Matteo Ripa

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Matteo Ripa ( Chinese  馬國賢 , Pinyin Ma Guoxian , born March 29, 1682 in Eboli , † March 29, 1746 in Naples ) was an Italian missionary and orientalist. He worked as a painter and engraver under the Chinese emperor Kangxi . After his return from China he founded the Collegio dei Cinesi in Naples . From these beginnings, the Regio Istituto Orientale and the Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli developed , which ultimately laid the foundation for the University of Naples L'Orientale . The development of the English Gardens was also influenced by his engravings.

Matteo Ripa

Life

Early career and trip to China

Coat of arms of the Barons of Ripa

Ripa was born in Eboli into a noble Apulian family. His parents were the doctor Gianfilippo Ripa, Baron di Pianchetelle, and Antonia Longo. Matteo spent his youth with his brothers Tommaso, Diego and Lorenzo in the medieval village, which is overlooked by a Norman castle. It is said that he had a penchant for art from an early age. At that time, however, the son of a baron was not only allowed to indulge in the “piaceri dell'ozio” (the muse), which is why he was prepared for a career as a lawyer. The Kingdom of Naples was deeply moved by a missionary consciousness at this time, and Ripa was also inspired by an idea religiosa . He entered a secular missionary institute . During his study stay in Rome he was confronted with the problem of the rite dispute , as a result of which the Jesuits were banned from their activities in China by the Holy See in 1704: Clement XI. sent a delegation under Charles Thomas Maillard de Tournon to China to clarify these questions (1705-1706).

Matteo Ripa was ordained on May 28, 1705 and called in 1707 to travel with the group of missionaries of the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide to convey to Tournon the appointment as cardinal, which had been made on August 1, 1704. Gennaro Amodei, Giuseppe Cerù, Domenico Perroni and the French Guglielmo Fabre-Bonjour traveled with him on an English boat that left London on April 6, 1708. However, the missionaries traveled without revealing their Catholic views. They reached Manila in the Philippines in June 1709 . They had to wait until the beginning of November before they could embark for Macau on a boat made available to them by the Spanish governor. They set off under the leadership of the Lazarist Teodorico Pedrini , who had arrived in Manila two years earlier.

At the beginning of 1710 they reached Macau, where they finally met on Tournon, who, however, had already been removed from office as a legate and had been placed under house arrest by the Portuguese. Shortly after the legate's death, on June 8th, Ripa was appointed to the court of the Chinese Emperor Kangxi together with Pedrini and Bonjour . There he worked for thirteen years (February 1711 - November 1723) as a painter and engraver for the emperor.

At the Chinese imperial court

In the Summer Palace in Jehol, Manchuria , Ripa made 36 engravings of views of the palace and printed engravings, which the emperor distributed to his family members. He had to overcome great difficulties in setting up the printing press and procuring the materials that he needed to produce the engravings. When he returned to Europe, he brought copies of Jehol's views with him.

He also vigorously pursued his idea of ​​evangelizing China. Despite some conflicts, he tried to open a school in Beijing to train young Chinese who were supposed to spread Christianity among their compatriots, a project that the Lazarist Ludovico Antonio Appiani had also pursued a few years earlier. In November 1723, however, he decided to return to Italy and implement an idea that would not leave him for the rest of his life: the establishment of the Collegio dei Cinesi di Napoli . To this end, he brought four young Chinese with him: Giovanni Guo (approx. 1700–1763), Giovanni Yin (approx. 1704–1735), Philipo Huang (approx. 1711–1776) and Lucio Wu (approx. 1712–1763), as well an adult compatriot who was a master of mandarin . His intention was to give the boys in Italy a religious education. On the way back through Canton and London they were even from George I received.

Foundation of the Collegio dei Cinesi in Naples

After their arrival in Italy in November 1724, this group formed the core of the Collegio dei Cinesi . After some difficulties, the college was on April 7, 1732 by Clemens XII. recognized with a Breve Apostolico . In the 1930s Ripa also acted as an advisor to the Propaganda Fide on the issue of the rite dispute, which was finally resolved in 1742 by the papal bull Ex quo singulari . Ripa died on March 29, 1746, his 64th birthday.

