WESTERN COUNTRIES IN CHINESE JESUIT SOURCES OF THE 17TH

CENTURY

From the end of the 16th century, Jesuit missionaries went East and enteredthe Chinese Empire to spread the Catholic gospel. They soon discovered that the Chinese were «slow to take a salutary spiritual potion, unless [...]seasoned with an intellectual flavoring» (Mungello, 1989 [1985]: 72-73).
Therefore, it is well known how the Jesuits, apart from writing and translating books on religion, began to use science to captivate the interest of the Chinese literati. Geography was one of the main scientific topics that missionaries focused on during their work of cultural accommodation. They discovered that Chinese literati were interested to acquire knowledge, for various reasons, about Western countries. This lecture will shortly describe the main works in the field of Geography made by Jesuits missionaries describing the Western cartographic discoveries to Chinese, taking into consideration some previous key studies, then giving some examples of how these atlases and maps became a place of cultural encounter.

Speaker: Associate Professor Paolo De Troia. The Italian Institute of Oriental Studies, Sapienza University of Rome.

Time: 6-7pm, Thursday 17 November 2022

          7.30pm, Complimentary Chinese Buffet

Venue: 004 Theatre, UCD Confucius Institute for Ireland; Please register (opens in a new window)here if attending in person

            Hybrid event, click (opens in a new window)here for Zoom link