Michał Boym

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Michał Boym on a woodcut from 1667

Michał Piotr Boym (* around 1612 in Lemberg ; † June 22, 1659 near Guangxi , China ) was a Polish scientist, explorer, Jesuit and missionary in China. He was one of the first Europeans to travel to central China and wrote numerous books on Asian fauna, flora and geography.

Life

Little is known about Boym's childhood and youth. It was 1612 (or 1614) in Lesser Poland born as the son of a distinguished family of Hungarian origin. His father was a doctor. In 1631 Boym joined the Jesuits and was ordained a priest. He spent the next twelve years studying intensively in monasteries in Kraków , Kalisz , Jarosław and Sandomierz . Finally, in 1643, he set out on a trip to East Asia . His path led him first to Rome, where he obtained the blessing of Pope Urban VIII for his trip, and then on to Lisbon . Later that year he embarked with a group of nine other priests and clergy on a ship to the Portuguese colonies of Goa and then Macau . Once there, Boym initially taught at a Jesuit school. However, he moved on to Hainan Island and opened a small Catholic mission. However, he had to flee to Tonkin in 1647 when the island was conquered by the Manchus .

Letter from the Empress Mother Helena to Pope Innocent X in a Latin translation by Michał Boym and Andreas Koffler

In 1649 Boym was sent as a diplomat to the court of Emperor Yongli , the last ruler of the Ming dynasty . The emperor, whose rule was already threatened by the invading Manchus (later Qing dynasty ), had converted to Christianity, believing that this would induce the western rulers to stand by him in the struggle for power. Boym was chosen to explain the emperor's situation to the Pope. He received letters from the emperor's minister, known by his Christian name Pang Achilles , which he was to forward to Pope Innocent X and Cardinal John de Lugo. Other letters were addressed to the Doge of Venice and the King of Portugal. He left for Goa with Chen , a member of the imperial court. There they learned that the Portuguese king had already refused aid to the Chinese emperor and that Boym's mission was seen as a possible threat to future relations with the victorious Manchus. The newly appointed local Jesuit Provincial shared this view and was of the opinion that the Jesuit order should not interfere in the internal power struggles over China.

Boym was placed under house arrest. However, he managed to escape and continued his journey on foot. He reached Isfahan in Persia via Hyderabad , Surat , Bandar Abbas and Shiraz , and then traveled on to Venice via Erzurum , Trabzon and İzmir , where he arrived in December 1652. Since the Venetian court was at odds with the Jesuits, Boym shed his habit and put on the clothes of a Chinese mandarin .

The Doge of Venice initially refused an audience for Boym, as Venice wanted to remain neutral on the question of China. Boym managed to get the French ambassador to stand up for the case. He was allowed to audition and the doge accepted the emperor's letter. The French interference, however, led to an upset Pope Innocent X, who was negative about France and its ambitions. The newly appointed general of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), Goswin Nickel , feared Boym's mission would jeopardize the activities of the Jesuits in China and other parts of the world.

In 1655 a new Pope was elected, and three years later, on December 18, 1658, Alexander VII finally granted an audience. The Pope was benevolent of the Ming Dynasty and its cause, but could not offer practical help, and his letter to the Chinese emperor contained little but sympathetic words and an offer to pray for the emperor. However, this new letter from the Pope opened many new doors for Boym, and at an audience King John IV of Portugal promised to give the emperor military support.

In March 1659 Boym left for China. Of the eight priests who accompanied him, only four survived the trip. In Goa, he learned that Yongli was in dire straits, and the Portuguese authorities refused to allow him to travel to Macau, despite instructions from their king. Trade with the victorious Manchus should not be jeopardized. Boym again disregarded the fact that only Portuguese had the right to travel on foot. He took an unmapped route to Ayutthaya , the capital of Siam . He bought a ship from pirates and took it to the north of Vietnam . In Hanoi he tried to find a guide who would bring him and the rest of the priests to China. But he failed and had to leave alone, only accompanied by Chen, who had traveled with him all the way from China to Europe and back. They made it to the Chinese province of Guangxi, but on June 22, 1659 Boym died without reaching the imperial court. The place of his grave is unknown today.

Works

Map of China drawn by Boym

Boym is best known for his descriptions of the flora, fauna, history, traditions and customs of the countries he visited. During his first trip to China he wrote a short paper on the plants and animals of Mozambique . The script was later sent to Rome but never printed. During his first return trip from China, he made a large collection of maps depicting central China and Southeast Asia. He planned to add nine chapters to the collection, which should describe China, its customs and political system, but also Chinese science and Chinese inventions. His main merit was that his maps were the first European maps to correctly depict Korea as a peninsula rather than an island. He also recorded the exact positions of many Chinese cities that were previously unknown in the West or only known from the half-fabulous reports by Marco Polo . Boym also drew the Great Wall of China and the Gobi Desert . Although his collection was not published during his lifetime, it expanded the West's knowledge of China.

His most famous work is Flora Sinensis (Chinese flora), published in Vienna in 1656. The book was the first description of an ecosystem in the Far East to appear in Europe. Boym emphasized the medicinal properties of Chinese plants. The work also contains appeals in support of the Catholic Chinese Emperor and a poem of homage to Emperor Leopold I , in which each line contains a chronogram with the year 1655, the year of Leopold's coronation as King of Hungary. Boym hoped that he would support his mission.

Another botanical work from his pen is Specimen medicinae Sinicae (Medicinal Plants of China), in which he describes traditional Chinese medicine and introduces various healing methods and diagnostic methods that were previously unknown in Europe, such as acupuncture and measuring the pulse.

literature

Web links

Commons : Michał Boym  - collection of images, videos and audio files