The Aboriginal Frontier

Throughout the Qing period, the relationship between Han settlers and Taiwan's indigenous peoples was defined by an official boundary — the 'savage boundary' (番界) — a line of earthen mounds, ditches, and guard posts stretching across the island's western foothills. East of this line lay the territories of indigenous communities whom the Qing classified as 'raw savages' (生番), largely beyond imperial control; to the west spread the Han-settled plains, where 'cooked savages' (熟番) — indigenous groups that had adopted Han customs and paid taxes — occupied an increasingly precarious middle ground.

This frontier was never stable. Generation after generation, Han settlers pushed eastward in search of arable land and the island's lucrative camphor forests, encroaching on indigenous hunting grounds and provoking violent confrontations. The Qing authorities alternated between enforcing the boundary to maintain order and quietly tolerating its violation to collect land taxes from newly cleared fields. For plains-dwelling indigenous peoples, the result was a slow dispossession: their communal lands were absorbed through lease agreements, intermarriage, and outright seizure, gradually eroding their cultural and economic autonomy.

The Mudan Incident of 1874 — when Japan launched a punitive expedition into southern Taiwan after Paiwan warriors killed shipwrecked Ryukyuan sailors — exposed the consequences of Qing neglect. Japan's intervention demonstrated that territories the Qing claimed but did not effectively govern could become pretexts for foreign aggression. The crisis prompted Shen Baozhen's 'open the mountains, pacify the savages' (開山撫番) campaign, a belated and often brutal effort to extend roads, military posts, and administrative control into the island's mountainous interior.