Ming emperor from 1521 to 1567, named after his era title. Devoted to Daoist rites and elixirs, he stayed away from court for years while pirates raided the coast; the official 海瑞 was jailed for a memorial criticising him.
During the Jiajing era, Japanese pirates ravaged the southeast coast.
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海瑞's 1565 memorial passed on a joke going round the empire: the era name 嘉靖 really meant 家家皆净, 'every household wiped clean', with nothing left to live on.
