QOTD: “Despite these as well as other internal divisions, the Eight Banners by and large presented a united front to the outside world. With some exceptions, such as the addition of the Tibetan company to the Manchu banners in the 1770s, membership in the system was based on birth and was closed to new recruits. Thus, regardless of their ethnic origins, all members of the Eight Banner system shared a common status and a common identity that set them hereditarily apart from the rest of China’s population. Thus, both individually and collectively, they called themselves and were called by others “banner people.” Since their primary function was to hold themselves in readiness to protect and defend the Qing emperor and his court, the banner people, in this regard, constituted a hereditary military caste. They were differentiated from the non-banner people, who were generally known as “civilians.”” Manchus and Han by Edward J.M. Rhoads
QOTD
