Qing dynasty

Hong Taiji proclaims the Great Qing empire at Mukden

Before sunrise, officials from three constituencies rode out of Mukden, took their places by rank, and watched their khan step into the position reserved for an emperor.

The eleventh day of the fourth lunar month

On the eleventh day of the fourth lunar month of 1636 — May in the modern calendar — Hong Taiji formally assumed the title of emperor and proclaimed the Qing empire at Mukden, the existing Manchu capital.

At dawn he led Manchu, Mongol, and Chinese officials from the palace out to the suburban Altar of Heaven and Earth, where the participants were arranged by rank.

Three sticks of incense, nine prostrations

Hong Taiji took the altar's central position, made the offerings, and read a prepared declaration addressed to Heaven.

The offerings were three sticks of incense, three bolts of silk, and three offerings of wine. Each presentation was followed by three genuflections and nine prostrations.

What changed, and what was already true

The proclamation replaced the polity's Jin-associated identity with Da Qing, or Daicing, and publicly turned its khan into an emperor presiding over a multiethnic imperial order. It followed the 1635 collapse of the Chahar Mongol polity, whose submission brought with it a purported Yuan imperial seal — an object whose origin, authenticity, and legitimating force specialists still contest.

Mukden was not chosen as capital that year. Nurhaci had captured Shenyang and Liaoyang in 1621 and moved the capital to Shenyang in 1625.

And the empire proclaimed in 1636 did not yet hold China: the Qing took Beijing only in 1644.

Sources

Researched 23 Aug 2026 7 sources not yet audited Date corrected

How this was checked

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Date corrected. The research places this at 1636-05.

What the sources leave uncertain

The scholarly sources give the exact traditional date and identify its Gregorian month as May 1636; the sheet therefore uses month precision rather than relying on an unsourced day conversion.
The precise origin and authenticity of the purported Yuan or Mongol imperial seal—and how much legitimacy it actually conferred—remain contested by specialists.