Makassar, (Buginese-Makassarese language: ᨀᨚᨈ ᨆᨀᨔᨑ sometimes spelled Macassar, Mangkasara) is the provincial capital of South Sulawesi, Indonesia, and the largest city on Sulawesi Island. From 1971 to 1999, the city was named Ujung Pandang, after a precolonial fort in the city, and the two names are often used interchangeably. The port city is located at 5°8′S 119°25′E / 5.133°S 119.417°E / -5.133; 119.417Coordinates: 5°8′S 119°25′E / 5.133°S 119.417°E / -5.133; 119.417, on the southwest coast of the island of Sulawesi, facing the Makassar Strait.

Its area is 175.77 km² and has population of around 1.4 million.

Beginning in the sixteenth century, Makassar was the dominant trading center of eastern Indonesia, and soon became one of the largest cities in island Southeast Asia. The Makassarese kings maintained a policy of free trade, insisting on the right of any visitor to do business in the city, and rejecting the attempts of the Dutch to establish a monopoly over the city.

The trade in spices figured prominently in the history of Sulawesi, which involved frequent struggles between rival native and foreign powers for control of the lucrative during the pre-colonial and colonial period, when spices from the region were in high demand in the West. Much of South Sulawesi's early history was written in old texts that can be traced back to the 13th and 14th centuries.