Official Session in a Chinese Yamen, Guangzhou, before 1889.

Drawing of the Yamen at Shaoxing Fu, Zhejiang Province, 1803.

A yámen (Simplified Chinese: 衙门; Traditional Chinese: 衙門; Hanyu Pinyin: yámén) is any local bureaucrat's, or mandarin's, office and residence of the Chinese Empire. The term has been widely used in China for centuries, but appeared in English during the Qing Dynasty. Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 570 pixelsFull resolution (2210 × 1575 pixel, file size: 330 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Official Session in a Chinese Yamen Guangzhou, before 1889 File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 800 × 570 pixelsFull resolution (2210 × 1575 pixel, file size: 330 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Official Session in a Chinese Yamen Guangzhou, before 1889 File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects... Guangzhou is the capital and the sub-provincial city of Guangdong Province in the southern part of the Peoples Republic of China. ... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 679 × 599 pixelsFull resolution (800 × 706 pixel, file size: 202 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Chinese Yamen at Shaoxingfu, Province Zhejiang Drawing of 1803 File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects... Image File history File links Size of this preview: 679 × 599 pixelsFull resolution (800 × 706 pixel, file size: 202 KB, MIME type: image/jpeg) Chinese Yamen at Shaoxingfu, Province Zhejiang Drawing of 1803 File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects... Shaoxing (Simplified Chinese: 绍兴; Traditional Chinese: 紹興; Pinyin: ShàoxÄ«ng; Wade-Giles: Shao-hsing) is a prefecture-level city in northeastern Zhejiang province, Peoples Republic of China. ... Zhejiang (also spelled Chehkiang or Chekiang) is an eastern coastal province of the Peoples Republic of China. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Traditional Chinese (Traditional Chinese: 正體字/繁體字, Simplified Chinese: 正体字/繁体字) refers to one of two standard sets of printed Chinese characters. ... Pinyin (拼音, Pīnyīn) literally means join (together) sounds (a less literal translation being phoneticize, spell or transcription) in Chinese and usually refers to Hànyǔ Pīnyīn (汉语拼音, literal meaning: Han language pinyin), which is a system of... A bureaucrat is a member of a bureaucracy, usually within an institution of the government. ... A Mandarin was a bureaucrat in imperial China. ... China is the worlds oldest continuous major civilization, with written records dating back about 3,500 years and with 5,000 years being commonly used by Chinese as the age of their civilization. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... The Qing Dynasty (Chinese: ; Hanyu Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Ching chao; Manchu: daicing gurun; Mongolian: Манж Чин), occasionally known as the Manchu Dynasty, was the ruling Chinese Dynasties. ...

Within the yámen, the bureaucrat administered the government business of the town or region. Typical responsibilities of the bureaucrat includes local finance, capital works, judging of civil and criminal cases, and issuing decrees and policies.

Typically, the bureaucrat and his immediate family would live in a residence attached to the yámen. This was especially so during the Qing dynasty, when imperial law forbade a person from taking government office in his native province. The Qing Dynasty (Chinese: ; Hanyu Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Ching chao; Manchu: daicing gurun; Mongolian: Манж Чин), occasionally known as the Manchu Dynasty, was the ruling Chinese Dynasties. ...

Yámen's varied greatly in size depending on the level of government they administered, and the seniority of the bureaucrat's office. However, yámens at a local level typically had similar features: a front gate, a courtyard and a hall (typically serving as a court of law); offices, prison cells and store rooms; and residences for the bureaucrat, his family and his staff.

At the provincial level and above, specialisation among officials occurred to a greater extent. For example, the three chief officials of a province (Simplified Chinese: 三大宪; Traditional Chinese: 三大憲; Hanyu Pinyin: Sàn Dà Xiàn; literally "the Three Great Laws") controlled the legislative and executive, the judicial, and the military affairs of the province or region. Their yámen would accordingly be specialised according to the functions of the office. This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Traditional Chinese (Traditional Chinese: 正體字/繁體字, Simplified Chinese: 正体字/繁体字) refers to one of two standard sets of printed Chinese characters. ... Pinyin (拼音, Pīnyīn) literally means join (together) sounds (a less literal translation being phoneticize, spell or transcription) in Chinese and usually refers to Hànyǔ Pīnyīn (汉语拼音, literal meaning: Han language pinyin), which is a system of...

After 1911

The institution of the yámen fell victim to the Wuchang Uprising and the Xinhai Revolution, after which warlords often wound up becoming the ultimate authorities, in spite of Sun Yatsen's best efforts to establish a Republic of China covering all of China. Sun Yatsen tried to establish a form of self-government, or home rule, on a regional (or local) basis, but he found that he needed bureaucracy to run a country as big as China. Hence, new bureaucratic offices arose, thus replicating the functions of the Imperial yámens in many ways. The Wuchang Uprising (武昌起義, pinyin: WÇ”chāng Qǐyì) of October 10, 1911, started the Xinhai Revolution, which triggered the collapse of the Qing Dynasty and establishment of the Republic of China (ROC). ... Combatants Qing Dynasty Chinese Revolutionary Alliance Commanders Feng Guozhang, Yuan Shikai, and local Qing governors. ... Warlords may refer to: The plural of Warlord, a name for a figure who has military authority but not legal authority over a subnational region. ... Sun Yat-sen (November 12, 1866 - March 12, 1925) was a Chinese revolutionary leader and statesman who is considered by many to be the Father of Modern China. He had a significant influence in the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty and establishment of the Republic of China. ... Motto Three Principles of the People (三民主義 San-min Chu-i) Anthem National Anthem of the Republic of China Capital Taipei (de facto)  Nanking (de jure)1  Largest city Taipei Official languages Mandarin (GuóyÇ”) Government Semi-presidential system  -  President Chen Shui-bian  -  Vice President Annette Lu  -  Premier Chang Chun-hsiung... Devolution or Home rule is the pooling of powers from central government to government at regional or local level. ... The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Bureaucracy. ...

The term "Yamen" is still used in colloquial Chinese today, however, to denote government offices. It sometimes carries negative connotations of an arrogant or inefficient bureaucracy, much as the term "mandarin" does in English. Mandarin has a number of meanings: mandarin, a bureaucrat of Imperial China, and in the United Kingdom and Canada, by analogy, any government bureaucrat Mandarin, a group of dialects of spoken Chinese, or more specifically, its standardized dialect, Standard Mandarin Mandarin Airlines, a subsidiary of China Airlines mandarin duck, Aix...

Notable Yamens

• The Zongli Yamen acted as an office of foreign affairs in the late Qing dynasty.
• The yamen at Kowloon Walled City, Hong Kong is an important historical site.