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Angelo Zottoli and His Mission

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Angelo Zottoli, a Jesuit Missionary in China (1848 to 1902)

Part of the book series: Christianity in Modern China ((CMC))

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Abstract

This chapter offers a detailed biography of Fr. Angelo A. Zottoli S. J. (1826–1902) stemming from archival documents and other personal materials. It takes into consideration the relevance of the mission of the Society of Jesus in Xujiahui starting from the 1840s. It offers an unedited view on Zottoli’s personality, ideas and personal events. At the same time, it also shows how Zottoli had always a very close relationship both with his students in Shanghai and the Jesuit community in Italy, and in Naples in particular.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For a general view on the early missions of the Jesuits in China, see Ana Carolina Hosne, The Jesuit Missions to China and Peru, 1570–1610: Expectations and Appraisals of Expansionism (London: Routledge, 2013); Florence C. Hsia, Sojourners in a Strange Land: Jesuits and Their Scientific Missions in Late Imperial China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011); Ronnie Po-Chia Hsia, Matteo Ricci and the Catholic Mission to China, 1583–1610: A Short History with Documents (Cambridge: Hackett, 2016).

  2. 2.

    There are, however, significant books that have narrated, in general, the Jesuits in China after the suppression of the order. See Jesuit Survival and Restoration: A Global History, 1773–1900, edited by R. Maryks and J. Wright (Boston: Brill, 2014), 245–352; Anthony Clark, China's Saints: Catholic Martyrdom During the Qing (1644–1911) (Bethlehem: Lehigh University Press, 2011); Amanda C. R. Clark, China’s Last Jesuit. Charles J. McCarthy and the End of the Mission in Catholic Shanghai (London: Springer, 2017); David E. Mungello, The Catholic Invasion of China (London: Littlefield, 2015); David Strong, A Call to Mission: A History of the Jesuits in China, 1842–1954 (Adelaide: ATF, 2018), 2 vols.

  3. 3.

    On the restoration of the Society of Jesus refer to Maryks and Wright, eds., Jesuit Survival and Restoration: A Global History, 1773–1900.

  4. 4.

    For a more detailed analysis, see John T. P. Lai, Literary Representations of Christianity in Late Qing and Republican China (Boston: Brill, 2019); Joseph Tse-Hei Lee, The Bible and the Gun: Christianity in South China, 1860–1900 (London: Routledge, 2014); Salt and Light: More Lives of Faith That Shaped Modern China, edited by Carol Lee Hamrin and Stacey Bieler (Eugene: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2011), vol. 3. For the theological context, including also later periods, see Sinicizing Christianity, edited by Zheng Yangwen (Boston: Brill, 2017); Alexander Chow, Chinese Public Theology: Generational Shifts and Confucian Imagination in Chinese Christianity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018); Alexander Chow, Theosis, Sino-Christian Theology and the Second Chinese Enlightenment: Heaven and Humanity in Unity (New York: Springer, 2013).

  5. 5.

    For an account of the Franciscan missions and the Franciscan martyrs in China, see Anthony E. Clark, China’s Saints: Catholic Martyrdom During the Qing (1644–1911) (Bethlehem: Lexington Books, 2011), 27–58; 113–145. For an account of the later persecutions of Franciscans during the Boxer Uprising see Anthony E. Clark, Heaven in Conflict: Franciscans and the Boxer Uprising in Shanxi (Washington: University of Washington Press, 2015).

  6. 6.

    For the story of Salvetti and other Francisan missionaries in China read Henrietta Harrison, The Missionary’s Curse and Other Tales from a Chinese Catholic Village (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2013).

  7. 7.

    Ernest P. Young, Ecclesiastical Colony: China’s Catholic Church and the French Religious Protectorate (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).

  8. 8.

    Jean Charbonnier, Christians in China: A.D. 600 to 2000 (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2007), 319–349.

  9. 9.

    For a concise biography of de Poirot and an brief anthology of his texts on translation see Martha Cheung, An Anthology of Chinese Discourse on Translation: From the Late Twelfth Century to 1800 (London: Taylor & Francis, 2016), vol. 2, 146–148.

  10. 10.

    See Benjamin A. Elman, “The Jesuit Role as ‘Experts’ in High Qing Cartography and Technology”, Taida lishi xuebao 臺大歷史學報, vol. 31 (2004), 223–250.

  11. 11.

    Rule, “Restoration or New Creation? The Return of the Society of Jesus to China”, in Maryks and Wright, eds., Jesuit Survival and Restoration: A Global History, 1773–1900, 264.

