the crown prince and instructed northern commanders to defend Song territory independently.

By the eleventh day, only nine officials remained with the captive emperor as negotiations continued. The Jin commanders grew increasingly frustrated with unmet demands – incomplete territorial transfers in Hebei and Shanxi, insufficient war reparations, and growing disorder in the capital. Their solution: permanent removal of the Song imperial family.

The Systematic Dismantling of a Dynasty

From the twenty-fifth day onward, the Jin methodically stripped the Song of its cultural and political essence:

– Imperial regalia including jade tablets, carriages, and crowns
– Six hundred young girls and hundreds of court musicians/artisans
– Former imperial concubines and entertainers
– Ritual objects for state ceremonies
– Government officials and their families to staff the Jin bureaucracy
– Precious materials like rhinoceros horn, ivory, jade, and medicinal stones
– Books and printing blocks from the Imperial Academy
– Astronomical instruments and musical devices
– Buddhist and Daoist scriptures with their printing plates

The human cost became unbearable as women were priced like commodities – palace women worth 500 silver ingots, singers 200, commoners 100. Streets echoed with wailing as families were torn apart.

The Final Humiliation

On the fifth day of the second month, during what should have been a friendly polo match, Jin commanders received the long-awaited edict from their emperor: the formal deposition of Emperor Qinzong. When informed of his dethronement, the emperor’s official Li Ruoshui clung to him, screaming: “This is the true Son of Heaven! You dog-slaughtering villains show no respect!” Li was later beaten to death for his defiance – the only Song official to die for his loyalty.

The Jin systematically removed the entire imperial clan from Bianjing:

– The retired emperor and empress on the seventh
– Three thousand princes, princesses, and their spouses on the eighth
– Remaining imperial relatives on the ninth
– The empress and crown prince on the eleventh

Commoners watched in horror as their rulers were led away. When two citizens dared question a prince about abandoning his people, Fan Qiong had them executed.

Legacy of the Jingkang Catastrophe

The Jin ultimately installed a puppet ruler, Zhang Bangchang, to govern what remained of the Northern Song territories. The captured imperial family endured brutal treatment during their forced march north – many women became concubines for Jin nobility, while male prisoners faced humiliation and early deaths.

This catastrophe, known as the Jingkang Incident, marked the end of the Northern Song dynasty after 167 years. It stands as one of China’s most traumatic historical moments – a cautionary tale about military weakness, diplomatic miscalculation, and the fragility of civilization before brute force. The event’s memory would fuel Southern Song revanchism for generations while demonstrating the high cost of failed leadership in times of national crisis.