This map is an excerpt of Coastal Map of China, which draws China’s sea boarders from northernmost Korea to the farthest south, Cochin, including Qiongzhou (Hainan), Pescadores, Taiwan and other islands. It bears features of China’s ancient coastal maps, namely, it only describes the relative geographic locations of objects on land observed from sea, with continent drawn up and ocean down whereas there is no fixed direction on south and north. Therefore landscapes on shore towards ocean are depicted while the other side is not. On the map shown is not Guangzhou City but coastal lines. Macau and Xiangshan County are drawn together on an island, on which there’re hills, ramparts, banners and buildings. Xiangshan County is located on the top, Qianshan Fastness in the middle and Macau city on the bottom. The lotus-stem-like place is painted customs walls separating each side, which remains vivid appearances of old Macau in about 1800.Inside the city surrounded by three sides’ walls built by Portuguese, interior harbour in northwest is kept as a loophole. Macau is marked out there inside the city on the map and structures are briefly stated. Drawn also are places surrounding Macau, Chicken neck hills (today’s Taipa), Apomi (Coloane), Hengqin Islands and other hills. The waterway between them is marked Cross Gate, too wide, though. Like many traditional coastal maps, it combines both mapping and drawing techniques, more artistic than scientific, as it pays little attention to the proportions and the real surveying technology. Anyway, it is an important historical material for many places around Macau and their distributions are noted. 

This is a copy of “G7822.C6A5 1801 .H31”,one part of the Coastal Map of China, which is the No.5 contribution made by Hummel Arthur William(1884-1995) in 1965, is now preserved in the Library of Congress, U.S.A. 

Reference:

^[1]. 林天人編撰; 張敏英文編譯. (2013). 皇輿搜覽 : 美國國會圖書館所藏明清輿圖( pp324-327). 臺北 : 中央研究院數位文化中心; Washington D.C. : 美國國會圖書館.

^[2]. 胡孝忠. (2011). 明清香山縣地方誌研究(博士論文). 濟南 : 山東大學.