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Infante Dom Henrique: the prince who set the Age of Discovery in motion
Infante Dom Henrique (Henry the Navigator)
A son of King João I of Portugal and a central figure of the Age of Discovery, he sponsored expeditions down the West African coast and championed advances in navigation. Avenida do Infante D. Henrique on the Macau peninsula was named after him in 1939.
Jorge Álvares: the Portuguese navigator who reached the China coast in 1513
Jorge Álvares
A Portuguese navigator who reached the Pearl River estuary in 1513 and is regarded as among the first Portuguese to arrive in China by sea. He died near Tuen Mun on 8 July 1521. The Macau square 歐華利前地 (also rendered 區華利前地) carries his name.
Luís de Camões: Portugal's national poet and the Macau garden that bears his name
Luís de Camões
Portugal's national poet and author of the epic Os Lusíadas (rendered in Macau as 葡國魂), regarded as a founding figure of Portuguese-language literature. Camões Garden in Macau is named after him; the well-loved story that he composed part of the epic in a grotto there is a legend, not documented fact.
Alessandro Valignano: the Jesuit Visitor to the East Indies who made Macau a mission gateway and founded St. Paul's College
Alessandro Valignano
An Italian Jesuit and Visitor of the Society's missions in the East Indies. He reached Macau in 1578 and made the city his command centre for Jesuit work across Asia. In 1594 he founded St. Paul's College in Macau, regarded as one of the earliest Western-style colleges in East Asia. Macau's role as the gateway of the Catholic China mission is largely his doing. He died and was buried in Macau in 1606.
Michele Ruggieri: a pioneer of the China mission who began in Macau and co-authored the first Portuguese-Chinese dictionary
Michele Ruggieri
An Italian Jesuit who arrived in Macau in 1579 to study Chinese language and customs, regarded as among the pioneers of the Jesuit China mission. With Matteo Ricci he co-authored the first Portuguese-Chinese dictionary, and at Zhaoqing he printed the first book written in Chinese by a European. His path into China began in Macau, an early testament to the city's role as a mission gateway.
Matteo Ricci: the Jesuit who entered China by way of Macau in 1582
Matteo Ricci
An Italian Jesuit who reached Macau in August 1582, studied Chinese language and customs there, and entered mainland China from 1583. His scholarly and missionary achievements — and his fame — belong mainly to the mainland (Zhaoqing, Nanjing, Beijing). This archive frames his Macau link through the gateway of his entry into China. He died in Beijing in 1610.
Wu Li: an early-Qing master painter who trained for the priesthood at Macau's St Paul's College
Wu Li
A master of early-Qing landscape painting — one of the "Six Masters" — who was also one of China's first Catholic poets and Jesuit priests. In 1681 he came to St Paul's College in Macau to study theology and Latin, and in 1688 was ordained at Nanjing as Simon-Xavier a Cunha, among the earliest Chinese Jesuit priests. His Macau years mark a distinctive chapter in the history of Chinese–Western cultural exchange.
George Chinnery: the English painter who spent his last decades in Macau and gave the Pearl River a face
George Chinnery
An English painter, born in London in 1774, who spent years in Madras and Calcutta before settling in Macau in 1825, where he lived until his death in 1852. He was the only Western painter resident in South China through the early-to-mid 19th century, recording Macau's streets, temples and the ordinary people of the Pearl River Delta in oils, watercolours and drawings. He is buried in Macau's Old Protestant Cemetery.
Lin Zexu: the Qing imperial commissioner of the Humen opium destruction who inspected Macau in 1839
Lin Zexu
A Qing official and statesman who served as imperial commissioner during the Opium War era. In 1839 he was sent to Guangdong to suppress the opium trade and destroyed a vast quantity of opium at Humen. On 3 September that year, accompanied by the Viceroy of Liangguang Deng Tingzhen, he inspected Macau and received Portuguese officials at Lin Fung Temple. The Lin Zexu Memorial Museum, inside Lin Fung Temple in Macau, commemorates this episode.
Ferreira do Amaral: the governor whose hardline rule left his name on a Macau square
João Maria Ferreira do Amaral
A Portuguese naval officer who governed Macau from 1846 to 1849, pursuing an aggressive expansionist policy. He was assassinated near the Barrier Gate in 1849. The square Praça de Ferreira do Amaral on the Macau peninsula carries his Portuguese name.
