Empress Dowager Cixi and her luxurious and unique pleasures made her subjects angry and her servants terrified

When talking about Empress Dowager Cixi, it is impossible not to mention her extravagant and unusual lifestyle. During her reign, Empress Dowager Cixi many times shocked people with fun things that only she dared to do.

Empress Dowager Cixi (November 29, 1835 - November 15, 1908) was the concubine of Thanh Van Tong Ham Phong Emperor, mother of Thanh Muc Tong Dong Tri Emperor. She became Empress Dowager Regent of the Qing court along with Empress Dowager Tu An when King Tung Chih ascended the throne. After Dong Tri passed away, Emperor Thanh Duc Tong Quang Tu ascended the throne, and she continued to be regent.

Empress Dowager Cixi and Empress Dowager Ci An were the only two Empress Dowagers of the Qing Dynasty to perform regency. Among them, Empress Dowager Cixi is mentioned the most, and is also one of the most famous figures in ancient Chinese history.

Not only is she known for her power, people also know how to beautify and preserve beauty. Besides, history has also recorded the luxurious habits and hobbies of this Queen Mother.

Throw m.oney for fun

One of the luxurious pleasures of this Queen Mother that will be remembered forever in later generations is the hobby of "burning" m.oney for fun. To prepare for the fun, Tu Hy will order the servant to take out a chest containing several thousand silver coins.

This amount of m.oney was so much that the eunuchs had to work together to bring it out. The luxury game that Empress Dowager Cixi wanted was to throw m.oney. This was simply to give her the gloating satisfaction of watching other ordinary people have to compete for those coins.

Not simply throwing m.oney on the ground as many people imagine, Empress Dowager Tu Hy's fun is much more "weird" when she likes to throw m.oney on the ice. Accordingly, this powerful woman will sit high up and throw m.oney on the ice at will.

Standing below are not only the palace maids and eunuchs but also the courtiers, futons and concubines. As a member of the royal family, the amount of m.oney they collected was actually not too large, but everyone had to try to s.how their interest to please the Queen Mother.

They stood on all four sides, despite the slippery ice surface, having to rush forward and compete with each other when they were "given" m.oney by their superiors. On that extremely slippery ice surface, just one mistake can cause that person to "snatch a frog". This is what makes Tu Hy excited, seeing the royal women f.ighting over those few silver coins.

The more the people below fought with each other and fell, the happier the Queen Mother was. At the end of each game, it is unknown how much gold has been spent. In exchange for her few smiles, the national treasury had suffered a huge deficit, and people were extremely resentful.

Wear silk socks and foot wash according to the weather

At the time Empress Dowager Cixi was regent, the Chinese custom of foot binding was still popular, but she herself did not follow this custom. On the contrary, the queen mother deeply appreciates her feet. She only wears soft socks made from high-quality white silk, decorated with delicate patterns. Each pair of socks takes 7-8 days to complete, but Empress Dowager Cixi only wears them once. Every year, she spends up to 3,000 workers and 100,000 taels of silver to make socks.

In addition, the foot-washing water reserved for Empress Dowager Cixi must also be extremely special. On h.ot days, her foot-washing water had to be boiled from Hangzhou chrysanthemum flowers. On cold days, use papaya cooked with water to wash your feet. Depending on the weather every day, the servants and physicians in the palace had to change the types of medicinal herbs to bring the most suitable foot-washing water for the queen mother.

The hobby of "tormenting" slaves

Every time the snow in Beijing begins to fall, Empress Dowager Cixi happily thinks of "unique and strange" games while the servants are terrified. Every game in exchange for Tu Hy's laughter is the obsession of so many people.

Empress Dowager Cixi loved ice skating. But that hobby of ice skating is not what we imagine: a person wearing skates and sliding on the ice himself, what Tu Hy likes is pulling a sled.

When the ice has covered the road surface in the Forbidden City to the point that the road is smooth, Tu Hy and the Emperor's concubines and Phuc Tan (wives) of the princes will gather together and begin the experience. This feeling of joy.

They will sit together on sleds and enjoy the feeling of being pulled like flying across the ice. People sitting in the car will be extremely excited when they feel every sound of the wind blowing outside.

But in return, the eunuchs and palace maids were extremely miserable because they had to pull heavy carts on slippery ice. That performance will last at least an hour.

The party was elaborate but extremely scary

Empress Dowager Cixi once treated a delegation from the West in 1874 with a lavish, extremely elaborate and expensive party. The party for 400 guests consumed at least 400 taels of gold with 140 dishes and 1,750 people serving, lasting a week.

The most special thing about this party is the dishes that are both delicious, strange and horrifying, including: ginseng (stomach rat soaked in whole ginseng), pharynx brain (monkey's brain). ), static statue (elephant's essence), royal pig (a precious pig breed), chamois (chamois is a mountain goat, worm is a maggot), peacock egg (peacock's egg)...

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