A note on currency -- Romanization of Japanese and Chinese names -- Introduction: Background to De Missione -- Objectives of the Embassy and the individuals chosen -- Publication of De Missione -- Authorship of De Missione -- Sources of De Missione -- Contextualizing De Missione -- Evaluating De Missione and the Tensho embassy -- The boys after their return to Japan -- Conclusion -- Text: A Dialogue Concerning the Mission of the Japanese Ambassadors to the Roman Curia: Imprimatur -- Nihil obstat -- Alessandro Valignan of the Society of Jesus to the pupils of the Japanese seminaries -- Duarte de Sande to Claudio Aquaviva, Superior General of the Society of Jesus -- Contents of these Colloquia -- Colloquium I-XXXIV -- Bibliography -- Index.

In 1582 Alessandro Valignano, the Visitor to the Jesuit mission in the East Indies, sent four Japanese boys, two of whom represented important Christian daimyo in western Japan, to Europe. This book is an account of their travels. The boys left Japan on 20 February 1582 and disembarked in Lisbon on 11 August 1584. They then travelled through Portugal, Spain and Italy as far as Rome, the highpoint of their journey, before returning to Lisbon to begin the long voyage home on 13 April 1586. They reached Nagasaki on 21 July 1590, amidst great rejoicing, more than eight years after their departure. During their travels in Europe they had audiences and less formal meetings with Philip II, king of Spain and Portugal, and with popes Gregory XIII and Sixtus V, and were received by many of the most important political, ecclesiastical and social figures in the places they visited. Until the arrival of the embassy in Europe, the Euro-Japanese encounter had been almost exclusively one way: Europeans going to Japan. The embassy was an integral part of Valignano's strategy for advancing the Jesuit mission in Japan. The boys chosen were intended to personify Jesuit success in Japan, raise awareness of Japan in Europe amongst the clerical and secular elites, and demonstrate conclusively that what the Jesuits had been writing about Japan since their arrival there in 1549 was not a fabrication. The embassy was further intended to impress upon the boys the glory, unity, stability and splendour of Christian Europe, so that they might report favourably about their experiences on their return, and counter what Valignano believed were the negative impressions of Europe left by Portuguese merchants and seamen in Japan. As part of this plan, a book consisting of thirty-four colloquia detailing the boys' travels was compiled and translated into Latin under Valignano's supervision. It was published in Macao in 1590 with the title De Missione Legatorvm Iaponensium ad Romanum curiam. Valignano anticipated that it would become a standard text in Jesuit seminaries in Japan. The present edition is the first complete version of this rich, complex and impressive work to appear in English, and is accompanied with maps and illustrations of the mission, and an introduction discussing its context and the subsequent reception of the book.--Pub. note.

Sixteenth century European printed works on the first Japanese mission to Europe : a descriptive bibliography / by Adriana Boscaro.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 195-196).

