Eclipsed Entrepôts of the Western Pacific

Among the great entrepots around the Pacific there were some which had such great advantages of location that for many centuries there always was a trade center somewhere in the vicinity. Others rose to prominence for a time when the political and economic conditions were right, but then were eclipsed and almost forgotten. In the 1600s Taiwan was a vortex of world trade and great power rivalry, but then became a remote frontier of the great Qing Empire. Hoi An in central Vietnam was another major center of foreign trade, strongly encouraged by the local Nguyen rulers, from the 1500s to the 1770s, but then was shattered by the Tayson Rebellion and revived only in very different form under the 19th-century Nguyen dynasty. This volume offers access to the scattered but excellent scholarship on these two intriguing cases which help throw light on the success of other centers, such as Macao or Manila. Contents: General editor's preface; Introduction; Taiwan as an entrepôt in East Asia in the 17th century, Ts'ao Yung-ho; The earliest Chinese eyewitness accounts of the Formosan Aborigines, Laurence G. Thompson; Retribution and remorse: the interaction between the administration and the Protestant mission in early colonial Formosa, Leonard Blussé; How and why the Dutch East India Company became competitive in Intra-Asian trade in East Asia in the 1630s, Paul A. Van Dyke; Political spectacle and colonial rule: the Landdag on Dutch Taiwan, 1629-1648, Tonio Andrade; Chinese settlers against the Dutch East India Company: the rebellion led by Kuo Huai-i on Taiwan in 1652, Johannes Huber; Vietnam and the monetary flow of Eastern Asia, 13th to 18th centuries, John K. Whitmore; Les Portugais sur les côtes du Viêtnam et du Campa: études sur les routes maritimes et les relations commerciales, d'après les sources Portugaises (XVIe, XVIIe, XVIIIe siècles). Chapter on 'La Cochinchine' and related material, Pierre-Yves Manguin; The Japanese Christians of Faifo and the transference of Fr. Pedro de Zúñiga’s relics to Manila in 1651, C.R. Boxer; Historical notes on Hôi-An (Faifo), Chingho A. Chen; Index.