The Jesuits, the Padroado and East Asian Science (1552-1773)

Book excerpt: At the end of the 15th century, Portugal was given the oversight (Padroado) of all Catholic missions in Asia. The Society of Jesus played a major role in this enterprise of evangelization, which in Jesuit hands led to the transmission of major elements of European mathematical sciences to East Asia. The essays in this volume present important new data and analysis on the extent to and ways in which Jesuit scientific culture and Portuguese policies regarding education, trade and mission shaped the reception of OC Western learningOCO in China, Japan, Korea and Vietnam in the early modern period. Sample Chapter(s). Foreword (89 KB). The Jesuit Mathematicians of the Portuguese Assistancy and the Portuguese Historians of Mathematics (1819-1940) (279 KB). Contents: The Jesuit Mathematicians of the Portuguese Assistancy and the Portuguese Historians of Mathematics (1819OCo1940) (L M R Saraiva); The Jesuit College in Macao as a Meeting Point of the European, Chinese and Japanese Mathematical Traditions. Some Remarks on the Present State of Research, Mainly Concerning Sources (16thOCo17th Centuries) (U Baldini); The Transmission of Western Cosmology to 16th Century Japan (R Hiraoka); The Contents and Context of Manuel Dias' Tianwenle (H Leituo); The Textual Tradition of Manuel Dias' Tianwenle (R Magone); Restoring the Unity of the World: Fang Yizhi and Jie Xuan's Responses to Aristotelian Natural Philosophy (J Lim); Traditional Vietnamese Astronomy in Accounts of Jesuit Missionaries (A Volkov); Tom(r) Pereira (1645OCo1708), Clockmaker, Musician and Interpreter at the Kangxi Court: Portuguese Interests and the Transmission of Science (C Jami); The Yuzhi Lixiang Kaocheng Houbian in Korea (Y Shi). Readership: Advanced undergraduate and graduate students and researchers of the history of science, particularly East Asian science and Eastern and Western science relations; researchers on the history of the Society of Jesus."