  12. 12.

    Rule, “Restoration or New Creation? The Return of the Society of Jesus to China”, 269.

  13. 13.

    For understanding the role of Xu Guangqi’s image in the mission, see Hsin-fang Wu, “The Transmission of Memories: Reprints, Historical Studies, and Commemoration in the Jesuit Shanghai mission, 1842–1949”, Ph.D. dissertation, Pennsylvania State University, State College, United States of America, 2017, 138–174.

  14. 14.

    Agustín Udías, Jesuit Contribution to Science: A History (Boston: Springer, 2014), 144–145.

  15. 15.

    Colombel is also famous for being the main writer of the history of the Jesuit mission in Jiangnan see Augustin Colombel, Histoire de la mission de Kiang-nan (History of the (Jesuit) mission in Kiang-nan) (Shanghai: Imprimerie de la mission catholique à l'orphelinat de T'ou-sè-wè, 1899).

  16. 16.

    Agustín Udías, Jesuit Contribution to Science: A History (Boston: Springer, 2014), 145. For other information on the observatories, see Robert Bickers, “Meteorology on the China Coast 1869–1912”, in Treaty Ports in Modern China: Law, Land and Power, edited by Robert Bickers and Isabella Jackson (London: Routledge, 2016), 187–194. For a general accourt of the history of the observatory and its scientific relevance, see The Observatory of Zi-Ka-Wei. Fifty Years of Scientific Work (Paris: Imprimerie d'Art G. Bouan, 1929).

  17. 17.

    See “The Transmission of Memories”, 23–28. See also Hui-Lan H. Titangos, “Xujiahui Library: A Cultural Crossroads Between East and West”, Chinese Librarianship: An International Electronic Journal, no. 41 (2016), 1–19.

  18. 18.

    For a study of the workshop created in Tu Shanwan and its heritage in Europe, especially Brussels, see William Ma, “From Shanghai to Brussels: The Tushanwan Orphanage Workshops and the Carved Ornaments of the Chinese Pavilion at Laeken Park”, in Beyond Chinoiserie. Artistic Exchange Between China and the West During the Late Qing Dynasty (1796–1911), edited by Petra ten-Doesschate Chu and Jennifer Milam (Boston: Brill, 2018), 268–296.

  19. 19.

    See Wu, “The Transmission of Memories”, 28–31.

  20. 20.

    For more information about Liu Dezhai’s life and his main works, see Zhang Wei 張偉, Xifeng Dongjian: Wan Qing Minchu Shanghai yiwenjie 西風東漸: 晚清民初上海藝文界 (Western styles gradually coming eastward: artistic circles in Shanghai during the late Qing and early Republican  period) (Taipei: Yaoyouguang, 2013), 22–37. For the general artistic environment in the same period and the contribution of Liu Dezhai to artistic movements in Shanghai, see Lai Yu-chih, “Hokusai à Shanghai: Ren Bonian et la Culture Populaire Japanaise,” Li Weikun, Lai Yu-Chih, Clarissa Von Spee, Éric Lefebvre and Jean-François Allain, L'école de Shanghai: 1840–1920, Peintures et calligraphies du musée de Shanghai (The School of Shanghai: 1840–1920, Paintings and Calligraphy from the Shanghai Museum) (Paris: Paris Musées, 2013), 26–37.

  21. 21.

    Zhang, Xifeng Dongjian, 19.

  22. 22.

    Jian Gong, “Modern Transformations of Visuality in Late Qing China: Gong Zizhen, Ren Bonian, and Kang Youwei”, Ph.D dissertation, University of New South Wales, Sydney, 2016, 139–140. See also Craig Clunas, Chinese Painting and Its Audiences (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017), 150.

  23. 23.

    Gong, “Modern Transformations of Visuality in Late Qing China”, 161.

  24. 24.

    Gong, “Modern Transformations of Visuality in Late Qing China”, 164.

  25. 25.

    Fernando Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina. I gesuiti nel Ciannan, nel Celì e nel Cuantun. Dal loro ritorno in Cina alla divisione del Ciannan in tre Missioni indipendenti (1842–1922), (Fights and Triumphs in China. The Jesuits in Ciannan, Celi and Cuantun. From Their Return in China to the Divison of the Ciannan into Three Indipendent Missions, 1842–1922) (Frosinone: Abbazia di Casamari, 1975), 782.

  26. 26.

    Zhang, Xifeng Dongjian, 35.

  27. 27.

    Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina, 195.

