António de Andrade (; 1580– March 19, 1634), also known as António d'Andrade or Andrada, was a
Jesuit
The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
priest and explorer from
Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...
.
He entered the
Society of Jesus
The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rome. It was founded in 1540 ...
in 1596.
[ From 1600 until his death in 1634, he was engaged in missionary activity in ]India
India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
.[ Andrade was the first known ]Europe
Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...
an to have crossed the Himalayas
The Himalayas, or Himalaya ( ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the Earth's highest peaks, including the highest, Mount Everest. More than list of h ...
and reached Tibet
Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...
, establishing the first Catholic mission on Tibetan soil.
Life
António de Andrade was born in Oleiros, Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...
.[ In 1600, he went to ]Goa
Goa (; ; ) is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is bound by the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north, and Karnataka to the ...
, the capital of Portuguese India
The State of India, also known as the Portuguese State of India or Portuguese India, was a state of the Portuguese Empire founded seven years after the discovery of the sea route to the Indian subcontinent by Vasco da Gama, a subject of the ...
, where he pursued his higher studies and was ordained a priest. He was one of the Jesuits attached to the court of the Mughal
Mughal or Moghul may refer to:
Related to the Mughal Empire
* Mughal Empire of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries
* Mughal dynasty
* Mughal emperors
* Mughal people, a social group of Central and South Asia
* Mughal architecture
* Mug ...
emperor Jahangir
Nur-ud-din Muhammad Salim (31 August 1569 – 28 October 1627), known by his imperial name Jahangir (; ), was List of emperors of the Mughal Empire, Emperor of Hindustan from 1605 until his death in 1627, and the fourth Mughal emperors, Mughal ...
, and was head of the Jesuit mission in Agra
Agra ( ) is a city on the banks of the Yamuna river in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, about south-east of the national capital Delhi and 330 km west of the state capital Lucknow. With a population of roughly 1.6 million, Agra is the ...
. In 1624, he left Agra
Agra ( ) is a city on the banks of the Yamuna river in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, about south-east of the national capital Delhi and 330 km west of the state capital Lucknow. With a population of roughly 1.6 million, Agra is the ...
for Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, but spread chiefly to the west, or beyond its Bank (geography ...
, where he and the Jesuit
The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
brother Manuel Marques joined a group of Hindu
Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...
pilgrims bound for the temple of Badrinath
Badrinath is a town and nagar panchayat in Chamoli district in the state of Uttarakhand, India. It is a Hindu holy place, and is one of the four sites in India's Char Dham pilgrimage. It is also part of India's Chota Char Dham pilgrimage c ...
located in the Northern part of the present-day Indian state of Uttarakhand
Uttarakhand (, ), also known as Uttaranchal ( ; List of renamed places in India, the official name until 2007), is a States and union territories of India, state in North India, northern India. The state is bordered by Himachal Pradesh to the n ...
. Overcoming incredible hardships in the journey, they crossed the Mana Pass
Mana Pass (; ) or Chongnyi La (; ) is one of the Extreme points of Earth, highest vehicle-accessible passes in the world, containing a road constructed in the 2005-2010 period for the Indian military by the Border Roads Organisation and visibl ...
to Tibet
Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...
, the first Europeans known to have done so.
Kindly received in Tibet by the sovereign[ of the Western Tibetan kingdom of ]Guge
Guge () was an ancient dynastic kingdom in Western Tibet. The kingdom was centered in present-day Zanda County, Ngari Prefecture, Tibet Autonomous Region. At various points in history after the 10th century AD, the kingdom held sway over a vast a ...
, in the capital city of Tsaparang
Tsaparang () was the capital of the ancient kingdom of Guge in the Garuda Valley, through which the upper Sutlej River flows, in Ngari Prefecture (Western Tibet) near the border of Ladakh. It is 278 km south-southwest of Shiquanhe, Senggezan ...
, Andrade left after less than a month to obtain formal permission for the mission from the Father-Provincial in Goa, and to get funds and other missionaries to accompany him back to Tsaparang. Andrade returned to Tibet in 1625 and was joined by other Jesuit missionaries. They succeeded in building a church and made many converts, aided by support from the king and other members of the royal family. Andrade returned to Goa in 1629; the mission foundered soon afterward, with the invasion of Guge by Ladakh
Ladakh () is a region administered by India as a union territory and constitutes an eastern portion of the larger Kashmir region that has been the subject of a Kashmir#Kashmir dispute, dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947 and India an ...
