Joseph-Marie Amiot

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Joseph-Marie Amiot

Joseph-Marie Amiot (born February 8, 1718 in Toulon , † October 8 or 9, 1793 in Beijing ) was a French Jesuit , astronomer and historian . His works on Chinese music are among the first serious musicological works by a European scholar on non-European music.

Life

In 1737 Amiot entered the novitiate of the Jesuit order and was ordained a priest in Lyon in December 1746 . During his training, he had expressed a desire to be sent to China as a missionary . This request was granted and, accompanied by two Chinese Jesuit novices , he left the port of Lorient in December 1749 and reached Macau on July 27, 1750. The following year he continued his journey to Beijing, where he met on August 22, 1751 arrived and stayed until the end of his life.

At the court of Emperor Qianlong (1736–1796) he worked in the Forbidden City as an astronomer and researcher. He was one of the first through whom Europe received more precise information about the peoples of East Asia, as he thematized and vividly portrayed the antiquities, history, Manchurian language and arts of the Chinese in all of his publications . This also included a collection of transcriptions of Chinese flute music for the European recorder, known as "Airs chinois". In 1772 he translated "The Art of War" (chin. 孫子兵 法, "Sūnzǐ bīngfǎ") by Sunzi into French and made this book known for the first time in Europe under the title Treize Articles ("Thirteen Articles").

At the age of 75, Joseph-Marie Amiot died in 1793 as the last survivor of the Jesuit mission in China and found his final resting place in the Jesuit cemetery in Beijing.

Works (selection)

  • Mémoires concernant l'histoire les sciences et les arts des Chinois . Nyon, Paris 1776–1814 (15 vols.)
  • The life of Confucius (vol. 12 of the Mémoires sur les Chinois )
  • Dictionnaíre tatar-mantchou-francais , Nyon, Paris 1789 (3 vol.)
  • Grammaire de la langue tatare-mantchoue .
  • Mémoire sur la musique des Chinois, tant anciens que modern . Minkoff, Geneva 1973 (repr. Of the Paris 1779 edition)
  • ( Qianlong :) Éloge de la ville de Moukden , translated from the Chinese 1770 digitized
  • Art militaire des Chinois , 1772; Plusieurs ouvrages sur la Typographie et la Musique des Chinois
  • Divertissements ou concerts de musique chinoise , en deux fois trois cahiers, accompagnés d'un cahier de musique sacrée (prières catholiques en chinois mis en musique, envoyés à Mr. Bignon, bibliothécaire du Roi) unpublished.

literature

Web links

Commons : Joseph-Marie Amiot  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Amiot, Joseph-Marie
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Amiot, Joseph
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French Jesuit and China traveler
DATE OF BIRTH February 8, 1718
PLACE OF BIRTH Toulon , France
DATE OF DEATH October 8, 1793 or October 9, 1793
Place of death Beijing , Chinese Empire