TY - JOUR AU - Folch, Dolors PY - 2018/07/06 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Martín de Rada’s Book Collection JF - Sinología hispánica. China Studies Review JA - Sinología hispánica VL - 6 IS - 1 SE - DO - 10.18002/sin.v6i1.5485 UR - https://revpubli.unileon.es/index.php/sinologia/article/view/5485 SP - 1-26 AB - <p><span style="font-size: xx-small;">This article will explore the library of the most important of the 16th century Manila based Augustinians, fray Martin de Rada, a well known cosmographer, mathematician and astronomer. </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">After spending more than five years in Mexico, </span></span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">and ten in the Philippines, in 1575 he was </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">assigned to the first Spanish expedition to China and wrote a highly influential </span></span><em><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">Relación </span></span></em><span style="font-size: xx-small;">about it. From his own letters —14 of them extant—, the letters of his contemporaries about Rada —from </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">Manila, Mexico and Spain—, and the </span></span><em><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">Relación </span></span></em><span style="font-size: xx-small;">of </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">his fellow traveler to China, Miguel de Loarca, </span></span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">we are able to disentangle his main intellectual interests and the contents of his library: what he </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">wrote —both in Mexico and Asia—, the significance of the scientific works that he took with him to Asia, the importance of the Chinese maps with <span style="font-size: xx-small;">which he worked while in Manila —before and </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">after his travel to China—, what books he bought in China and what use did he make of them, and </span></span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">the last works in which he was working before </span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS,Trebuchet MS; font-size: xx-small;">his death. This gives Rada a strong intellectual profile that has to be compared with that of his </span></span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">contemporary, the Jesuit Matteo Ricci. </span></span></span></p> ER -