Jean-Théodore Monbeig-Andrieu (22 October 1875 in Salies-de-Béarn – 12 June 1914 in

Litang Litang may refer to: * Litang County (理塘县), Sichuan *Litang, Guangxi (黎塘镇), town in Binyang County *Li Tang (hall of worship) The Confucian church ( or ) is a Confucian religious and social institution of the congregational type. It ...

) 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 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...

missionary and botanist who collected plants for the

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. ...

Natural History Museum A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more ...

from northern

Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the ...

where he was posted. He also collected

butterflies Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The group comprises t ...

for

Charles Oberthür Charles Oberthür (14 September 1845 – 1 June 1924) was a French amateur entomologist specializing in lepidoptera. Biography Charles Oberthür was born in Rennes, the son of the printer François-Charles Oberthür and Marie Hamelin, and bro ...

Career

Monbeig was ordained for the

Paris Foreign Missions Society The Society of Foreign Missions of Paris (french: Société des Missions Etrangères de Paris, short M.E.P.) is a Roman Catholic missionary organization. It is not a religious institute, but an organization of secular priests and lay persons de ...

and sent to the Tibetan part of Yunnan in 1899. He assisted Father who was murdered in 1905 in Tse-kou with other colleagues. Father Soulié was also killed by a Lama revolt at that time. Father Monbeig moved afterwards to more secure Cizhong with his parishioners. He built the church of the village (dedicated to Holy Heart) and founded a convent for young Tibetan women to be village teachers. He devoted his free time to collecting plants from the mountains. In November 1913, the Apostolic Vicar of Tibet in

Tatsienlu Kangding (), also called Tachienlu and Dartsedo (; ), is a county-level city and the seat of Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan province of Southwest China. Kangding is on the bank of the Dadu River and has been considered the hi ...

, , called Monbeig to

Batang, Sichuan Batang Town ( bo, འབའ˙ཐང; Chinese: 巴塘 or 八塘; Pinyin: Bātáng), or Xiaqiong Town (Chinese: 夏邛镇; Pinyin: Xiàqióng Zhèn), is a town in Batang County, Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province, in the China o ...

to revive the Christian community there. He set to work immediately and baptised some new converts. He was murdered near Litang the next year, while reaching a mission post. More than 20 species were named after him, such as ''Deutzia monbeigii'' W.W.Sm. or ''Cornus monbeigii'' Hemsl.

References

Bibliography

* J. H. Barnhart (1965) ''Biographical Notes Upon Botanists'', 2:504 * E. H. M. Cox (1945), ''Plant Hunting in China'' : 120 {{DEFAULTSORT:Monbeig, Theodore 1875 births 1914 deaths 20th-century French botanists Roman Catholic missionaries in Tibet Roman Catholic missionaries in Sichuan Paris Foreign Missions Society missionaries French Roman Catholic missionaries French people murdered abroad People murdered in China French expatriates in China Missionary botanists Roman Catholic Diocese of Kangding

Career

See also

References

Bibliography