Imperial Woman PDF Download

Author: Pearl Sydenstricker Buck
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : China
Languages : en
Pages : 394

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Book Description
Fictionized biography of Tzu-hsi, the last empress of China, who was known as "Old Buddha."

Author: Pearl S. Buck
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1480421189
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 572

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Book Description
From the Nobel Prize–winning author of The Good Earth: the New York Times–bestselling biography of Tzu Hsi, the concubine who became China’s last empress. In Imperial Woman, Pearl S. Buck brings to life the amazing story of Tzu Hsi, who rose from concubine status to become the working head of the Qing Dynasty. Born from a humble background, Tzu Hsi falls in love with her cousin Jung Lu, a handsome guard—but while still a teenager she is selected, along with her sister and hundreds of other girls, for relocation to the Forbidden City. Already set apart on account of her beauty, she’s determined to be the emperor’s favorite, and devotes all of her talent and cunning to the task. When the emperor dies, she finds herself in a role of supreme power, one she’ll command for nearly fifty years. Much has been written about Tzu Hsi, but no other novel recreates her life—the extraordinary personality, together with the world of court intrigue and the period of national turmoil with which she dealt—as well as Imperial Woman. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Pearl S. Buck including rare images from the author’s estate.

Author: S.E. Wood
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004351280
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 501

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Book Description
From the end of the Roman Republic to the death of the last Julio-Claudian emperor, portraits of women - on coins, public monuments, and private luxury objects - became an increasingly familiar sight throughout the empire. These women usually represented the distinguished bloodlines of the head of the state, or his hopes for succession, but in every case, their images were freighted with political significance. These objects also communicated social messages about the appropriate roles, behavior, and self-presentation of women. This volume traces the emergence and development of the public female portrait, from Octavia, the first Roman woman to be represented in propria persona on coinage, to the formidable and ambitious Agrippina the Younger, whose assassination demonstrated to later women the limits of official power they could demand.

Author: Yi-Li Wu
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520947614
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 378

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Book Description
This innovative book uses the lens of cultural history to examine the development of medicine in Qing dynasty China. Focusing on the specialty of "medicine for women"(fuke), Yi-Li Wu explores the material and ideological issues associated with childbearing in the late imperial period. She draws on a rich array of medical writings that circulated in seventeenth- to nineteenth-century China to analyze the points of convergence and contention that shaped people's views of women's reproductive diseases. These points of contention touched on fundamental issues: How different were women's bodies from men's? What drugs were best for promoting conception and preventing miscarriage? Was childbirth inherently dangerous? And who was best qualified to judge? Wu shows that late imperial medicine approached these questions with a new, positive perspective.

Author: Mary T. Boatwright
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0197567037
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 405

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Book Description
The Imperial Women of Rome explores the constraints and activities of the women who were part of Rome's imperial families from 35 BCE to 235 CE, the Roman principate. Boatwright uses coins, inscriptions, papyri, material culture, and archaeology, as well as the more familiar but biased ancient authors, to depict change and continuity in imperial women's pursuits and representations over time. Focused vignettes open each thematic chapter, emphasizing imperial women as individuals and their central yet marginalized position in the principate. Evaluating historical contingency and personal agency, the book assesses its subjects in relation to distinct Roman structures rather than as a series of biographies. Rome's imperial women allow us to probe the meanings of the emperor's authority and power; Roman law; the Roman family; Roman religion and imperial cult; imperial presence in the city of Rome; statues and exemplarity; and the military and communications. The book is richly illustrated and offers detailed information in tables and appendices, including one for the life events of the imperial women discussed in the text. Considered over time and as a whole, Livia, the Agrippinas and Faustinas, Julia Domna, and others closely connected to Rome's emperors enrich our understanding of Roman history and offer glimpses of fascinating and demanding lives.

Author: Susan E. Wood
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9789004119505
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 508

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Book Description
Portraits of women -- on coins, public monuments, and private luxury objects --became an increasingly familiar sight throughout the Roman Empire. These portraits, always freighted with political significance, communicated social messages about the appropriate roles, behavior, and self-presentation of women. This book traces the emergence and development of the public female portrait, from Octavia, the first Roman woman to be represented on coinage, to the formidable and ambitious Agrippina the Younger, whose assassination demonstrated to later women the limits of official power they could demand.

Author: Keith McMahon
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN: 1442222905
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
Chinese emperors guaranteed male successors by taking multiple wives, in some cases hundreds and even thousands. Women Shall Not Rule offers a fascinating history of imperial wives and concubines, especially in light of the greatest challenges to polygamous harmony—rivalry between women and their attempts to engage in politics. Besides ambitious empresses and concubines, these vivid stories of the imperial polygamous family are also populated with prolific emperors, wanton women, libertine men, cunning eunuchs, and bizarre cases of intrigue and scandal among rival wives. Keith McMahon, a leading expert on the history of gender in China, draws upon decades of research to describe the values and ideals of imperial polygamy and the ways in which it worked and did not work in real life. His rich sources are both historical and fictional, including poetic accounts and sensational stories told in pornographic detail. Displaying rare historical breadth, his lively and fascinating study will be invaluable as a comprehensive and authoritative resource for all readers interested in the domestic life of royal palaces across the world.

Author: Barbara Hill
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317884655
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 218

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Book Description
This book will be essential reading for anyone studying Byzantine history in this period. It ranges in time from the death of the emperor Basil II in 1025 to the sacking of the city of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusaders in 1204, spanning the rise and fall of the successful Komnenos dynasty. Eleventh-century Byzantine history is unusual in that imperial women were able to wield immense power and in this ground-breaking book Dr Hill explores why this was possible and, equally, why they lost their position of influence a century later.

Author: Mary Taliaferro Boatwright
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190455896
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 405

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Book Description
Using all available sources, Boatwright explores the constraints and activities of the women of Rome's imperial families from 35 BCE to 235 CE. Livia, Agrippina the Younger, Julia Domna, and others feature in this richly illustrated investigation of change, continuity, historical contingency, and personal agency in imperial women's pursuits and representations.

Author: Anchee Min
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1408828995
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 402

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Book Description
'Vivid and entertaining ... this is history as it plays upon the emotions. Empires crumble, hearts are broken' THE TIMES From the bestselling author of Red Azalea comes the much-anticipated sequel to Empress Orchid At the end of the nineteenth century China is rocked by foreign attacks and local rebellions. The only constant is the power wielded by one woman, Tzu Hsi, also known as Empress Orchid, who must face the perilous condition of her empire and devastating personal losses. In this sequel to the bestselling Empress Orchid, Anchee Min brings to life one of the most important figures in Chinese history, a very human leader who sacrifices all she has to protect both those she loves and her doomed empire.