not satisfied with this arrangement. According to imperial customs, Imperial Noble Consort Dowager Kangci had no right to claim the position of empress dowager because she was neither the birth mother of the Xianfeng Emperor, nor did she hold the rank of Empress while the Daoguang Emperor was still living. Although the Xianfeng Emperor ignored her appeals to become empress dowager, he treated her respectfully like a stepmother. In 1852, Imperial Noble Consort Dowager Kangci, as the highest ranked living consort of the previous emperor, was allowed to exercise her privilege to select potential candidates to be the Xianfeng Emperor's consorts. Among those she chose were the future Empress Dowager Ci'an and Empress Dowager Cixi. Imperial Noble Consort Dowager Kangci became critically ill in August 1855. Fearing that she had little time left, she conspired with her son, Yixin, to earn her the title of empress dowager before she died. Yixin then issued an imperial edict to honor his mother without full consent of the Xianfeng Emperor. In order to save himself from public embarrassment, the Emperor, although being displeased, reluctantly acknowledged the title later. She became Empress Dowager Kangci on 13 August 1855 and died eight days later. The Xianfeng Emperor appointed two princes, one of whom was Yixin, to take charge of the funeral arrangements, and announced that he would spend the mourning period in the Hall of Mental Cultivation. In 1857, Empress Dowager Kangci was interred in the Mu Mausoleum of the Western Qing tombs. She was also granted the posthumous title "Empress Xiaojing". The Xianfeng Emperor did not add the character cheng – indicating her status as an empress consort of the Daoguang Emperor, as were Empresses Xiaomucheng, Xiaoshencheng and Xiaoquancheng – to her posthumous title because he wanted to highlight his belief that Empress Dowager Kangci never qualified as an empress consort. He also did not give her a place in the Imperial Ancestral Temple, which meant that she would not be included in ancestral worship rites. Tongzhi era When the Xianfeng Emperor died on 22 August 1861, his first son and successor, the Tongzhi Emperor, was still too young to rule. In the Xinyou Coup that followed, the Empresses Dowager Ci'an and Cixi collaborated with Yixin to overthrow and seize power from a group of eight regents appointed by the Xianfeng Emperor on his deathbed. The two empresses dowager thus became the regents for