What is history: it is the echo of the past to the future, the reflection of the future on the past. - Hugo
In the era of the development of modern capitalist relations of production, the first contact between the West and the East was commerce, and we need to pay attention to the fact that this commercial contact was the initiative of the West, while China in the East, because of its self-sufficient natural economy, occupied an absolutely dominant position and did not engage in effective commercial and economic exchanges with the West.
The History of Sino-British Trade states that "China never intended to engage with Europeans, but had the goods to attract them." China has the best grains, rice; the best drinks, tea; and the best clothing, cotton, silk, and fur. There are these large commodities and countless indigenous by-products, so they don't need to buy a penny from somewhere else. ”
The first colonial power to come to China was portugal, and in the sixth year of Ming Zhengde (1511), Alberquerque led the Portuguese army to capture Managa (southwest of the Malay Peninsula), a larger international trade center at that time.
Six years later, in 1517 (the twelfth year of Zhengde), Anrade led a total of 8 Portuguese and Malay ships to attack at Tuen Mun in Guangdong on August 15, and the main personnel on board went to Guangzhou to lay salutes to meet Chen Jin, the governor of Liangguang, and asked to enter Beijing to meet the emperor, and the governor Chen Jinsheng reported to the imperial court, and the Zhengde Emperor approved the Portuguese request to enter Beijing a long time later. Zhang Kui, a native of Zhangzhou, Fujian Province, wrote in the fifth volume of his book "Examination of the East and West": "Flang Ji did not understand China, and zhengde drove a large ship to Guangzhou Aokou in the twelfth year, and the sound was like thunder, in the name of tribute. ”
In 1518 (the thirteenth year of Zhengde), Anrad returned to Malacca, and his brother Ximen came to China to take over Anrad's position, while the Portuguese royal family also sent envoys to Beijing to meet the Chinese Emperor.
The Guangdong authorities ordered that except for the envoys who had visited the emperor in Beijing, the rest of the people would retreat to Tuen Mun, Guangdong. Simon ignores Chinese sovereignty on Chinese soil. "He discriminated against Chinese prejudice and his tyrannical proclivities, he built a fortress and began to exercise criminal jurisdiction." "Building houses and tree fences, bullying fire and hardening oneself", "setting up camps, making fire bolts on a large scale, killing people and robbing ships for the sake of attacking war equipment, the situation is very rampant." ”
This forced the Chinese authorities to confront Portugal. In 1521, the Zhengde Emperor died, the Jiajing Emperor took the throne, in the face of the Portuguese colonists in Guangdong's misdeeds, the emperor ordered the Guangdong authorities to ban trade, expel foreign merchants out of the country, and ordered the Portuguese to evacuate Tuen Mun.
At the same time, it was explicitly ordered that the Portuguese envoys and others who had come to Beijing for a visit be escorted to Guangdong and expelled from the country, and the Portuguese colonists stubbornly resisted. In this form, the Guangdong authorities sent The Deputy Admiral Wang Fengcai to lead a four-month battle of troops and ships, and by the end of October, they defeated the Portuguese colonists and retaken Tuen Mun.
Unwilling to accept defeat, the Portuguese again led a large army to attack the southeast coast in July of the following year, and the Ming army rose up to resist, and the two sides fought fiercely at Xicao Bay in Xinhui, and the portuguese retreated to Malacca after the defeat.