Great Clearance

The Great Clearance (traditional Chinese: 遷界令; simplified Chinese: 迁界令), also translated as the Great Evacuation or Great Frontier Shift, was caused by edicts issued in 1661, 1664, and 1679, which required the evacuation of the coastal areas of Guangdong, Fujian, Zhejiang, Jiangnan, and Shandong, in order to fight the Taiwan-based anti-Qing loyalist movement of the erstwhile Ming dynasty (1368–1644).

The edict was first issued by the Shunzhi Emperor of the Qing dynasty in 1661, the last year of his rule. With the Shunzhi Emperor's death in the same year, his son, the Kangxi Emperor (1661–1722), succeeded this edict under a regency led by Oboi (1661–1669). The ban on human settlement of those coastal areas was lifted in 1669, and some residents were allowed to return. Yet, in 1679, the edict was issued again. In 1683, after the Qing defeated the Kingdom of Tungning in the Battle of Penghu and took control of Taiwan, the people from the cleared areas according to the edict were allowed to return and to live in the cleared areas.