Historic Centre of Macao

World Heritage

China

🎧 Listen to Introduction

Macau is a lucrative port with strategic importance in the development of international trade. Since the mid-16th century, Macau has been under Portuguese rule until 1999 when it was returned to China. The historic center of Macau, with its historic streets, residential, religious and public Portuguese and Chinese buildings, is a unique testimony to the intersection of Eastern and Western aesthetic, cultural, architectural and technological influences. The site also houses a fortress and a lighthouse, the oldest in China. It bears witness to one of the earliest and most lasting contacts between China and the West, based on the dynamism of international trade.

# Portuguese rule

# Return in 1999

# Chinese and Western Architecture

# Cultural Exchange

# fortress

# lighthouse