Only edition of a rare account on the 1784/1785 persecutions of Catholic missionaries in China written by an eye-witness, the Italian Franciscan missionary Giuseppe Mattei. In 1784, Mattei, together with Atto Biagini, Giovanni da Sassari, Luigi Landi da Signa and some others, was sent from Macau to look after the Catholic communities in the Shaanxi province. The missionaries got arrested and were taken to Wuhang. A few months before their arrival a Muslim uprising had taken place in Gansu and the authorities assumed that the missionaries had come to support the Muslim rebels. After troublesome interrogations the missionaries were expelled from China (Biagini had died in prison in 1785) and arrived at the Philippines in 1786.
Pasted bookplate on title-page. A fine copy of this rare account on the 1784-1785 Catholic persecutions in China. Cordier, Sinica, col. 842; Löwendahl 666; not in Lust.