Jean-François Gerbillon (4 June 1654,

Verdun Verdun ( , ; ; ; official name before 1970: Verdun-sur-Meuse) is a city in the Meuse (department), Meuse departments of France, department in Grand Est, northeastern France. It is an arrondissement of the department. In 843, the Treaty of V ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

– 27 March 1707,

Peking Beijing, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's most populous national capital city as well as China's second largest city by urban area after Shanghai. It is l ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

) was a French

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

missionary who worked in

Biography

Gerbillon 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 ...

on 5 October 1670, and after completing the usual course of study, taught grammar and humanities for seven years. In 1685, he was among the Jesuits chosen to found the French mission in China. For the first leg of the trip, he was attached to the embassy of the Chevalier de Chaumont to

Siam Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

, and was accompanied by a group of Jesuit mathematicians ( Jean de Fontaney (1643–1710), Joachim Bouvet (1656–1730), Louis Le Comte (1655–1728), Guy Tachard (1648–1712) and Claude de Visdelou (1656–1737)). Tachard remained in Siam beside King

Narai King Narai the Great (, , ) or Ramathibodi III ( ) was the 27th monarch of Ayutthaya Kingdom, the 4th and last monarch of the Prasat Thong dynasty. He was the king of Ayutthaya Kingdom from 1656 to 1688 and arguably the most famous king of the ...

, but the others reached China in 1687. CEM-44-La-Chine-la-Tartarie-Chinoise-et-le-Thibet-1734-Amur-2572

Upon their arrival in

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

, they were received by the

Kangxi Emperor The Kangxi Emperor (4 May 165420 December 1722), also known by his temple name Emperor Shengzu of Qing, personal name Xuanye, was the third emperor of the Qing dynasty, and the second Qing emperor to rule over China proper. His reign of 61 ...

, who was interested in their scientific knowledge and retained Gerbillion and Joachim Bouvet at the court. As soon as they had learned the language of the country, Gerbillion with Thomas Pereira, one of his companions, was sent as interpreter to Nerchinsk with the ambassadors commissioned to treat with the Russians regarding the boundaries of the two empires, which were determined in the

Treaty of Nerchinsk The Treaty of Nerchinsk of 1689 was the first treaty between the Tsardom of Russia and the Qing dynasty of China after the defeat of Russia by Qing China at the Siege of Albazin in 1686. The Russians gave up the area north of the Amur River as ...

(1689). The emperor was impressed by Gerbillon's abilities as a scientist and diplomat, and thereafter Gerbillon frequently travelled in his suite. Gerbillon made eight different journeys into "

Tartary Tartary (Latin: ''Tartaria''; ; ; ) or Tatary () was a blanket term used in Western European literature and cartography for a vast part of Asia bounded by the Caspian Sea, the Ural Mountains, the Pacific Ocean, and the northern borders of China, ...

" (i.e.,

Manchuria Manchuria is a historical region in northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day northeast China and parts of the modern-day Russian Far East south of the Uda (Khabarovsk Krai), Uda River and the Tukuringra-Dzhagdy Ranges. The exact ...

and

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

). On one of these he was an eyewitness to the campaign in which Kangxi defeated the

Oirats Oirats (; ) or Oirds ( ; ), formerly known as Eluts and Eleuths ( or ; zh, 厄魯特, ''Èlǔtè'') are the westernmost group of Mongols, whose ancestral home is in the Altai Mountains, Altai region of Siberia, Xinjiang and western Mongolia. ...

. On his last journey he accompanied the three commissioners who regulated public affairs and established new laws among the

Khalkha The Khalkha (; ) have been the largest subgroup of the Mongols in modern Mongolia since the 15th century. The Khalkha, together with Chahars, Ordos Mongols, Ordos and Tumed, were directly ruled by Borjigin khans until the 20th century. In cont ...

Mongols, who had yielded allegiance to the emperor. He availed himself of this opportunity to determine the latitude and longitude of a number of places in what is today the

Northeastern China Northeast China () is a geographical region of China, consisting officially of three provinces Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang. The heartland of the region is the Northeast China Plain, the largest plain in China with an area of over . The regi ...

and adjacent areas of Russia and Mongolia. Gerbillion was for a time, in charge of the French college in Beijing, and afterwards, became superior-general of the mission. In 1692, he obtained an edict granting the free exercise of the Christian religion. After the emperor's recovery from a fever, during which he was attended by Gerbillion and Bouvet, he showed his gratitude by bestowing on them a site for a chapel and residence.

Works

Gerbillon's account of his travels in Tatary details the topography, local customs, and his life at court. His writings also document foreign fauna, and have since been used as a reference for natural history and even veterinary medicine. He additionally wrote several works on mathematics. Writings by Gerbillon include: * (1689) * (1690) * * Also called . (1688–98) * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gerbillon, Jean-Francois 1654 births 1707 deaths People from Verdun French Roman Catholic missionaries 17th-century French Jesuits Jesuit missionaries in China 18th-century French Jesuits French missionaries in China