Dutch and Spanish rule

Vingboons/ ca.1640 / Nationaal Archief

Portuguese sailors, passing Taiwan in 1544, first jotted in a ship's log the name of the island "Ilha Formosa", meaning Beautiful Island. In 1582 the survivors of a Portuguese shipwreck spent ten weeks battling malaria and Aborigines before returning to Macau on a raft.Dutch traders, in search of an Asian base first arrived on the island in 1623 to use the island as a base for Dutch commerce with Japan and the coastal areas of China. The Spanish and allies established a settlement at Santissima Trinidad, building Fort San Salvador on the northwest coast of Taiwan near Keelung in 1626 which they occupied until 1642 when they were driven out by a joint Dutch-Aborigine invasion force. They also built a fort in Tamsui (1628) but had already abandoned it by 1638. The Dutch later erected Fort Anthonio on the site in 1642, which still stands (now part of the Fort San Domingo museum complex).