Nankan Township is the political and cultural center of Matsu. Most of the tourist sites are located in Nankan, which is where you generally go to buy the specialty products and foods that Matsu is best known for.
2009 July 5, Annie Huang, “Taiwan islands blossom as China tensions ebb”, in San Diego Tribune[3], archived from the original on 10 September 2022[4]:
Since 2001, islanders and their immediate Chinese neighbors have been able to take the 90-minute boat ride between the Chinese port of Mawei and the Matsu town of Nankan, allowing people with the same ancestry to reunite after generations of estrangement. Now any Chinese or Taiwanese can make the trip.
2011, Chia-Hung Hsieh et al., “Population genetic structure of the newly invasive Q biotype of Bemisia tabaci in Taiwan”, in Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata, volume 138, number 3, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 264, column 2:
We collected B. tabaci Q biotype samples from eight sites (Figure 1), six of which (TTS, TMJ, TTG, TNP, TYY, and TTF) were ornamental greenhouses, one (TTN) an ornamental plant trade market, and one (TLM) a small island in Nankan Township, Lienchiang County, Taiwan.
2021 March 18, Ming-Te Tang, “Army Command issues a press release stating that "an armoured vehicle of the Matsu Defense Command was slightly damaged when it hit a slope. The driver and passengers were not injured."”, in Ministry of National Defense, Republic of China[5], archived from the original on 10 September 2022[6]:
ROC Army Matsu Defense Command states today (18th) that a CM21 Armored vehicle of the Nankan Garrison Brigade had accidentally and for unknown reasons bumped into a slope when it was going through drills for armored vehicles driving in the morning as it drove through Central Avenue and Shengtian Road of Nankan Township this morning (18th).
2021 April 27, George Liao, “Taiwan’s Matsu turns off street lights to see ‘blue tears’”, in Taiwan News[7], archived from the original on 27 April 2021[8]:
Nankan Township has even used light control measures in the daytime at certain sections of Jieshou Village, Fuxing Village, Meishi Village, and Renai Village since April 9.
Name Designation Lat. N. Long. E. Code[…] Matsu Island 26 10 119 56 eq Nan Kantang eq Nan-Kan-Tang CH Ma-tsu Shan eg[…] Nan Kantang—see Matsu cq[…] Nan-Kan-Tang—see Matsu CH]
No single island in the 19-islet group bears the name of Matsu[.] It is named after a harbor of Nankan, the main island of the group. Nankan is 114 nautical miles west of the northern Taiwan port of Chilung, and 114 nautical miles from Kinmen. Besides Nankan, other islands in the group are: Peikan, Kaoteng, Tungkun and Hsikun. Kaoteng is only 5 5 nautical miles from the closest mainland point and has been the occasional target of Communist gunners for years. The total land area is only 29 3 sq km. (11.3 sq. mi) Nankan alone has 4.03 sq. km. (10.44 sq mi.) of the total. Located in the fishing area of Fukien, the Matsus are naturally the home of a fishing population. On Nankan there are two good harbors, Fuyu and Matsu.
One hundred and fifty miles north of Quemoy on Nankan Island, it wasn't the sound of Communist artillery fire that awoke Lieutenant Colonel Carl Kueffer, but the persistent jangling of his telephone.[...]The one landing strip in the Matsus, and good for light aircraft only, was on the second largest island, Peikan. Between Nankan and Peikan lay the Matsu Straits, a twisted riptide-torn channel, boasting freak winds and bouldered shores.
1973 November 4, “Matsu is strong, prosperous”, in 自由中國週報 [Free China Weekly][12], volume XIV, number 43, Taipei, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 2, column 1:
Nankan, the biggest island, is 20,000 meters from the mainland. Kaoteng is only 9,000 meters offshore. In the 1950s, when the Communists were shelling Quemoy, shells aimed at Nankan fell into the ocean. Since then the Communists have extended the range of their artillery.[…] There has been no attempt to mount an amphibious assault on Matsu, and with good reason. Nankan is almost straight up and down and nearly devoid of landing places. Embryo beaches are guarded by barbed wire and mines. Traffic in and out of Nankan is by landing boat and planking. No wharves have been built.
