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Boxer Rebellion

The Boxer Rebellion, also known as the Boxer Uprising, the Boxer Insurrection, or the Yihetuan Movement, was an anti-foreign, anti-imperialist, and anti-Christian uprising in North China between 1899 and 1901, towards the end of the Qing dynasty, by the Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists, a group known as the "Boxers" in English due to many of its members having practised Chinese martial arts, which at the time were referred to as "Chinese boxing". It was defeated by the Eight-Nation Alliance of foreign powers.

For the rock band from London, see The Boxer Rebellion (band).

Boxer Rebellion

義和團運動

义和团运动

Militia united in righteousness movement

Yìhétuán yùndòng

Yìhétuán yùndòng

ㄧˋ ㄏㄜˊ ㄊㄨㄢˊ ㄩㄣˋ ㄉㄨㄥˋ

I4-ho2-t'uan2 yün4-tung4

Yì-hé-tuán yùn-dòng

ᠴᡳᠣᠸᠠᠨ
ᠰᡝᡵᡝ
ᡝᡥᡝ
ᡥᡡᠯᡥᠠ ᡳ
ᡶᠠᠴᡠᡥᡡᠨ

ciowan sere ehe hūlha i facuhūn

After the Sino-Japanese War of 1895, villagers in North China feared the expansion of foreign spheres of influence and resented the extension of privileges to Christian missionaries, who used them to shield their followers. In 1898, North China experienced several natural disasters, including the Yellow River flooding and droughts, which Boxers blamed on foreign and Christian influence. Beginning in 1899, the movement spread across Shandong and the North China Plain, destroying foreign property such as railroads, and attacking or murdering Christian missionaries and Chinese Christians. The events came to a head in June 1900, when Boxer fighters, convinced they were invulnerable to foreign weapons, converged on Beijing with the slogan "Support the Qing government and exterminate the foreigners."


Diplomats, missionaries, soldiers, and some Chinese Christians took refuge in the Legation Quarter, which the Boxers besieged. The Eight-Nation Alliance comprising American, Austro-Hungarian, British, French, German, Italian, Japanese, and Russian troops – moved into China to lift the siege and on 17 June stormed the Dagu Fort at Tianjin. Empress Dowager Cixi, who had initially been hesitant, supported the Boxers and on 21 June issued an imperial decree that was a de facto declaration of war on the invading powers. Chinese officialdom was split between those supporting the Boxers and those favouring conciliation, led by Prince Qing. The supreme commander of the Chinese forces, the Manchu general Ronglu, later claimed he acted to protect the foreigners. Officials in the southern provinces ignored the imperial order to fight against foreigners.


The Eight-Nation Alliance, after initially being turned back by the Imperial Chinese military and Boxer militia, brought 20,000 armed troops to China. They defeated the Imperial Army in Tianjin and arrived in Beijing on 14 August, relieving the 55-day Siege of the International Legations. Fighting over the capital and the surrounding countryside ensued, along with summary execution of those suspected of being Boxers in retribution. The Boxer Protocol of 7 September 1901 provided for the execution of government officials who had supported the Boxers, for foreign troops to be stationed in Beijing, and for 450 million taels of silver—more than the government's annual tax revenue—to be paid as indemnity over the course of the next 39 years to the eight invading nations. The Qing dynasty's handling of the Boxer Rebellion further weakened their control over China, and led to major governmental reforms.

In the Polish play by Stanisław Wyspiański, first published on 16 March 1901, even before the rebellion was finally crushed, the character of Czepiec asks the journalist (dziennikarz) one of the best-known questions in the history of Polish literature: "Cóż tam, panie, w polityce? Chińczyki trzymają się mocno!?" ('How are things in politics, Mister? Are the Chinese holding out firmly!?').[207]

The Wedding

The Travels of Lao Can[208] sympathetically shows an honest official trying to carry out reforms and depicts the Boxers as sectarian rebels.

Liu E

The 1963 film directed by Nicholas Ray and starring Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner, and David Niven.[209]

55 Days at Peking

In 1975, Hong Kong's studio produced the film Boxer Rebellion (Chinese: 八國聯軍; pinyin: bāguó liánjūn; Wade–Giles: Pa Kuo lien chun; lit. 'Eight-Nation Allied Army') under director Chang Cheh.[210]

Shaw Brothers

(Boston, 2007), by Anchee Min, describes the long reign of the Empress Dowager Cixi in which the siege of the legations is one of the climactic events in the novel.

The Last Empress

's Sandalwood Death, a novel told from the viewpoint of villagers during the Boxer Uprising.[211]

Mo Yan

By 1900, many new forms of media had matured, including illustrated newspapers and magazines, postcards, broadsides, and advertisements, all of which presented images of the Boxers and the invading armies.[205] The rebellion was covered in the foreign illustrated press by artists and photographers. Paintings and prints were also published including Japanese woodblocks.[206] In the following decades, the Boxers were a constant subject of comment. A sampling includes:

Further reading[edit]

General accounts and analysis[edit]

In addition to those used in the notes and listed under References, general accounts can be found in such textbooks as Keith Schoppa's Revolution and Its Past, p. 118–123.

William & Mary News Story, 3 January 2005.

Lost in the Gobi Desert: Hart retraces great-grandfather's footsteps

September 1900 San Francisco Newspaper

200 Photographs in Library of Congress online Collection

at IMDb

55 Days at Peking

at IMDb

Ba guo lian jun

University of Washington Library's Digital Collections – Robert Henry Chandless Photographs

Proceedings of the Tenth Universal Peace Congress, 1901

from the Caldwell Kvaran archives

Pictures from the Siege of Peking

Archived 14 August 2014 at the Wayback Machine, an excerpt of Pierre Loti's Les Derniers Jours de Pékin (1902).

Eyewitness account: When the Allies Entered Peking, 1900

National Museum of the U.S. Navy (Selected Naval Documents).

Documents of the Boxer Rebellion (China Relief Expedition), 1900–1901