The Panthay Rebellion (1856–1873), also known as the Du Wenxiu Rebellion (Tu Wen-hsiu Rebellion), was a rebellion of the Muslim Hui people and other (Muslim as well as non-Muslim) ethnic groups against the Manchu-led Qing dynasty in southwestern Yunnan Province, as part of a wave of Hui-led multi-ethnic unrest.

The name "Panthay" is a Burmese word, which is said to be identical with the Shan word Pang hse. It was the name by which the Burmese called the Chinese Muslims who came with caravans to Burma from the Chinese province of Yunnan. The name was not used or known in Yunnan itself. The rebellion referred to itself as the Pingnan Kingdom, meaning Pacified Southern Kingdom.

In 1856, a massacre of Muslims organized by a Qing Manchu official responsible for suppressing the revolt in the provincial capital of Kunming sparked a province-wide multi-ethnic insurgency. The Manchu official who started the anti-Muslim massacre was Shuxing'a, who developed a deep hatred of Muslims after an incident where he was stripped naked and nearly lynched by a mob of Muslims. He ordered several Muslim rebels to be slowly sliced to death. However, Tariq Ali claimed in his works that the Muslims who had nearly lynched Shuxing'a were not Hui, but belonged to another ethnicity; nevertheless, the Manchu official blamed all Muslims for the incident.

Meanwhile, in Dali City in western Yunnan, an independent kingdom was established by Du Wenxiu (1823–1872), who was born in Yongchang to a Han Chinese family which had converted to Islam. Du Wenxiu was of Han Chinese origin despite being a Muslim and he led both Hui Muslims and Han Chinese in his civil and military bureaucracy. Du Wenxiu was fought against by another Muslim leader, the defector to the Qing Ma Rulong. The Muslim scholar Ma Dexin, who said that Neo-Confucianism was reconcilable with Islam, approved of Ma Rulong defecting to the Qing and also assisted other Muslims in defecting.

Du Wenxiu openly claimed that his aims were to drive out the Manchus, unite with the ethnic Han, and destroy those who supported the Qing. Du Wenxiu did not blame Han for the massacres of Hui, instead, he blamed the Manchu regime for the massacres, saying that the Manchus were foreign to China and that they alienated the Chinese and other minorities. Anti-Manchu rhetoric was frequently used by Du, as he further tried to convince both the Han and the Hui to join forces to overthrow the Manchu Qing after 200 years of their rule. Du invited the fellow Hui Muslim leader Ma Rulong to join him in driving the Manchu Qing out and "recover China". For his war against Manchu "oppression", Du "became a Muslim hero", while Ma Rulong defected to the Qing. On multiple occasions Kunming was attacked and sacked by Du Wenxiu's forces. His capital was Dali. The revolt ended in 1873. Du Wenxiu is regarded as a hero by the present day government of China. Du Wenxiu has recorded issued call for the complete expulsion of the Manchus from all of China in order for China to come under Chinese rule once again. During this insurrection, Dun Wenxiu has released a slogan:

To bring peace to Han, Down with the Qing court. (Chinese: 安漢反清)

Albert Fytche opined this revolt was not religious in nature, since the Muslims were joined by the non-Muslim Shan and Kakhyen and other hill tribes. Modern historian Jingyuan Qian shared this view. Fytche reported this testimony from a British officer, and he also stated that the Chinese were tolerant of different religions so they were unlikely to have caused the revolt by interfering in the practice of Islam. In addition, loyalist Muslim forces helped Qing crush the rebel Muslims. Instead, the discrimination by China's imperial administration against the Hui caused their rebellions. James Hastings wrote in Volume 8 of the Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics that the Panthay Revolt was set off by racial antagonism and class warfare, rather than due to Islam and religion.

However, some sources suggest that the Panthay Rebellion originated solely as a conflict between Han and Hui miners in 1853, despite Han-Hui tension existing for decades prior to the event, including a three-day massacre of Hui by Han and Qing officials in 1845. Hui and Han were regarded and classified by Qing as two different ethnic groups, with Hui not seen as an exclusively religious classification.^{[citation needed]}