  28. 28.

    As documented in Giovanni Battista Rossi, Cenni Storici dei cinque fratelli Massa (Historical Mentions on the Five Massa Brothers) (Naples: Marchese, 1879).

  29. 29.

    Cited in Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina, 126. See also David Strong, A Call to Mission, vol. 1, 35. See also: la Servière, Histoire de la mission du Kiang-nan: Jésuites de la province de France (Paris) 1840–1899 (History of the mission of Kiang-nan: The Jesuit missionaries of the French province (Paris) 1840–1899) (Shanghai: l'Orphelinat de Tóu-sè-we, 1840), vol. 1, 1914, 169. The precise dates for the arrival of these and other missionaries have been retrieved from the following catalogue: Catalogus defunctorum in renata Societate Iesu ab a. 1814 ad a. 1970  (Catalogue of the deceased [Jesuits] from the reestablished Society of Jesus, from 1814 until 1970), edited by Rufo Mendizábal (Rome: Apud Curiam P. Gen., 1972).

  30. 30.

    Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina, 305.

  31. 31.

    Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina, 305.

  32. 32.

    la Servière, Histoire de la mission du Kiang-nan, vol. 2, 157.

  33. 33.

    For a biography in Italian, see Antonio De Caro, “Angelo Zottoli (1826–1902)”, Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Rome Treccani, vol. 100, (2020), 804–807.

  34. 34.

    Although Monsignor Zottoli was a famous figure and was titular bishop of Anastasiopolis, that can be identified with the province of Buru-Kalesi, in Greece, appointed officially on September 17, 1838, the information on him is scattered. For a concise mention of his activities in Anastasiopolis, see Dizionario di erudizione storico-ecclesiastica da S. Pietro sino ai nostri (Dictionary of historical-ecclesiastical erudition from St. Peter until our (ecclesiastical members)), edited by Gaetano Moroni Romano (Venice: Emiliana, 1893), vol. 2, 39 (entry Anastasiopoli). Giuseppe Cappelletti, Le chiese d’Italia dalla loro origine sino ai nostri giorni (The churches of Italy from their origins until our time) (Venice: Antonelli, 1866), vol. 20, 323.

  35. 35.

    See Antonio De Caro, “The Ruist Way of Heaven and the Jesuit Way to Heaven. Cosmogonic Meditations by Fr. Angelo A. Zottoli S. J. (Chao De Li 晁德蒞, 1826–1902)”, Ph.D dissertation, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong S.A.R, 2019, 51–57.

  36. 36.

    Lettere Edificanti della Provincia Napoletana della Compagnia di Gesù (Edifying Letters for the Neapolitan Province of the Society of Jesus) (Naples: Ricciardi, 1874-1901), 9 vols., vol. 9, 129–130.

  37. 37.

    Lettere Edificanti della Provincia Napoletana, vol. 9, 139–140.

  38. 38.

    Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina, 127.

  39. 39.

    Bortone, Lotte e trionfi in Cina, 767.

  40. 40.

    Lettere Edificanti della Provincia Napoletana, vol. 7, (1895), 49.

  41. 41.

    There is a play on words here since agnello, the father’s name, means lamb in Italian.

  42. 42.

    Lettere Edificanti della Provincia Napoletana, vol. 7, (1895), 53–54.

  43. 43.

    As described in Nicholas Morrow Williams, “Angelo Zottoli's Cursus Litteraturæ Sinicæ as Propaedeutic to Chinese Classical Tradition”, Monumenta Serica, vol. 63, no. 2 (2015), 327–359.

  44. 44.

    For the interaction between Zottoli and Ma Xiangbo, see Peter Pevarelli, The History of Modern Chinese Grammar Studies (London: Springer, 2015), 39; Jiang Youguo, Liberal Arts Education in a Changing Society. A New Perspective on Chinese Higher Education (London: Brill, 2014), 76–78; Zou Zhenhuan 鄒振環, “Ma Xiangbo yu ‘Ladingwentong’” 馬相伯與 拉丁文通 (Ma Xiangbo and the Institutio Grammatica), Fudan Journal of Social Sciences, no. 6 (2005), 112–113; Jean Paul Wiest, “Ma Xiangbo. Pioneer of Educational Reform”, Salt and Light: More Lives of Faith That Shaped Modern China, edited by Carol Lee Hamrin and Stacey Bieler, (Eugene: Pickwick, 2010), vol. 2, 42–43; John C. England, Asian Christian Theologies: Northeast Asia (New Delhi: ISPK, 2002), vol. 3, 46; Jiang Youguo 姜有國, Yesuhui zaihua gaodengjiaoyushi: shiming yu chuancheng (1594–1952) 耶穌會在華高等教育史: 使命與傳承 (1594–1952) (Jesuit Higher Education in China: Mission and Transmission, 1594–1952) (Xinbei: Fuda shufang, 2016), 153–154.

