# Pescadores
## English
### Alternative forms

* Pescadore
* Piscadores

### Etymology

From the Portuguese Ilhas Pescadores ("fishermen's islands").

### Pronunciation

* enPR: pěsʹkə-dôrʹǐs, pěsʹkə-dôrʹēz
* IPA: /ˌpɛskəˈdɔːɹɪs/, /ˌpɛskəˈdɔːɹiːz/

### Proper noun

Pescadores
* An archipelago in the Taiwan Strait; synonymous with Penghu County, Taiwan (ROC).
** 1798, A Voyage Round the World : Which was Performed in the Years 1785, 1786, 1787, and 1788, by M. De la Peyrouse‎, Edinburgh, pages 131–132:Standing from the shore, with topsails and courses close reefed, M. de Peyrouse hoped, that he might double the PESCADORE ISLES, by keeping the ship's head to the N. W., before a N. N. E. wind. To his astonishment, at nine o'clock in the morning, several rocks, making a part of that groupe of isles, were seen before them, in the bearing of N. N. W. The billows rolled so high, and so tempestuous, that the breakers from these rocks were not to be distinguished from them. They now tacked and stood towards Formosa. In this continuation of their course, they found the channel, between Formosa and the isles N. E. of the Pescadores, not to exceed four leagues in breadth. Perceiving it, at length, to be impossible, that they should succeed in accomplishing their course through this channel, before the change of the monsoon ; they were induced to direct their progress towards the most southern of the Pescadores, bearing W. S. W. with the purpose of passing to the Eastward of Formosa. They sailed along, parallel to the Pescadores, at two leagues of distance from them.
** 1836, John Francis Davis, The Chinese : A General Description of the Empire of China and its Inhabitants‎, volume 1, New-York: Harper & Brothers, page 42:The Dutch met with little success in their attempts to open a trade with China until 1624, when, by means of assistance from Batavia, they were enabled to form a settlement on the west side of Formosa, opposite to the Chinese coast. The vicinity of this to Manilla and Macao excited the jealousy of the Spaniards and Portuguese, as well as of the Chinese government. Liberty of trade with that empire was at first denied them; but the Dutch annoyed the coast with their ships, until it was agreed that, on their evacuating the Pescadores, some small islands between the mainland and Formosa, and confining themselves to the latter, liberty of commerce should be granted them.
** 1905 May 18, “The War on Sea and Land”, in The Independent‎, volume LVIII, number 2946, New York, page 1096:The Japanese have made extensive preparations for the defense of Formosa and the Pescadores. [For a description of the Pescadores and a map, see THE INDEPENDENT for February 16th.] The Pescadores Islands have been supplied with provisions and ammunition for two years and heavy guns mounted in strategic positions. In Formosa the ports of Keelung and Tamsui are strongly protected by mines. The garrison is estimated at 15,000 men. The island is declared to be under martial law and in a state of siege.
** 1963, Dwight Eisenhower, Mandate for Change 1953-1956‎, Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 460:As a result of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95, China lost to Japan the important islands of Taiwan (Formosa) and the Pescadores, lying about a hundred miles off the Chinese coast.
** 1976, Manabu Sasa, “Filariasis in the Asian Region”, in Human Filariasis: A Global Survey of Epidemiology and Control‎, University of Tokyo Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 458:The occurrence of filariasis in the Pescadores was reported by GOTO & HARAYO (1919). TANAKA (1937) examined 229 Chinese dockyard laborers at Makung Navy Base, and found 27 (16.2%) to be positive for the microfilariae of W. bancrofti.
** 1983 May 15, “ROC to open new beach resort areas”, in Free China Weekly‎, volume XXIV, number 19, Taipei, page 2:As summer approaches, residents of Taiwan have been pleased to learn that the government has decided to open up 42 previously restricted areas to the public for recreational purposes. Of the areas, 30 are on the coastline of Taiwan and 12 more are in the Pescadores between Taiwan and the China mainland.
** 2011, Henry Kissinger, On China‎, New York: Penguin Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, pages 155, 156:To deter an attack caused by a misapprehension as to American resolve — as in Korea — Dulles and the Taiwanese ambassador in Washington, on November 23, 1954, initialed the text of the long-planned defense treaty between the United States and Taiwan. However, on the matter of the territory that had just come under actual attack, the American commitment was ambiguous: the treaty applied specifically only to Taiwan and the Pescadores Islands (a larger group of islands about twenty-five miles from Taiwan). It made no mention of Quemoy, Matsu, and other territories close to the Chinese mainland, leaving them to be defined later, “as may be determined by mutual consent.”[...]In the last week of January, they arranged for the passage of a resolution of both houses of the United States Congress authorizing Eisenhower to use U.S. forces to defend Taiwan, the Pescadores Islands, and “related positions and territories” in the Taiwan Strait.
** 2021 December 20, John J. Tkacik, Jr., “John J. Tkacik, Jr. On Taiwan: The American Constitution and recognizing Taiwan”, in Taipei Times‎, archived from the original on 19 December 2021:Let me pose a question: What if President Biden were to exercise his exclusive constitutional authority and issue an explicit White House statement that “the United States does not now recognize, nor has the United States ever recognized, the sovereignty of China over the island of Taiwan and the Pescadores. And furthermore, the United States has repeatedly informed both the government of the People’s Republic of China as well as the Secretariat of the United Nations of this fact.”[...] Not so far-fetched would be a “negative” Presidential declaration along the lines described above: “the United States does not now recognize, nor has the United States ever recognized, the sovereignty of China over the island of Taiwan and the Pescadores.” As I have documented in previous “one Taiwan” columns, for seven decades the United States has refused to recognize even Nationalist China’s sovereignty over Taiwan — despite a “US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty” which was explicitly limited to Taiwan and the Pescadores “administered by the Republic of China.”
** (Can we date this quote?), “Living in Penghu”, in Foundation for Scholarly Exchange (FSE) in Taiwan‎, archived from the original on 26 October 2022:Baisha is a rural township in Penghu County (the Pescadores). It is located to the north of Penghu Main Island and linked to Siyu Island by the Penghu Trans-Oceanic Bridge, which at 2.5 km (1.6 mi) long is the longest of its kind in East Asia.
** For more quotations using this term, see Citations:Pescadores.

#### Synonyms

* (from Mandarin Chinese) Penghu, P'eng-hu

#### Translations
### Further reading

* “Pescadores”, in Collins English Dictionary.
* “Pescadores”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
* “Pescadores” in TheFreeDictionary.com, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.: Farlex, Inc., 2003–2024.