The college

A Konvikt for the training of young Neapolitans belonged to the college. Among other things, the doctor of the church Alfonso Maria de Liguori was trained there in the 18th century . After the unification of Italy in 1868, there were initially efforts to close the monastery. However, it was successfully defended by lawyers Filippo de Blasio , Giuseppe Cavallo and Antonio Tagliamonte . Later, the Collegio dei Cinesi was converted into the Real Collegio Asiatico and finally became the Istituto Orientale after a reform under Francesco De Sanctis . After the institution gave up its missionary orientation, it was placed on an equal footing with other state universities. The governor of Shanxi Province once described the importance of Ripa: “He enriched the mosaic of the missionary tradition of Campania by introducing a special interest in China that runs through the ages (...), he has established that the Traces on this earth that this Salerni missionary left are indelible and that the many schools that are dedicated to him testify to this. "

The Collegio dei Cinesi was founded to secure the religious education of young Chinese converts to priests and to spread Catholicism in China. To this end, he has always trained translators and experts in the languages ​​of India and China. The graduates often found employment in the services of the Ostend company , which at the instigation of Emperor Charles VI. formed in the Austrian Netherlands to promote trade with the Far East. At that time, the Kingdom of Naples was linked to the Netherlands by the Habsburgs.

The Chinese students

All four of Ripa's Chinese seminarians were ordained - Giovanni Gu and Giovanni Yin in 1734, Philipo Huang and Lucio Wu in 1741 - three of whom returned to China.

Ripa severely punished Lucio Wu several times for insubordination and finally instructed Propaganda Fide in June 1744 not to send the young priest to China because of his "immaturity". Devastated, Lucio fled the seminary and disappeared until Ripa found him in the monastery of Monte Cassino the following spring. Ripa punished him again and again the young man fled. It was in September 1745 in Senigallia arrested, where he forged papers of a priest by the Papal States was traveling and had held in various churches fairs. This time he was sentenced to one year imprisonment in the Collegio dei Cinesi . However, this was not enough for Ripa. In a letter dated March 29, 1746 - the day he died - he demanded life imprisonment for the Chinese priest from Propaganda Fide. The cardinals agreed and Lucio was imprisoned in Rome in Castel Sant'Angelo . His appeals for clemency were rejected by the Propaganda Fide, especially since Ripa's successor, Fr. Fatigati, shared the negative opinion. Lucio Wu died in Italy in 1763.

The diary

What is remarkable in the biography of Matteo Ripa is the fact that, despite a relatively short stay at the Imperial Court in Beijing, he has compiled a large amount of material for the propaganda fide. Among other things, he kept a detailed diary in Beijing in which he recorded all events, conversations, documents and discussions and which provides a comprehensive picture of the various protagonists. For several years, Ripa, together with his friend Teodorico Pedrini, was the only one who did not live as a Jesuit at the court of Kangxi and who was able to offer a view of the mission in China that was clearly different from the officially offered version. In the period immediately after his return to Italy, his diary provided a lot of first-hand information that was published in many papers and letters. The Propaganda Fide, which also consulted him, used it to draft the Bull Ex Quo Singulari 1742, which finally condemned the Chinese rites. In addition, his diary, which he edited in Naples in the 1930s, is an important source for historical research on the mission.

Works

  • Giornale (1705-1724) , Vol. I, Testo critico, note e appendice documentaria di Michele Fatica, Istituto Universitario Orientale, Collana “Matteo Ripa” XIV, Napoli 1991
  • Giornale (1705–1724) , Vol. II, Testo critico, note e appendice documentaria di Michele Fatica, Istituto Universitario Orientale, Collana “Matteo Ripa” XIV, Napoli 1996
  • Storia della fondazione della Congregazione e del Collegio de 'Cinesi sotto il titolo della Sacra Famiglia di GC scritta dallo stesso fondatore Matteo Ripa e de' viaggi da lui fatti . 3 volumi, Napoli, dalla tipografia Manfredi, 1832, contiene:
    • vol. I: Dalla sua vocazione sino allo stabilimento della scuola a Pekin
    • vol. II: Dallo stabilimento della scuola in Pekin fino alla solenne apertura in questa Congregazione e del Collegio in Napoli
    • vol. III: Il quale contiene quel che avvenne dopo la solenne apertura della fondazione fino agli ultimi anni, in cui potei notare queste memorie

