This Week in China’s History: The Battle of Sarhu

April 14, 1619

In the spring of 1619, the court of the Ming Wanli Emperor faced a dilemma: how to teach a lesson to one of its vassals who had gone rogue. This was not a new problem. For nearly a decade, the emperor and his ministers had been searching for a solution to this growing problem on their northern border, a problem that had a name: Nurhaci.