LEE SS
Researcher, Mythology Research Center of Yonsei Institute for Sinology, Republic of Korea

This paper examines the fruit production and ritual offering system of the Manchu imperial household in the Qing dynasty, thereby exploring one aspect of Qing imperial ritual and material resource management. Across different cultural contexts, fruit has long been regarded as a gift of nature or as a pure offering presented to deities and ancestors. Seasonal fruit, in particular, occupied an important place in rituals such as sacrifices to Heaven, sacrifices to deities, and ancestral rites, owing to its freshness and seasonality.
     The Manchus who founded the Qing dynasty likewise used seasonal fruit as offerings in rituals dedicated to Heaven, deities, and ancestors. Within the Qing imperial household, fruit was certainly a precious food consumed in the daily life of the imperial family. Yet its more important significance lay in its role as an offering required for imperial sacrifices. In early tribal society, the Manchus had relied primarily on gathering wild fruits from mountains and forests. However, after occupying the agrarian regions of Liaodong and subsequently moving the capital to Beijing, the Qing imperial household gradually established a fruit production system based on imperial orchards(tubihe i yafan).
      In these imperial orchards established in Shengjing (Mukden), Guangning, Zhili, and other regions, orchard workers(yafan i haha) were assigned to cultivate fruit on a relatively large scale. The varieties included peaches (toro), plums (foyoro), apricots (guilehe), cherries (ingtu), grapes (mucu), pears (xulhe), hawthorns (umpu), dwarf flowering cherries (uli), and bird cherries (yengge), among others. The fruit produced in this way was supplied for various imperial sacrifices and ritual activities. This shows that fruit production in the Qing imperial household was not merely a matter of food supply, but rather a distinctive mode of material resource management that integrated Manchu subsistence traditions, agrarian forms of production, and the Qing imperial ritual system.

Keywords: Manchu, imperial ritual, Office of Ceremonial Affairs (掌儀司), fruit offerings, orchards, gardeners