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ impreziosisce il mosaico della tradizione missionaria campana, lasciando intravedere un particolare interest per la Cina che ha attraversato le various epoch (...), ricordando che sono indelebili le tracce lasciate nella sua terra da quest'intrepido missionario salernitano e che an moltora oggi sono scuole a lui dedicate ; Italian translation: Alfonso Raimo (direttore regional Centri missionari diocesani Campania)
  2. ↑ David E. Mungello: The Great Encounter of China and the West, 1500-1800. Rowman & Littlefield, 2005, ISBN 0-7425-3815-X , pp. 119-123 ( online ).
  3. ↑ by his brother Abbè Platel: Memoires Historiques , 1744, 1766

literature

  • G. De Vincentiis: Documenti e titoli sul privato fondatore dell'attuale R. Istituto (antico Collegio dei Cinesi in Napoli): Matteo Ripa sulle missioni in Cina nel secolo XVIII e sulla costituzione e consistenza patrimoniale dell'antica fondazione. Napoli, 1904.
  • G. Di Fiore: La Legazione Mezzabarba in Cina (1720-1721). Istituto Universitario Orientale, Collana "Matteo Ripa" VII, Napoli 1989.
  • P. Dreyfus: Matteo Ricci. Le jésuite qui voulait convertir la Chine. Parigi, Éditions du Jubilé, 2004.
  • Michele Fatica: L'Istituto Orientale di Napoli come sede di scambio culturale tra Italia e Cina nei secoli XVIII e XIX. In: Scritture di storia. n. 2, 2001, pp. 83-121.
  • M. Fatica: Le sedi dell'Istituto Universitario Orientale (1729-2000). Istituto Universitario Orientale, Napoli, 2002.
  • M. Fatica: Matteo Ripa e il Collegio dei Cinesi di Napoli (1682–1869), percorso documentario e iconografico, catalogo della Mostra. Archivio di Stato di Napoli, November 18, 2006–31. March 2007, Napoli, 2006.
  • M. Fatica: Note sul viaggio di Pietro Guo in Italia, 1859-1860. In: Scritture di storia. n. 2, 2001, pp. 49-83.
  • C. Malpica: Il Collegio de 'Cinesi in Napoli. L'apostolo. In: Poliorama pittoresco. n. 41 del 25 maggio 1839, pp. 324–326.
  • F. Prandi: Matteo Ripa. Memoirs of Father Ripa, during Thirteen Years' Residence at the Court of Peking in the Service of the Emperor of China. With an account of the foundation of the college for the education of young Chinese at Naples. Selected and translated from the Italian by Fortunato Prandi. Elibron Classics, 2002 (riedizione dell'originale curato nel 1844 a Londra da John Murray).
  • G. Nardi: Cinesi a Napoli. 268 S., Ed. Dehoniane, Napoli, 1976.
  • Kwok Philip: Napoli e la Cina. 79 pp.
  • Kwok Philip: Napoli e la Cina dal settecento agli inizi del secolo. 80 p., L, Regina Editore, Napoli, 1982.
  • N. Nicolini: L'Istituto Orientale di Napoli: origine e statuto. Tipografia di F. Giannini & figli, Napoli, 1942 / XX.

See also

Web links

Commons : Matteo Ripa  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Ripa, Matteo
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 馬國賢; Ma Guoxian; Ma ko hsian (Chinese)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian missionary and orientalist
DATE OF BIRTH March 29, 1682
PLACE OF BIRTH Eboli
DATE OF DEATH March 29, 1746
Place of death Naples