, the death of the pro-missionary king and the installation of a hostile Ladakhi-controlled government in Tsaparang. The missionaries were persecuted or expelled, the Tibetan Christians were sent to Ladakh, and by 1640 the mission, which had begun with so much promise, was over.
Andrade became the Father-Superior of the Jesuit province of Goa in 1630, leaving this post in 1633 and resuming the rectorship of the College
of St. Paul. He was also active during this period as a deputy of the Goa Inquisition. He was poisoned on March 4, 1634, and lingered on in agony until dying on March 19. The Inquisition inquiry into his death revealed that he had been murdered by disgruntled Jesuits at the college, possibly supported by powerful enemies among the Goa authorities and merchants. The matter was hushed up and nobody was ever prosecuted for the crime. Later Jesuit accounts portrayed Andrade as a martyr of the faith who was killed because of his zeal as an official of the Inquisition.
Andrade's two extensive accounts of Tibet, written in 1624 and 1626, were published in the Portuguese original in Lisbon
Lisbon ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 567,131, as of 2023, within its administrative limits and 3,028,000 within the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, metropolis, as of 2025. Lisbon is mainlan ...
in 1626 followed by a Spanish translation in Segovia
Segovia ( , , ) is a city in the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Castile and León, Spain. It is the capital and most populated municipality of the Province of Segovia. Segovia is located in the Meseta central, Inner Pl ...
(Spain) in 1628 and a publication in Kraków
, officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...
(Poland) in the same year, and quickly translated into all the major European languages; they had a significant influence on European knowledge of and attitudes toward Tibet. Modern translations of Andrade's accounts into Italian and French are found in Toscano (1977) and Didier (2002). An English translation of Andrade's writings relating to Tibet was published in 2017 by Sweet and Zwilling.
Works
* .
See also
* Catholic Church in Tibet
* Portuguese Civil Code of Goa and Damaon
References
Bibliography
* .
* , published in the Revolutionary Year 4 (1795 or 1796).
* Desideri, Ippolito. 2010. ''Mission to Tibet: The Extraordinary Eighteenth-Century Account of Fr. Ippolito Desideri, S.J.'' trans. Michael Sweet, ed. Leonard Zwilling.
* .
* .
* Esteves Pereira, Francisco (editor). 1924. ''O Descobrimento do Tibet pelo P.Antonio de Andrade''. Coimbra: Imprensa da Universidade.
* Sweet, Michael J. ''Murder in the Refectory: The Death of António de Andrade, S.J.'' Catholic Historical Review, 102, no.1, 2016, pp. 26–45.
* Sweet, Michael J. (trans. and intro) and Leonard Zwilling (ed.). 2017 ''More than the Promised Land: Letters and Relations from Tibet by the Jesuit Missionary António de Andrade (1580-1634)''. Boston: Institute of Jesuit Sources/Boston College.
* Tavares, Célia Cristina da Silva. 2006. ''Jesuítas e Inquisidores em Goa. A Cristianidade Insular (1540-1682)''.
* Toscano, Giuseppe. 1977. ''Alla Scoperta del Tibet''.
* .
External links
Detailed biography of de Andrade
The Goa Jesuit Province of the Society of Jesus
- The Jesuits in Goa
TYBET - Wielkie Panstwo w Azyey
(Tibet - A great country in Asia) - 1628
{{DEFAULTSORT:Andrade, Antonio
1580 births
1634 deaths
People from Oleiros, Portugal
Portuguese Roman Catholic missionaries
Portuguese travel writers
Jesuit missionaries in Tibet
Explorers of Central Asia
Assassinated educators
Jesuit missionaries in China
16th-century Portuguese Jesuits
17th-century Portuguese Jesuits
17th-century Portuguese explorers
Jesuit missionaries in India
Deaths by poisoning
People assassinated in the 17th century
Explorers of South Asia
Writers about India