Lampacau or Lampacao, also known by other names, was a small island in the

Pearl River Delta The Pearl River Delta Metropolitan Region is the low-lying area surrounding the Pearl River estuary, where the Pearl River flows into the South China Sea. Referred to as the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area in official documents, ...

, which in the mid-16th century played an important role in Sino-Portuguese trade. Lampacau no longer exists as a separate island, as sedimentary deposits from the Pearl River system resulted in it becoming a part of a larger island.

Location

The exact location of Lampacau has been a somewhat of a puzzle to the students of the region's historical geography, since both the coastlines and the place names in the area have changed significantly since the 16th century. The Portuguese maps of the period showed it located somewhat west of

Macau Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by p ...

, but closer to that city than Shangchuan (', "St John's Island") farther to the southwest. According to the research of Chang Tseng-hsin, making use of both Chinese and Western sources, Lampacau has become connected with the neighboring island of Lianwan (). The name of Lianwan was thus used for the entire "new" greater island, and the name Langbaiao became relegated to the narrow straight separating Lianwan from the nearby Wenwan Island (). This would place Lampacau within the Jinwan District of present-day

Zhuhai Zhuhai; Yale romanization of Cantonese, Yale: ''Jyūhói''; Chinese postal romanization, also known as Chuhai is a prefecture-level city located on the west bank of the Pearl River (China), Pearl River estuary on the central coast of southern ...

, some west of Macao and much closer than that to Zhuhai Sanzao Airport.

Name

Over the last 100 years, there has been a lively debate of what the "proper" name of the island was during its heyday. The most recent survey of the literature on that topic is probably the page-long note in Witek & al. It lists the following spelling variants as attested in European sources, mostly Portuguese: Lampacau, Lampacam, Lam Puk, Lanpacan, Lampachan, Lampchào, Lamapacào, Lamapzan, Lanpetan, Lampaço; Lan-pai-kao (in Mandarin) and Long-pa-kao (in Cantonese); Langpetsao. They note that the character notionally is a Cantonese character and does not often appear in standard Chinese dictionaries; it is thus only natural that the name of the place would be written differently in most Chinese sources. Modern Chinese variants include Langbaiao, Langbaizao, and Lanbaijiao.

History

Lampacau became important for the international trade , when the center of the Portuguese offshore trade in the

gradually shifted there from the more remote Shangchuan. Ptak speculates that it was a more convenient base for the transshipment of cargoes to and from sampans and other river boats traveling to the interior of Guangdong. The brief period of Lampacau's significance ended some time , as the Portuguese trade moved to the recently established permanent base,

Macao Macau or Macao is a special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most densely populated region in the world. Formerly a Portuguese colony, the ter ...

Notes

References

Citation

Bibliography

* * {{coord, 22.077, 113.440, display=title Zhuhai Islands of Guangdong Ming dynasty China–Portugal relations