  45. 45.

    See also Liu Jinyu 刘津瑜, “Chao Deli, Ma shi xiongdi he ladingwen”  晁德蒞、馬氏兄弟和拉丁文 (“Zottoli, the Ma Brothers, and Latin”), Wenhuibao xueren zhuankan 文匯報·學人專刊 2015, 11.

  46. 46.

    Jiang Youguo, “Liberal Arts in China’s Modern Universities: Lessons from the Great Catholic Educator and Statesman, Ma Xiangbo”, Frontiers of Education in China, vol. 7, no. 3 (2012), 293.

  47. 47.

    See Li Tiangang 李天綱, Xinyang yu chuantong—Maxiangbo de zongjiao shengya 信仰與傳統–馬相伯的宗教生涯 (Faith and tradition: Ma Xiangbo's religious career) (Shanghai: Fudan daxue chubanshe, 1996), 1237.

  48. 48.

    According to David Strong, Zottoli influenced Ma Xiangbo in his decision to enter the novitiate in March 1862. See David Strong, A Call to Mission (Adelaide: ATF, 2018), vol. 1, 148.

  49. 49.

    Li, Xinyang yu chuantong, 1242.

  50. 50.

    See Li, Xinyang yu chuantong, 1242.

  51. 51.

    See Jonathan Spence, The Taiping Vision of a Christian China. 1836–1864 (Waco: Markham Press Fund, 1998); Carl S. Kilcourse, Taiping Theology: The Localization of Christianity in China. 1843–64 (Boston: Springer, 2016).

  52. 52.

    See Lettere Edificanti della Provincia Napoletana, vol. 8, 142.

  53. 53.

    The original text is as follows (my translation above):

    P. ANGELO ZOTTOLI S. J.

    VIRO SPECTABILI ET RELIGIOSISSIMO

    LITTERARUM MORUMQUE SINENSIUM PERITISSIMO

    STRENUO CATHOLICAE FIDEI PROPAGATORI

    L ANNOS

    A FELICI IN SINAS ADVENTU EXPLENTI

    JUNIORES SCHOLASTICI NEAP. PROV.

    LAETO ANIMO GRATULANTUR

    EIQUE FAUSTA OMNIA IN ANNOS PLURIMOS

    ADPRECANTUR.

  54. 54.

    The original text is as follows (my translation above):

    NEAPOLITANAE MATERNAE PROVINCIAE

    IUNIORIBUS SCHOLASTICIS

    EXUL SINENSIS

    LONGE DISTRACTIS SALUTEM

    MINORIBUS FRATRIBUS AMOREM

    BENEVOLENTISSIMIS GRATIAS

    QUAMPLURIMAS PIA PIAE JUVENTUTIS MATER

    MATERNO MULCE AFFECTU

    IUNIORES.

  55. 55.

    Lettere Edificanti della Provincia Napoletana, vol. 8, 138.

  56. 56.

    See “Tianzhujiao xiushi jingzhuang Chao gong zhi mu” 天主教修士敬莊晁公之墓 (The tomb of the Roman Catholic Monk, the Much Respected and Solemnly honored Elder Chao, [i.e., Chao Deli, or Angelo Zottoli]) Ren guo liu hen. Faguo Yesuhui dang’anguan Shanghai Yesuhui xiushimu mubei tapian 人過留痕。法國耶穌會檔案館上海耶穌會修士墓墓碑拓片 (Traces as left: rubbings of tombstones of Shanghai Jesuit Brothers in the French Jesuit Archives) edited by Ye Nong 葉農 and Shao Jian 邵建 (Macau-Shanghai: Jinan daxue Aomen yanjiuyuan, Aomen jijinhui, Shanghai shehui kexueyuan lishi yanjiusuo, 2020), 88.

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  1. Centre for Early Medieval Studies, Department of Art History, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic

    Antonio De Caro

  2. Department of Chinese Studies, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic

    Antonio De Caro

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De Caro, A. (2022). Angelo Zottoli and His Mission. In: Angelo Zottoli, a Jesuit Missionary in China (1848 to 1902). Christianity in Modern China. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-5297-4_1

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