Nankan Island is sometimes erroneously referred to as 'Matsu Island' because it's the largest island in the archipelago.[…] The 7km journey by boat between Nankan and Peikan takes either 10 or 40 minutes depending on which vessel you take.
Meanwhile, fishermen on the islands of Pei-kan, Nan-kan and Pai-chuan have asked Chinese troops for help in building cyclone shelters for their boats.]
2000 May, Keyuan Zou, “Redefining the Legal I Status of the Taiwan Strait”, in The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law[15], volume 15, number 2, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 247:
The main island of the complex is Nankan, more commonly known as Mazu, from the name of the major port of the island. It is 114 nautical miles north-west of Keelung, the port city on the northern tip of Taiwan, and is the same distance north of the Jinmen Islands. Other major islands of the group are Peikan, Kaoteng, Tungyin, Hsiyin, Tungchu and Hsichu. Nankan is the largest, with an area of 10.4 square kilometres.
2003 July 30, “President Chen Inspects the Matsu Defense Headquarters and Various Development Projects”, in Office of the President, Republic of China (Taiwan)[16], archived from the original on 10 September 2022[17]:
During the meeting, the private association members also came up with many suggestions, including building a bridge linking Matsu island group's Nankan and Peikan islets, expanding its airport capacity, setting up an offshore shipment center, allowing Taiwan people to travel to mainland China via Matsu and building large tourist vessels to attract Taiwan tourists to Matsu.
2007 April, Julie Grundvig, “TAIWAN”, in The Asia Book: A Journey Through Every Country in the Continent[18], →ISBN, →OCLC, page 104, columns 1, 2:
Matsu, goddess of the sea, is the most revered deity of Taiwan. Legend has it that Matsu was once a real person named Lin Mo, born to fisherfolk on Meizhou Island in Fujian, China. It is said that Lin Mo loved the sea and would often stand on the seashore and guide ships safely to shore. On a stormy night, Lin Mo drowned while saving a sailor and her body washed up on the shores of Nankan Island, Matsu, where she was buried by the villagers. Temples were built to honour the young woman and her popularity eventually spread as far as Japan and Southeast Asia. Today there are over 500 temples dedicated to her around Taiwan.
The main island of the complex is Nankan, more commonly known as Matsu, from the name of the major port of the island. It is 114 nautical miles northwest of Keelung, the port city on the northern tip of Taiwan, and is the same distance north of the Kinmen Islands. There are two harbors in Nankan: Fuwo and Matsu. Other major islands of the group are Peikan, Kaoteng, Tungyin, Hsiyin, Tungchu, and Hsichu. Nankan is the largest, with an area of 10.4 sq. km.
(Note: cf. 2000 May, Zou, Keyuan, “Redefining the Legal I Status of the Taiwan Strait”, in The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law above.)
2017 December, Jing-Yuan Chen et al., “Ages and petrogenesis of Jurassic and Cretaceous intrusive rocks in the Matsu Islands: Implications for lower crust modification beneath southeastern China”, in Journal of Asian Earth Sciences[20], volume 150, Elsevier, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC:
The gneissic granites (sample Ms04) and massive granites (sample Ms05a) are widespread in the Nankan Island. Gneissic granite has coarse-grained texture and gneissic structure.[…]The massive granites (sample Ms05a) with fine-grained texture in the Nankan Island are intruded by later diabases (sample Ms05b).
2020 August, Yuan Chung-Shin et al., “Spatiotemporal Variation and Chemical Fingerprints of Marine Fine Particles (PM2.5) at the Matsu Islands in Northern Taiwan Strait”, in Aerosol and Air Quality Research[21], volume 20, number 12, Taiwan Association for Aerosol Research, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 2720, column 1:
Furthermore, HYSPLIT was then used to plot the backward trajectories of air masses moving towards the Matsu Islands. For this particular study, 120-h backward trajectories starting from Nankan Island at three heights of 100, 200, and 300 m above the ground were plotted to simulate the transport routes of air parcels.
2020 October 26, Andrew Ryan, “More than 100 Chinese boats gather in Taiwanese waters near Matsu”, in Radio Taiwan International[22], archived from the original on 10 September 2022[23]:
Taiwan’s coast guard tells the ships that they’ve entered restricted waters and orders them to disperse. These ships began to gather in the early hours of Sunday morning, between the islands of Nankan and Juguang.
