Đồng Khánh

Emperor Đồng Khánh wears a dragon robe

Đồng Khánh was born on 19 December 1864 in the Imperial City of Huế. His childhood name was Chánh Mông because he was brought up in Chánh Mông palace. Đồng Khánh was the eldest son of Prince Nguyễn Phúc Hồng Cai, a son of emperor Thiệu Trị, and his concubine Bùi Thị Thanh.

As his uncle, Emperor Tự Đức, had no children, Đồng Khánh was adopted and given the title Kiên Giang quận công (Duke of Kiên Giang).

After the French armies captured the city of Huế and the Imperial city fell to the French, the court regents Nguyễn Văn Tường and Tôn Thất Thuyết took the young Emperor Hàm Nghi and escaped from the Purple Forbidden City of Huế, and took him to Tân Sở in the mountains as the figurehead of a revolutionary movement against the French. To take away the legitimacy of Hàm Nghi, general de Courcy and résident de Champeaux of France asked the empress dowager Nghi Thiên to enthrone Hàm Nghi's elder half brother prince Nguyễn Phúc Ưng Kỷ. On 19 September 1885 with the backing of the governor of Annam, Prince Nguyễn Phúc Ưng Kỷ was crowned as the ninth emperor of Đại Nam with the era name of Đồng Khánh.

Đồng Khánh was pro-French, which was noted in the diary of Trần Trọng Kim:

"Emperor Đồng Khánh had a gentle personality, loved to wear luxurious jewelry and adopted French culture[,] therefore [the] French colonial government gave favor to him. After the dethroned emperor Hàm Nghi fled to Quảng Bình, Đồng Khánh accepted the French request of travelling to Quảng Bình to persuade Hàm Nghi and his loyal subjects [to] surrender but [was] unsuccessful. After that, Hàm Nghi was betrayed by his loyal subject Trương Quang Ngọc[;] then he was captured by [the] French and exiled [to] Algérie."

On 28 January 1889, Đồng Khánh died aged 24 after reigning for three years. He was granted the posthumous name Hoằng Liệt Thông Thiết Mẫn Huệ Thuần Hoàng Đế (弘烈聰哲敏惠純皇帝), with the temple name Cảnh Tông (景宗).

In 1916, his son the Emperor Khải Định granted him the name Phối Thiên Minh Vận Hiếu Đức Nhân Vũ Vĩ Công Hoằng Liệt Thông Thiết Mẫn Huệ Thuần Hoàng Đế (配天明運孝德仁武偉功弘烈聰哲敏惠純皇帝). He was buried in Tư Lăng mausoleum (思陵), which is located at Dương Xuân Thượng village, Hương Thuỷ commune, Thừa Thiên Province.

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  Portrait of Emperor Đồng Khánh.
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  Emperor Đồng Khánh on his throne.
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  Empress Hựu Thiên, wife of Đồng Khánh
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  Empress Phụ Thiên, wife of Đồng Khánh

• Media related to Emperor Đồng Khánh at Wikimedia Commons