Zhu Yuanzhang (the Hongwu Emperor) establishes the Ming dynasty, setting the political and legal framework in which household servitude (nubi) and other forms of coerced labor operated.
The Great Ming Code (Da Ming lü)—the core legal code of the Ming—reaches its final form. It became a foundational reference for later Qing law, shaping how household status and coercive relations were defined and adjudicated.
The Ming collapse and the Qing conquest of Beijing marks a major transition in institutions of bondage, including the expansion of Banner-based servitude and the reworking of Ming legal categories under a new ruling house.
An imperial edict organizes what would become the Qing Imperial Household Department (Neiwufu) into the “Thirteen Yamen,” reflecting the centrality of court administration staffed through bondservant (baoyi/booi) structures.
Qing authorities issue the first major edict initiating the Great Clearance, forcibly depopulating coastal regions to counter anti-Qing maritime resistance—an episode that produced large-scale compelled relocation and labor dislocation.
The Thirteen Yamen are abolished and the Imperial Household Department (Neiwufu) is re-established, consolidating palace administration that relied heavily on booi/baoyi (bondservants) for staffing and control.
The Qing lifts the coastal evacuation ban in many areas (after petitions by provincial officials), allowing some displaced populations to return—though impacts persisted for years and the broader depopulation policy extended through the 1680s in different forms.
Following Qing victory over the Taiwan-based Kingdom of Tungning (including the Battle of Penghu/Pescadores), the long coastal depopulation campaign associated with the Great Clearance reaches its conclusion, reshaping coastal settlement and labor patterns.
The Yongzheng Emperor’s reign begins (1722–1735), a period often associated with intensified state capacity and reforms that also touched Banner households and the governance of servile statuses within Qing institutions.
Early Yongzheng-era policies (and later Qianlong extensions) addressed Banner livelihood pressures and population composition, including measures that pushed certain Han Banner affiliates out of Banner registers—intersecting with the governance of dependent and servile households tied to the Banner order.
In Qianlong 7, the Qing court orders an “exodus” of many post-conquest Han Army Banner members from the Banner system—part of broader mid-Qing restructuring that affected Banner-linked dependency and service arrangements.
The Qing launches the Late Qing Reforms (Xinzheng/New Policies)—a broad modernization program that included legal and institutional restructuring and created the setting for explicit anti-trafficking and anti-slave-trade ordinances.
Legal reformers draft an ordinance commonly rendered as the Prohibition of Buying and Selling Human Beings (1909), aiming to criminalize transactions in persons and eliminate “slave” as a formal legal category in the new legal language.
An imperial rescript dated 1910-01-31 is issued by the Qing court, presented as an empire-wide abolition of slavery and linked to New Policies legal modernization and international “civilized nation” standards.
The Imperial Edict of Abdication ends Qing imperial rule. Post-1912 governments inherited late-Qing legal reforms and continued grappling with coerced domestic servitude and trafficking under new criminal-law frameworks.
Bonded Labor, Servitude, and Slavery in Ming–Qing China (1368–1912)
