Which Portuguese-ruled city in China began as a leased trading post in 1557? The answer is Macau.
Portuguese merchants had already been active along the southern Chinese coast, but Macau became their permanent base in 1557, when Ming authorities allowed them to establish a settlement and trading post. The arrangement involved an annual payment commonly recorded as 500 taels of silver. China retained sovereignty and legal authority, while Portugal gradually developed day-to-day control.
Macau grew because its sheltered harbor linked Chinese markets with wider maritime networks, including India, Southeast Asia, Japan, and Europe. It became especially important in the trade connecting China and Japan, and religious orders, merchants, and mixed Portuguese-Chinese communities helped shape its distinctive culture.
A common mix-up is treating Macau as a Portuguese possession in exactly the same way as a conventional colony from the beginning. Its early status was more complicated: a leased settlement under Chinese sovereignty that later became de facto Portuguese-controlled. Portugal transferred sovereignty to China in 1999, and Macau is now a Special Administrative Region.