O-êr-t'ai 鄂爾泰 (T. 毅庵, H. 西林) Mar.–Apr., 1680–1745, May 23, official, first Earl Hsiang-ch'in 襄勤伯), was a member of the Silin Gioro clan and belonged to the Manchu Bordered Blue Banner. His great-grandfather, Tumen 圖捫, died in 1631 of wounds received at the battle of Ta-ling-ho (see under Abahai) and was posthumously given the minor hereditary rank of Ch'i-tu-yü. O-êr-t'ai's father, Oboi 鄂拜, served as libationer of the Imperial Academy from 1691 to 1895. O-êr-t'ai learned both Manchu and Chinese and became a chü-jên in 1699. In 1703 he was appointed captain of the company to which his family belonged. In the same year he was made a senior Imperial Bodyguard of the third rank; but owing to his knowledge of Chinese was promoted, in 1716, to the post of an assistant department director of the Imperial Household. In this post he became known for his strict observance of custom, and once declined a summons he received from Yin-chên [q. v.], then a prince, for a private interview. After the latter ascended the throne, he appointed O-êr-t'ai an examiner in the Yunnan provincial examination. Soon after the latter returned from Yunnan he was made financial commissioner of Kiangsu, a post in which he greatly encouraged the work of the local students. He edited their best essays and poems, including some of his own, in a collection, entitled 南邦黎獻集 Nan-pang li-hsien chi, 16 chüan, printed in 1725.
In 1725 O-êr-t'ai was promoted to the governorship of Kwangsi, but when he went to Peking for preliminary instructions he was appointed instead governor of Yunnan, and acting governor-general of Yunnan and Kweichow. In March 1726 he arrived in Yunnan and at once attacked the problems confronting him, namely, disaffection among the aborigines and reform of provincial finances. The aborigines of that region, known in general as Miao, but also by other tribal names, were ruled by chieftains who had been recognized officially as hereditary administrators. Often, however, they gave concern to the authorities. O-êr-t'ai's policy, known as kai-t'u kuei-liu 改土歸流 was to abolish the hereditary chieftainships and to govern the tribes as part of the provincial administrative system. He first applied his policy to the aborigines of Kuang-shun, Kweichow, who were pacified in 1726, and their hereditary chieftainships abolished. He went to Kweichow to conduct in person the trial of the insurgent chieftains, and in November 1726 was made governor-general of Yunnan and Kweichow. Meanwhile the chieftains at Wu-mêng and Chên-hsiung in southeastern Szechwan, apprehensive of their fate, became restive. On his way back to Yunnan O-êr-t'ai cooperated with Yüeh Chung-ch'i [q. v.], governor-general of Szechwan, in forcing these chieftains to surrender. By 1727 their territory was pacified and jurisdiction was transferred to Yunnan. For this achievement O-êr-t'ai was awarded the minor hereditary rank of Ch'i tu-yü and later in the same year, for pacifying 184 groups of Miao tribesmen in the Ch'ang-chai region, Kweichow, he was elevated to the hereditary rank of Ch'ing-ch'ê tu-yü of the first class. In 1727 there broke out a rebellion of the Ch'ê-li and other tribes in southwestern Yunnan. That region was likewise stabilized (1728) and most of the land which was subject to an hereditary chieftain with the clan name, Tiao 刁, was organized into a prefecture called P'u-êr (1729).
After capturing several rebellious chieftains (1728) of the Tung-ch'uan region, O-êr-t'ai was made governor-general also of the province of Kwangsi where aborigines on the border of Kweichow had rebelled. Placed thus in control of three provinces, he was determined to put an end to trouble with the aborigines by appeasing the tribes that submitted and subduing by force those that resisted. In 1729 his rank was raised to an hereditary baron of the third class. Meanwhile, with the help of Chang Kuang-ssŭ [q. v.], he succeeded in pacifying many Miao in the Ku-chou region, Kweichow, and for this was given the title of Junior Guardian. He made it a fixed policy to confiscate, whenever possible, the land of the aboriginal chiefs. Those chiefs who offered resistance were executed or banished and the rest were either allowed to remain with an annual stipend or were shifted to other provinces. Several local uprisings were quickly extinguished, the most serious being that at Wu-mêng in 1730 (see under Ha Yüan-shêng). Thus during his term of office of more then six years in Yunnan, O-êr-t'ai succeeded in reducing the power of the aboriginal chiefs and in greatly extending the taxable lands of the state.
Other achievements of O-êr-t'ai in Yunnan included reforms in the salt and copper-mining industries, and reorganization of the mints so that they yielded substantial profits. Early in 1732 he was summoned to Peking and was made a Grand Secretary, and concurrently president of the Board of War and Grand Councillor.
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