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accumulation of human waste in living spaces and by limiting the pro-
longed face-to-face contact through which the disease generally spreads.
Once settled, however, people become more vulnerable, often, as in the
case of seven Liaodong banner villages in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries, in direct proportion to their numbers. Overall, a number of
social and ecological factors influence microbe and host, both of which
may exhibit consequent change over a range of time scales from seasonal
to evolutionary, that condition epidemics historically. Thus, an outbreak
of“Qing”smallpox would not necessarily involve a microbe strain of the
same virulence as a“Ming” outbreak.^23 Some of these factors also
contribute to the development of differential resistance.
As Chia-feng Chang explains in detail, Qing authorities carefully regu-
lated interactions between groups with differential resistance. Immunized,
mainly Han carriers resident south of the Great Wall posed a threat to
those Mongols and Manchus who came from populations resident to the
north who had never been adequately exposed to acquire sufficient
immunization. There was, of course, not such a neat divide in practice.
Some indigenous peoples of the lower SAH, for example, would not
venture even as far south as Ilan Hala in Jilin to present their pelt tribute
in epidemic years such as 1825. Even before the Qing conquest diplomatic
activities, including audiences, sable tribute, and embassies, could be
hindered by the participation of individuals who had not yet been
infected. The Manchus accordingly made a further distinction between
people north of the Great Wall who had survived smallpox, and were
therefore immune (“cooked bodies”;shu shen), and those who had not
yet contracted it (“raw bodies”;sheng shen). Hong Taiji cited the vulner-
ability of his own raw body to avoid an audience in 1638 during an
outbreak in his realm.^24
Already in the 1650 s smallpox had become associated with
“contamination”from Han people in an urban environment. In culturally
relativist terms, it was a“Han”disease. Such perceptions not only helped
to reinforce human difference but also began to label postconquest popu-
lations in terms of their residence north or south of the Great Wall
regardless of any other factors uniting a group across this boundary. So,
for example, a 1726 regulation on hunting parties referred to susceptible
Chakhar Mongols as those who“had not broken out in smallpox”(wei
chudou). It made separate provision for their variolation to permit them
to mix with“the banner people of China proper,”a general reference
including Manchus and Mongols.^25 This is one example of intraethnic
division arising from Inner Asian diaspora south of the Great Wall that
The Nature of Imperial Indigenism in Southwestern Yunnan 177
