Your search

This article analyzes the complex political and commercial dynamics that defined Macao’s survival in the second half of the seventeenth century, a period of profound instability marked by the dynastic transition between the Ming and Qing. The author examines how the Portuguese settlement, geographically isolated and with reduced Crown control from Goa, was forced to redefine its strategies in the face of the collapse of its traditional trade networks—notably the loss of the Japanese market in 1640 and the fall of Malacca to the Dutch in 1641. Through detailed historical analysis, the study explores Macao’s precarious position amid the Chinese civil war, internal revolts, and the Manchu Tartars’ incursions. The article argues that the continuity of the Portuguese presence depended on a pragmatic management of interests, characterized by a policy of “compromises and subservience.” This stance allowed the city to navigate between its initial loyalty to the Ming pretenders in Southern China and the inevitable submission to the authority of the new Qing dynasty under Emperor Shunzhi. Ultimately, the research demonstrates that Macao’s survival resulted from its capacity to adapt to the political-economic transformations of the Middle Kingdom, reaffirming its role as an indispensable strategic and commercial entrepôt in the South China Sea.

The article analyzes the shipwreck, in 1685, of a Japanese vessel loaded with tobacco off the coast of Macau and interprets the episode as an "opportune moment" for the reconfiguration of commercial and political-religious relations between Macau and Japan, following the ruptures of the seventeenth century. The author argues that, in a context marked by Dutch competition and the growing fragility of support arriving from Goa, the Macanese elite mobilized the event to reactivate maritime routes and negotiate, through indirect channels, the reestablishment of trade with the Japanese archipelago. Methodologically, the study is grounded in a critical reading of a manuscript attributed to Juan Arnedo, complemented by documentation from the Leal Senado, deploying these sources to reconstruct the dynamics of local decision-making and their effects on Macau's institutional strategy. Among the findings, the capacity for the political exploitation of the shipwreck stands out, both to sustain the continuity of contacts with Japan and to manage the impact of Japanese sensibilities regarding the Christian presence. The article concludes that the case evinces Macanese agency and the centrality of maritime contingencies in the transformation of routes and port policies, during a period of decline and recomposition of the Lusophone system in Southeast Asia.

The article examines the notes written by the Portuguese Jesuit Gabriel de Magalhães (An Wensi) in 1674, intended to be included in the Chinese annual letter of that year, taking them as a privileged source for understanding, from a European perspective, the "Revolt of the Three Feudatories." The author situates the document within the context of the missionary presence at the court in Beijing, highlighting Magalhães's position at the Tribunal/Astronomical Observatory and the political-religious tensions that marked the 1670s, including rivalries with Muslim astronomers and fluctuations in imperial receptivity to Christianity. Methodologically, a historiographical and contextual reading of the manuscript is undertaken, linking its content to Jesuit practices of documentary production (annual letters) and to the historical framework of China under the reigns/regencies of Shunzhi and Kangxi. The main conclusions suggest that the notes transform the revolt into a problem interpreted through European categories—combining observation of events, providential language, and assessment of the impact on the mission—while simultaneously highlighting the limits of this "external view" in the face of the complexity of the Chinese political and institutional sphere. Thus, the source illuminates both the transcontinental circulation of information and the Jesuit modes of representing imperial instability.

This article analyzes, from a comparative perspective, the lives of the Poor Clares of Santa Clara in Macao and Coimbra during the 17th century, questioning whether religious profession can be understood as authentic devotion or as an "escape from female helplessness." The research articulates the documentary scarcity regarding Macao with a better-documented case in Coimbra, employing a historiographical approach grounded in common institutional frameworks: the rules and constitutions of the Order of Santa Clara (Second Franciscan Order), the vows of obedience, chastity, poverty, and enclosure, as well as the role of the dowry in conventual admission. As a starting point, the available archaeological evidence from the Convent of Santa Clara-a-Velha in Coimbra is discussed, where 16th-century Chinese porcelain pieces were found, questioning their circulation and the possible links between the East and the Coimbra conventual space. The author proposes hypotheses regarding the origin of these objects—contacts with other houses of the Order (Macao, Goa), gifts brought by clergymen, or integration into family dowries—concluding that the interpretation of the conventual phenomenon requires intersecting spirituality, the dowry economy, and Atlantic-Asian networks, rather than reducing enclosure to an exclusively instrumental logic or, conversely, a merely devotional one.

