A Departure from Buddhism

The Qing imperial necklaces demonstrate a dramatic departure from the Buddhist practice, almost deforming the prayer beads in the process. Reminder beads that are supposed to sit neatly at the beginning/end point of the string have been scattered along its sides, there are four larger beads that interrupt the counting flow during recitation, a lengthy back cloud string is present which disturbs the balance as the string is being held during recitation; all in all, these beads are not suited to serve as a counting aid while reciting.

At the Qing court, they did not serve as a ritual implement, but rather as a stratified symbol of rank. Still, they clearly find their origin in Buddhist prayer beads, and we have not yet answered the question posed at the beginning: how did they end up as a required piece in Qing official dress regulations?

In the early days of the Qing dynasty, Buddhism was a mighty political force in East Asia. The first Qing emperor Hung Taiji (r. 1636-1643) had built alliances with many largely Buddhist Mongol tribes. So it was that distant Manchuria became aligned with one side in the Tibetan civil wars between two Buddhist schools and their military backers. The Mongol allies of Hung Taiji were aligned with the Gelugpa school, who emerged as victors in this war in 1642. Their highest religious figure, the Dalai Lama, became ruler of all Tibet. The Manchus were still at war with the Ming and in dire need of support of their Mongol allies. Favor with the Dalai Lama, now an even more influential figure to the Mongols, was crucial.[cf, p 122-7] [cf, ch 7, 8]

In 1643, the Dalai Lama made a gift of prayer beads to the new Shunzhi emperor (順治; Ma. ijishvn dasan r. 1643-1661) [cf, p 68]. Gifting prayer beads was a practice with a long history, especially in cases of monks presenting gifts to rulers.[cf, p 131-2] From this point, the Qing incorporated the necklace gradually into their official dress code, finally including it into the Collected Statutes (huidian 會典) in 1763 [cf, (6) p 103] Additional evidence for a Tibetan origin of the Qing imperial necklaces is offered by the strangely dislodged reminders. A uniquely Tibetan feature of some prayer beads is that the reminders have also been moved to the side of the mother bead [cf, p 137]. See for an example the picture above.

Despite the gradual loss of its Buddhist functions, the prayer beads that were introduced into the Qing dynasty took on a new life, serving to indicate rank, serving as a discreet calculator and as a cumbersome, heavy hindrance at official occasions. It was no surprise either that the necklace was so readily adopted as a Qing attribute. There are eye witness reports of Nurhaci, Hung Taiji’s predecessor and father, and his high officials making use of prayer beads:

He often sat with prayer beads in his hand, counting them. His commanders, on the other hand, would wear a piece of cloth around their necks, and from the end of this piece of cloth they would suspend prayer beads and count them.[cf, (72) p 175]

Besides, the connection to Buddhism was never lost entirely through terms as ‘head of Buddha,’‘stūpa bead’ and the number of beads, 108. Yet, it was stylized and codified by the Qing, made into their own and imbued with Manchu, Tibetan Buddhist, and Chinese symbolism; a true product of the multi-ethnic Qing dynasty.