The Jingkang Incident, also known as the Humiliation of Jingkang and the Disorders of the Jingkang Period, was an episode of invasions and atrocities that took place in 1127 during the Jin–Song Wars when the troops of the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty besieged and sacked the imperial palaces in Bianjing, the capital of the Han-led Northern Song dynasty. The Jin forces captured the Northern Song ruler, Emperor Qinzong, along with his father, the retired Emperor Huizong, and many members of the imperial family of Emperor Taizong's bloodline and officials of the Song imperial court. The ordinary Song civilians of Bianjing living in the non-imperial quarter were left alone after being forced to pay huge ransoms to the Jin.
A portrait of Emperor Huizong of Song
The Jin–Song Wars were a series of conflicts between the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty (1115–1234) and the Han-led Song dynasty (960–1279). In 1115, Jurchen tribes rebelled against their overlords, the Khitan-led Liao dynasty (916–1125), and declared the formation of the Jin. Allying with the Song against their common enemy the Liao dynasty, the Jin promised to cede to the Song the Sixteen Prefectures that had fallen under Liao control since 938. The Song agreed but the Jin's quick defeat of the Liao combined with Song military failures made the Jin reluctant to cede territory. After a series of negotiations that embittered both sides, the Jurchens attacked the Song in 1125, dispatching one army to Taiyuan and the other to Bianjing, the Song capital.
The Song and Jin were allies against the Khitan Liao. Painting of Khitan hunters, from the National Palace Museum
Jurchen chieftain Wanyan Aguda, who in 1115 became first emperor of the Jin dynasty
Modern statue of Jin emperor Taizong at the Museum of the First Capital of Jin. Taizong ordered military campaigns that led to the fall of the northern Song in 1127.
Emperor Huizong left Kaifeng on January 28, 1126, as the Jurchen army approached the city.