Spanish Formosa

Spanish Formosa Gobernación de Hermosa española (Spanish) 臺灣西班牙統治時期 (Chinese)
1626–1642
Flag of New Spain Coat of arms
The locations of Spanish Formosa, overlapping a map of the present-day island.   Spanish Possessions   Dutch possessions   Kingdom of Middag
Status	Territory of the Spanish East Indies (colony)
Capital	San Salvador (Keelung)
Official languages	Spanish
Common languages	East Formosan languages • Hokkien
Religion	Roman Catholicism
Government	Colony
Historical era	Age of Discovery
• Established	1626
• Surrender of San Salvador	1642
Currency	Spanish real
Preceded by Succeeded by Prehistory of Taiwan Dutch Formosa
Today part of	Republic of China (Taiwan)

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Spanish Formosa (Spanish: Gobernación de Hermosa española) was a small colony of the Spanish Empire established in the northern tip of the island now known as Taiwan, then known to Europeans at the time as Formosa or to Spaniards as "Isla Hermosa" from 1626 to 1642. It was ceded to the Dutch Republic during the Eighty Years' War.

The Portuguese were the first Europeans to reach the island off the southern coast of China in 1544, and named it Formosa (Portuguese for "beautiful") due to the beautiful landscape as seen from the sea.^[1] The Spanish had translated the name into Spanish as "Hermosa" and is what was historically used in Spanish maps and documents about the colony.^[2]

The Spanish set up a colony in the north of the island in 1626 as part of the Manila-based Spanish East Indies that was also subordinated to New Spain (Mexico) at that time. As a Spanish colony, it was meant to protect the regional trade of Spanish Philippines, especially Manila-bound junk ships coming from Ming China and Japan from interference by the Dutch in Dutch Formosa in the south of the island. The colony was short-lived due to the loss of its strategic importance and unwillingness by Spanish authorities in Manila to commit more resources to its defense. After seventeen years, the last fortress of the Spanish was besieged by Dutch forces and eventually fell, giving the Dutch control over much of the island.^[2]

Indigenous Taiwanese (Likely Basay)^[2] in Keelung and Tamsui observed in Spanish Formosa via Boxer Codex (circa 1590)

Spanish Catholic friar missionaries, especially Dominicans and Franciscans, Christianized about 5,000 indigenous Taiwanese,^[3] mostly the Basay people in Keelung and Tamsui and the Kavalan people in Yilan,^[2] during the time of the Spanish governorate. The Spanish also settled Sangley Chinese and a few Christian Japanese^[2] in Chinese trading settlements (Parián) as traders and laborers and employed at least 300 or more native Filipinos (especially Kapampangan), Mexican Mestizos, Mulattos, Blacks, Mexican Amerindians, and some Mexican Criollo Spaniards from New Spain (Mexico) and Spanish Filipinos from Spanish Philippines as soldiers, laborers, and friar missionaries garrisoned in the forts and settlements of Spanish Formosa.^[4]