An Investigation And Research On City Walls During The Ming And Qing Dynasties In Macao

The Portuguese began to build city walls in Macao soon after the opening of it.During the historical period when the Portuguese building city walls in Macao,they were facing the threats from pirate,the attacks from the Dutch,and the guard of the Chinese government in the Ming and Qing dynasties.These factors insisted through the whole procedure when the building of city walls.What a pity,there is a small number of the entities of walls remain today.So most of time,we should discuss or study them in addition to historical maps and documents.First of this article is the preface.In this part,what an important role that the city walls had placed during the early cities is briefly introduced at frst.And I do a review and comment from the studies related to city walls in Macao until now.Then put forward the detail methods and meanings of this topic.Secondly,introduce the current situation of city walls during the Ming and Qing dynasties in Macao,and do a textual research to the situation.At first,I carry out some on-the-spot investigations to the entities of walls that remain today,then take photos,measure and number to them.And use different historical maps of Macao for reference,analysis and describe the entity walls' locations and distributions in each map.By this way,I can do some summary and research to the scale,direction and distribution of the city walls in Macao.Then raise some problems about the studies of city walls in Macao.Again,I analysis the process and context of the city walls in Macao.First analysis the influence to the city of Macao from the appearance of city walls,meaning that the differences to the history of Macao from the appearance of walls.Before the appearance,Macao was just a place that few people live in,but the appearance laid the base of development of the city.The process and development of the city walls were influenced from special historical traits.So here I use historical documents and records to analysis the different objective factors that the Portuguese faced during the building of city walls.At earliest time,the Portuguese were facing the threats from pirate,which were represented by Zeng Yiben and Lin Daoqian.Then the Portuguese faced the attacks from the Dutch,they had a conflict in 1601,from then on the Dutch continued to expand their powers in the East,to the year of 1622,they had a large scale of war in Macao.The Portuguese won again at the end.The threats from the pirate and the Dutch were,important factors that the Portuguese faced during the building of city walls.At the same time,the Portuguese faced the disagreement and protect from the Chinese government in the Ming and Qing dynasties during the whole process of building.There were several negotiations between the Chinese government and the Portuguese,the Chinese government had demanded and demolished the city walls several times.At last is the conclusion.Through the investigation data of entity walls,historical maps,documents and records in the front,I summary the scale,direction and distributions of city walls in Macao.And analysis the complex history that the Portuguese faced the pirate,the Dutch and the Chinese government.