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Macao's merchants had neglected the markets of the South China Sea. Their neglect, with the exception of Manila and, to a lesser degree, the Lesser Sunda islands, is explained by the magnitude of their trading opportunities in other markets. There were, in addition, costs and difficulties of penetrating new markets which they, previously, saw no economic reason to incur. In the Indonesian archipelago, the Portuguese from Macao encountered competition from their compatriots at Malacca and from the Estado da India, the Spanish, the VOC, EIC, other European Companies, Chinese, Indian and indigenous merchants. Malacca and the Estado da India's trade in the South China Sea was east–west in orientation. It was directed towards the purchase of spices in the Indonesian archipelago, to be shipped to Goa and Cochin for transhipment to Europe, silver and Indian cotton cloth sent in exchange. The development of Macao's trade to mainland Southeast Asia was influenced by the activities of Japanese and Chinese merchants. By the early seventeenth century, trade in various ports in the South China Sea increased in the north–south direction; Japanese go-shuin-sen and Chinese ships frequented the Tonkin, Cochinchina, Manila, Siam and Cambodia markets, which provided the Chinese products and locally produced silks, gold, aromatic woods and skins in demand in Japan. After discovering that the Chinese and Japanese had substantially improved the trade at those ports, Portuguese country traders from Macao sought to establish or augment existing local Portuguese populations and increase the frequency of their trading visits to those states. Catholic missionaries, especially the Jesuits, became active within those Portuguese and Japanese Christian communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maritime trade in Asia antedates early modern history. During the fifteenth century, intrepid Chinese mariners and ships sailed into the Indian Ocean. Chinese produce was sold in Indian ports and shipped into the Red Sea, Persian Gulf or along the east African coast. By the end of the fifteenth century, Ming China's official interest in these commercial and political links with India and the Indian Ocean had collapsed. Maritime trade between China and India was sustained by junk traders sailing, principally, to Malacca and other ports in the South China Sea. At Malacca, the Chinese encountered and traded with other Asian merchants who frequented that port. The Asian, Chinese, Indian, Arabian, Malay and non-Malay indigenous merchants who traded at Malacca met on the periphery of one geographical region in which the Chinese perceived themselves dominant. Those Chinese merchants did not concern themselves over the commercial and religious penetration by Islamic traders and missionaries throughout the Indonesian archipelago. Neither were they particularly preoccupied with the competitive commercial activities of the Malay and non-Malay indigenous merchants. Sinocentric attitudes led the Chinese merchants to ignore the maritime and commercial acumen of the many merchants of the Indian Ocean who were present at Malacca. The Indian Ocean and the South China Sea are terms recently created by geographers to delineate the physical boundaries between three regions, the Indian sub-continent, Southeast Asia and China. Asian and European merchants of the early modern period would not recognise the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea as those terms are currently used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]