Editing Kowtow (section)

== Diplomacy ==
[[File:The frontispiece of an anonymous critique of the Amherst embassy.jpg|thumb|Mandarins perform a kowtow before an altar as [[William Amherst, 1st Earl Amherst|Earl Amherst]] and other members of the failed 1816 Amherst Embassy kneel. ]]
The word "kowtow" came into English in the early 19th century to describe the bow itself, but its meaning soon shifted to describe any abject submission or groveling. The term is still commonly used in English with this meaning, disconnected from the physical act and the East Asian context.{{NoteTag|Formerly, historians illustrated the abjectness of kowtowing by claiming that diplomats, such as the British [[George Macartney, 1st Earl Macartney]] (1793) and [[William Pitt Amherst, 1st Earl Amherst]] (1816), refused submission before the [[Emperor of China|Emperor]], causing their visits' failure. However, as Stephen Platt has demonstrated, this oft-told tale about kowtowing does not bear itself out in the primary sources.<ref>{{cite book|author-first1=Stephen R. |author-last1=Platt|title=Imperial Twilight: the Opium War and the End of China's Last Golden Age|location=New York|publisher=Knopf|year=2018|pages=166–173|ISBN=9780307961730}}</ref>}}

Dutch ambassador [[Isaac Titsingh]] did not refuse to kowtow during the course of his 1794–1795 mission to the imperial court of the [[Qianlong Emperor]].<ref>van Braam Houckgeest, Andreas Everardus. (1798). [http://ebook.lib.hku.hk/CTWE/B2962471X/ ''An authentic account of the embassy of the Dutch East-India company, to the court of the emperor of China, in the years 1794 and 1795'']. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090215094026/http://ebook.lib.hku.hk/CTWE/B2962471X/ |date=15 February 2009 }}. Vol. I (English edition). pp. 285 in original (p. 335 of pp. 339 in digitized format).</ref> The members of the Titsingh mission, including [[Andreas Everardus van Braam Houckgeest]] and [[Chrétien-Louis-Joseph de Guignes]], made every effort to conform with the demands of the complex Imperial court etiquette.

The Qing courts gave bitter feedback to the [[Afghanistan|Afghan]] emir [[Ahmad Shah Abdali|Ahmad Shah]] when its Afghan envoy, presenting four splendid horses to Qianlong in 1763, refused to perform the kowtow. This was likely a result of the Islamic prohibition on performing [[Sujud]] before any except God. Coming amid tense relations between the Qing and [[Durrani Empire|Durrani]] empires, Chinese officials forbade the Afghans from sending envoys to Beijing in the future.<ref name="Newby">{{Cite book|first=L. J. |last=Newby|title=The Empire And the Khanate: A Political History of Qing Relations With Khoqand C1760–1860|date=2005|isbn=978-9004145504|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KTmO416hNQ8C|publisher=Brill}}</ref>

On two occasions, the kowtow was performed by Chinese envoys to a foreign ruler – specifically the Russian Tsar. T'o-Shih, Qing emissary to Russia whose mission to Moscow took place in 1731, kowtowed before Tsarina [[Anna of Russia|Anna]], as per instructions by the [[Yongzheng Emperor]], as did Desin, who led another mission the next year to the new Russian capital at St. Petersburg.<ref>Hsu, Immunel C.-Y. (1999), ''The Rise of Modern China'', New York, Oxford University Press, pp. 115–118.</ref> Hsu notes that the [[Kangxi Emperor]], Yongzheng's predecessor, explicitly ordered that Russia be given a special status in Qing foreign relations by not being included among [[tributary states]], i.e. recognition as an implicit equal of China.

The kowtow was often performed in intra-Asian diplomatic relations as well. In 1636, after being defeated by the invading Manchus, King Injo of Joseon (Korea) was forced to surrender by kowtowing three times to pledge tributary status to the Qing Emperor, Hong Taiji. As was customary of all Asian envoys to Qing China, Joseon envoys kowtowed three times to the Qing emperor during their visits to China, continuing until 1896, when the [[Korean Empire]] withdrew its tributary status from Qing as a result of the [[First Sino-Japanese War]].<ref>{{cite book|script-title=zh:仁祖 34卷, 15年 (1636) 正月30日 |publisher=[[Annals of Joseon Dynasty]]|language=zh|script-quote=zh:龍胡入報, 出傳汗言曰: "前日之事, 欲言則長矣。 今能勇決而來, 深用喜幸。" 上答曰: "天恩罔極。" 龍胡等引入, 設席於壇下北面, 請上就席, 使淸人臚唱。 上行'''三拜九叩頭禮'''。}}</ref>

The King of the [[Ryukyu Kingdom]] also had to kneel three times on the ground and touch his head nine times to the ground ({{lang|zh|三拜九叩頭禮}}), to show his allegiance to the Chinese emperors.<ref>{{cite book|url=http://www.hi.u-tokyo.ac.jp/personal/tsuruta/sei0005.htm|script-title=zh:重点領域研究「沖縄の歴史情報研究 |trans-title=History Study of Okinawa|script-quote=zh: – 「通航一覧・琉球国部 正編 巻之二十三　琉球国部二十三、唐国往来」"|language=ja}}</ref>