Nicolas Trigault
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nicolas Trigault (1577-1629) was a French Jesuit, and a missionary to China. He was also known for his latinised name Trigautius or Trigaultius.
Born in Douai (then part of the Spanish Netherlands), he became a Jesuit in 1594. He arrived at Nanking in 1611, and began his missionary work there. He died at Hangzhou, China.
Trigault edited, translated (from Italian into Latin), and published in 1605 Matteo Ricci's "China Journal", or De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas susce pta ab Societate Jesu. The work was translated into many European languages and widely read.
He produced the first system of Chinese Romanisation in 1626, in his work Xiru Ermu Zi (西儒耳目資 "Aid to the Eyes and Ears of Western Literati"). Aided by a converted Chinese, he also produced the first Chinese version of Aesop's Fables (況義 "Analogy"), published in 1625.
[edit] External links
- Biography in Chinese at the National Digital Library of China
- Bibliographical information of Xiru Ermu Zi at the Ricci 21st Century Roundtable database, supported only by 5.0 or later versions of Internet Explorer
- Facsimile of Xiru Ermu Zi at Gallica
