Frois, Luis
Very rare Portuguese edition of a collection of letters from Japan and India written by Jesuit missionaries and notable Japanese kirishitans. It includes the 1589 and 1590 annual letters from Japan by Luís Fróis (1532-1597), addressed to Alessandro Valignano, Visitor of the East Indies, in Rome.
Further images
12mo, (132 x 89 mm). 64 ff., title with woodcut Jesuit device; verso of f.27 with full-page woodcut of the cross. Handsome binding by Aquarius, full red panelled calf, richly gilt. Top edges closely shaved, with resultant occasional partial loss of headline or numbering, first three leaves with tiny hole in outer margin away from printed text, last few leaves with faint water staining, otherwise a fine example.
Fróis, who had arrived in Japan via Goa and Macau in 1563, was the author of the important Historia de Iapam. The collection also includes Portuguese translations letters sent to Pope Sisto V by Dom Protasio, Arima Harunobu (有⾺ 晴信), the daimyo (feudal lord) who ruled the Arima domain in Kyushu and was a prominent Christian convert, and by Dom Sancho, Ōmura Yoshiaki (1568–1616), the son and successor of Dom Bartolomeu. There is also a report from the court of the Gran Mogor (Mughal Empire) by Pedro Martin, along with two brief pieces pertaining to Jalaladin Muhammad (Akbar the Great).
Provenance: from the collection of Nicolas Ingleton, Australia.
Not in Cordier, BJ.
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