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PREFACE
The Japanese mission to Pope Gregory XIII in 1585 undoubtedly had a strong popular appeal, which is seen from the great number of printed booklets, relating only to it, printed in Europe for the occasion. The mission, planned by Alessandro Valignano, the great organizer of the missionary work in the Orient, had two predominant aims. The most important was to obtain from the Pope the rights to Japan for the Jesuits, the second was to make Europe known to the Japanese. Valignano's intentions were for the four young boys to be witnesses, once back home, for a reality which was somewhat incomprehensible to the Japanese. They could hardly believe that someone would leave such an extolled place to live in poverty and insecurity in their country. Not being able to understand the inner meaning of missionary life, this fact left them rather sceptical. But, on the other hand, sixteenth century Europe too did not know much about Japan. The mission was the event which provided the opportunity to propagate news about it. The fact that Pope Gregory decided to give them public concistory (which meant that he regarded them as official ambassadors) gave the final spur to people's curiosity. This is not the place for a detailed description of the mission and of its background, this having been done in fuller works. Just a few details about the envoys themselves. The three feudal lords (incorrectly called 'kings') who sent the mission were all from Kyushu: Otomo Yoshishige (Francisco) in Bungo, Arima Harunobu (Protasio) and Omura Sumitada (Bartholomeu) in Hizen province. Otomo sent Ita Mancio, who was the chief envoy; the lords of Arima and Omura chose Chijiwa Miguel. Two other young boys were added as escort: Nakaura Juliano and Hara Martino. The family relationships between the senders and the envoys were rather complicated and caused some misunderstandings in the European records, apart from the names which we find distorted in many chronicles.
The daily news publications seized hold of their trip through Portugal, Spain and Italy, and the gazettes dedicated to the Japanese  
appeared in rapid, almost frenetic, succession. The publishers, who were in most cases both authors and editors of these gazettes, competed in keeping people well informed about the movements of the envoys. To put such news against the right background they pillaged the annual letters and the reports previously written by the Jesuits from Japan. The details are fairly accurate: the description of the political situation and some acute observations of their way of writing, thinking and living, made these phamphlets excellent instruments of popularization. Such booklets are called cinquecentine in Italian, in other words works printed in the sixteenth century. Since the greatest number of them was published in Italy, they will be often referred to by this name. Seventy-eight items are presented here, in witness of an astonishing editorial boom. Surely many more exist (besides those listed in Appendix 11) and I should be most grateful for any kind of information.

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The Japanese mission to Europe, 1582-1590 : the journey of four samurai boys through Portugal, Spain and Italy / Michael Cooper.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 246-253) and index.

Preface -- Acknowledgements -- Maps -- Chronology -- Part 1. The Legation is Planned -- 1. Christianity in Japan -- 2. Preparing the Legation -- Part 2. The Journey to Europe -- 3. Passage to India -- 4. From India to Europe -- Part 3. Through Portugal and Spain -- 5. Portugal -- 6. Spain and 'the Most Potent Monarch' -- 7. From Alcalá to Alicante -- Part 4: Rome and the Two Popes -- 8. The Road to Rome -- 9. The Papal Audience -- 10. The Stay in Rome -- 11. The New Pope -- Part 5. Further Travels in Europe -- 12. Bologna and Ferrara -- 13. Carnival of Venice -- 14. From Padua to Genoa -- 15. Spain and Portugal Revisited -- Part 6. The Return to Japan -- 16. The Return Journey -- 17. Reception in Japan -- Part 7. Summing Up -- 18. Assessment of the Enterprise -- Appendices: 1. The Boys' Later Careers -- 2. The Sources -- 3. Azuchi Screens and Braun's Cities -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.

Following the pioneering work of Francis Xavier in establishing Christianity in Japan, in early 1581, Alessandro Valignano decided to send a legation to Europe representing the three Christian daimyo of Kyushu. The purpose of this mission was twofold. It would give Europeans the chance of seeing Japanese people at first hand and appreciating their culture; in this way the expedition would publicize the work of the Japanese Church and increase financial aid from Europe. Conversely, on their return to Japan the envoys would give to their fellow countrymen eyewitness reports on the splendours of Renaissance Europe, thus broadening the Japanese view of the outside world and moderating existing notions about foreign barbarians. It might benefit the impoverished Japanese mission financially and thus promote its expansion. Two Christian samurai boys were chosen as legates together with two teenage companions, and they sailed from Nagasaki in February 1582. After a journey lasting more than two years, the foursome reached Europe and began travelling through Portugal, Spain and Italy. They met King Philip II and his family several times, and in Rome were befriended by the elderly Pope Gregory XIII and his successor Sixtus V. During their progress through Italy the Japanese were lavishly welcomed with speeches, banquets, balls and spectacular firework displays; large crowds gathered to see them solemnly process through the streets, while church bells rang out and cannon fired in salute. The authorities in Venice even postponed the annual festival in honour of St Mark, the city's patron, so that the Japanese might view the spectacle.

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