1557: A Year of Some Significance

Speaker: CEAS CHINA COLLOQUIUM Peter Perdue, Professor of History, Yale University In 1557, the Ming dynasty leased the town of Macau to the Portuguese. Soon after, it legalized foreign trade, and Chinese began to migrate overseas. In 1571, silver mines opened in Latin America and the Spanish seized Manila. Thus began the great silver flow that linked the New and Old Worlds. The Ming decisions were the result of a continuous debate lasting from the 1520s to the 1570s about the value of coastal trade and policy toward the Mongols of the northwestern frontier. Imperial decisions about military defense and economic benefit on both frontiers determined China's opening to the world. Perdue will discuss the interactions between security and trade policy on the northwest and southeast frontiers.