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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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- Journal Article (4)