Chingunjav

(also Chingunzhab). Date of birth unknown; died June 12, 1757. Mongol noion (feudal lord). Leader of an anti-Manchu movement in Khalkha in the summer of 1756.

The movement resulted from an intensification of political and economic oppression by the Ch’ing Dynasty, which had long waged war against the Oirat Khanate in Dzungaria, and from the increased repression that followed the outbreak of the uprising led by the Oirat prince Amursana. However, the immediate cause of Chingunjav’s uprising was the execution in Peking of Erintsindorji, a Mongol military leader and brother of the bogdo-gegen (head of the Lamaist sect in Mongolia).

In July 1756, Chingunjav, who was serving in the Manchu army in Dzungaria as the leader of a 2,000-man detachment of Mongol troops, returned to his native nomad territories near Lake Khubsugul. There he made energetic efforts to incite the Mongol feudal lords to rebel against the Manchus. He also established contact with Amursana.

The Ch’ing responded by dispatching troops from Dzungaria to Khalkha to fight Chingunjav’s rebel detachments. Captured in January 1757, Chingunjav and his sons were taken to Peking and executed.