The article analyzes the tensions between the Society of Jesus, linked to the Portuguese Padroado, and the Leal Senado of Macau, taking as a case study the conflict involving Bento Pereira de Faria (1676). Situating the analysis within the political-religious framework of the post-Restoration period and the jurisdictional disputes between the Padroado and the Congregation of Propaganda Fide, the author argues that municipal governance and missionary ambitions intersected around competences, patronage, and the control of religious practices, in a context marked by international competition and the redefinition of influences in the East. Methodologically, the study draws on the historical-documentary reconstruction of the episode, articulating the local analysis of Macau with the broader problematic of the mechanisms of presentation, financing, and missionary autonomy in Portuguese territories. The author demonstrates that, although the Padroado regime sought to delimit evangelizing action to areas under Portuguese political dominion, the presence and prestige of the Jesuits—particularly in the broader Asian sphere—intensified friction points with civil and religious authorities. The article concludes that the 1676 case reveals how the administration of Macau operated simultaneously as a space of mediation and a field of conflict, where the interests of the mission and public order did not always converge.

The article investigates how the figure of St. Thomas of Mylapore (Mailapur) was constructed and narrated in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century sources, both Portuguese and foreign, by articulating geographical location, circulation of information, and production of devotional knowledge. The analysis focuses on three main testimonies—Duarte Barbosa (c. 1516), Jan Huygen Linschoten (published in 1596), and António Bocarro (1635)—comparing how each author describes the city, its position on the Coromandel coast and its “Christian particularity,” as well as the versions of the legend associated with the apostle. Methodologically, a historiographical and intertextual reading is employed, privileging narrative divergences and strategies for legitimizing traditions: while Duarte Barbosa presents more succinct allusions, Bocarro offers a more explicit framework, with location and urban characteristics, and Linschoten reconfigures the devotional plot by introducing etiological episodes (river obstruction, intervention by means of elephants, Brahmanical opposition, and corporal punishments inflicted on descendants). It is concluded that the variations among the sources do not negate the persistence of the cult but reveal processes of adaptation of sacred memory to the objectives, presuppositions, and networks of each observer, offering relevant indicators for understanding the cultural transposition of Indo-Portuguese Christianity and the consolidation of a localized “St. Thomas.”

The article provides a critical-documentary analysis of Manuel de Saldanha's embassy to Peking (1668–1670), drawing on an unprecedented collection of 52 letters preserved in the Historical Archives of Goa. The author argues that this corpus—comprising first-person writings, including appointments, instructions, directives, and orders issued by the ambassador himself—offers a more detailed account of the mission's internal dynamics and the political-institutional framework surrounding the diplomatic enterprise than other, then-scarce sources. Methodologically, the study systematically cross-references complementary accounts and testimonies, in particular: the itinerary of the Jesuit Francisco Pimentel, the tendentiously negative interpretative framing of Domingos Navarrete, the ambassador's letters to Jesuits linked to the Province of Japan, and the minutes of the Leal Senado of Macao. The analysis concludes that the embassy failed to gain credibility with the Mandarinate authority, suffered successive setbacks over the course of its two-and-a-half-year tenure, and did not achieve the objectives initially envisioned by the Leal Senado and the mercantile community of Macao, thereby contradicting any reading of presumed Sino-diplomatic understanding and acceptance. The text further relates the mission's outcome to the political and economic conjuncture of the Middle Kingdom, marked by dynastic instability and restrictive policies on coastal trade, which structurally undermined the viability of the Macanese settlement.

Jaime Correa do Inso was a Portuguese naval officer who lived between 1880 and 1967. With extensive experience in overseas postings, both before and after the fall of the monarchy and the subsequent establishment of the Republic in Portugal, he distinguished himself through several writings on the Orient, particularly Macao. In an era when there was a growing desire to learn more about the diverse Portuguese geographies around the world, the simplicity of his prose, combined with the descriptive rigor of his observations, conveyed insightful impressions as a Portuguese man unfamiliar with Eastern habits and cultures. Skillfully described, his analyses provide a fundamental testimony to life in what was then the Portuguese colony. This testimony is especially interesting, given that he was an outsider to the Luso-Chinese reality, who observed, reflected upon, and drew conclusions about cultural aspects vastly different from his own.