Mesquita: the Macau-born officer of the 1849 Barrier Gate clash
Vicente Nicolau de Mesquita
A Macau-born Portuguese army officer who, after the 1849 Barrier Gate incident, led a small detachment in an assault on the Baisha Ridge fort and later rose to colonel. Avenida do Coronel Mesquita carries his rank in its name.
Lou Wa Siu (Lou Kau): from merchant wealth to Macau city memory
Lou Wa Siu
Late-Qing Macau's wealthiest merchant and holder of the fantan gambling tax-farm. From New Hui refugee to merchant prince, his residence — the Lou Kau Mansion — remains one of the most iconic Chinese houses in Macau's UNESCO Historic Centre.
Zheng Guanying: the late-Qing reform thinker who completed《盛世危言》at the Mandarin’s House in Macau
Zheng Guanying
A late-Qing reform thinker, comprador and industrialist who worked for foreign firms and modern Chinese enterprises such as the China Merchants Steam Navigation Company. His major work《盛世危言》(Words of Warning in a Prosperous Age) argued for learning from the West to enrich and strengthen China, and was widely influential. From 1884 he retired to the Mandarin’s House (鄭家大屋) in Macau, where he revised the work that became this book. The Mandarin’s House is today part of the Historic Centre of Macao, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Horta e Costa: a two-term governor and the avenue renamed for how it sounded
José Maria de Sousa Horta e Costa
A Portuguese colonial official who served twice as Governor of Macau (first term 1894–1897) and later as Governor of Portuguese India. The Macau avenue named after him was originally rendered 柯高 in Chinese but later changed to 高士德 because the earlier reading sounded unflattering in Cantonese.
Sun Yat-sen: revolutionary pioneer and founding figure of the Republic of China who once practised medicine in Macau
Sun Yat-sen
A modern Chinese revolutionary and a founding figure of the Republic of China. After graduating from the Hong Kong College of Medicine for Chinese in 1892, he was invited to practise at Kiang Wu Hospital in Macau, regarded as the territory’s first Chinese doctor of Western medicine, and opened a Chinese-Western pharmacy. He later devoted himself to revolution, founding the Revive China Society and the Tongmenghui, and in 1912 became provisional president of the Republic of China. Macau was among the important places of his early medical practice and the stirrings of his revolutionary thought.
Manuel da Silva Mendes: the Portuguese scholar, jurist, and Chinese-art collector who made Macau home
Manuel da Silva Mendes
Manuel da Silva Mendes (1867–1931) was a Portuguese scholar, lawyer, and collector of Chinese art who lived in Macau from 1901. He taught at the Liceu de Macau and twice served as interim rector, practised law, served as judge and prosecutor, and presided over the Leal Senado. An early systematic collector of Chinese art whose collection helped form the Luís de Camões Museum, he was also a pioneer in introducing Taoist thought and Chinese culture to the Portuguese-speaking world.
Camilo Pessanha: the Portuguese symbolist poet who spent half his life in Macau
Camilo Pessanha
A Portuguese symbolist poet, born in Coimbra in 1867, who came to Macau in 1894 to teach, headed the property registry from 1900, and died in Macau in 1926. His collection Clepsidra is a landmark of Portuguese symbolism. Rua de Camilo Pessanha — formerly 爐石塘街 — was named after him in 1926.
Kou Fong: from a 1902 teahouse to a century-old hand-made bakery on Rua do Cunha
Kou Fong
Founder of Fong Kei Bakery, named after him. Its predecessor was a teahouse already operating on Rua do Cunha in Taipa by 1902 (Guangxu 28); when the tea trade declined the family closed the teahouse and focused on hand-made traditional pastries. The fourth generation, Kou Chi Kei, took over in 2018, and the shop has been Michelin-recommended.
Rodrigo Rodrigues: the physician-governor who wrote on Macau's place in the East
Rodrigo José Rodrigues
A Portuguese military physician and politician, the 109th Governor of Macau (1923–1925). After leaving office he wrote Macau: The Portuguese Problem in the Far East. Avenida do Doutor Rodrigo Rodrigues on the peninsula is named after him.
Kou Ho Neng and the gaming map of early twentieth-century Macau
Kou Ho Neng
Macau's gambling monopolist for the first half of the 20th century. From 1937 his Tai Hing consortium held the concessions for fantan, pak-kop-piu, and san-piu — dominating Macau gaming for twenty-five years until Stanley Ho displaced him in 1962.