The Western Missionaries' Geographical Images On Guizhou From 16^thto 18^thCentury

The western countries' cognition on China,which is an important issue in the field of communication between Chinese and western culture from 16th to 18th century,has been widely studied by scholars both at home and abroad.Yet so far there has been few systematic investigation in western images on Guizhou.Based on western maps and text books of the same period and by using the method of historical comparison and cross-cultural study,this dissertation focuses on the researches about Guizhou of western missionaries.Thus helping to promote the historical and geographical research on Guizhou as well as boosting the research about the cultural communication between China and western countries in Ming and early Qing dynasty.Western missionaries' images on Guizhou from 16th to 18th centuries can be roughly divided into three stages.The first stage-the whole 16th century-could be known as the fuzzy period.During this period,the western missionaries merely knew the general location of Guizhou in China,only a few city names,and an unknown number of towns,taxes and the armies.The second stage,which refers to the whole 17th century,could be called the stage of comprehensive images.This stages includes three atlas.The first one--Atlante della Cina,which was written by Michele Ruggieri,was only a brief description;the Second was Michael Boym's Atlas Imperii Sinarum,which attached great importance to the natural landscape;the last one was the Novus Atlas Sinensis written by Martino Martini.This atlas presented Guizhou's administrative division,natural scenery,customs,products and so on.The third stage can be recognized as the scientific understanding which was during the 18th century.In the early 18th century,the missionaries made survey and draw the Huang Yu QuanLan Tu.Later it was spread to the west and taken into Description Empire of China.The map part of this book revealed Guizhou's administrative system and rivers distribution of the Qing dynasty,but the text content such as customs and products was still the continuation of what Martino Martini has introduced.This dissertation also makes some demonstrations on Chinese literature sources of atlases of different places as well as its influence on the western countries.