The Later Jin, officially known as Jin or the Great Jin, was a Jurchen-led royal dynasty of China in Manchuria and the precursor to the Qing dynasty. Established in 1616 by the Jianzhou Jurchen chieftain Nurhaci upon his reunification of the Jurchen tribes, its name was derived from the earlier Jin dynasty founded by the Wanyan clan which had ruled northern China in the 12th and 13th centuries.
Later Jin (后金) c. 1626 shown in light green
Later Jin cavalry charging Ming infantry in the Battle of Sarhū.
Official portrait of Nurhaci, the founder of the Later Jin dynasty.
Official portrait of Hong Taiji, the second khan of the Later Jin dynasty and subsequently the founder of the Qing dynasty.
Jurchen is a term used to collectively describe a number of East Asian Tungusic-speaking people. They lived in northeastern China, also known as Manchuria, before the 18th century. The Jurchens were renamed Manchus in 1635 by Hong Taiji. Different Jurchen groups lived as hunter-gatherers, pastoralist semi-nomads, or sedentary agriculturists. Generally lacking a central authority, and having little communication with each other, many Jurchen groups fell under the influence of neighbouring dynasties, their chiefs paying tribute and holding nominal posts as effectively hereditary commanders of border guards.
Siberians capturing a reindeer
A Jurchen man hunting from his horse, from a 15th-century ink and color painting on silk.
Qilang people (奇楞). Huang Qing Zhigong Tu, 1769
Bixi from the grave of a 12th-century Jurchen leader in today's Ussuriysk
