Relatione delle persecutioni mosse contro la fede di Christo in varii regni del Giappone ne gl'anni 1628. 1629. e 1630. Al molto Rev.do in Christo P. Mutio Vitelleschi, Preposito Generale della Compagnia di GIESÙ.
Rome: Francesco Corbelletti, 1635.
Price: $9,500.00
Octavo: 15.2 x 10.2 cm. 187 pp. Collation: A-O8, P4
FIRST EDITION.
Bound in early limp vellum with new endpapers (a remboîtage), all edges gilt, upper edge gauffered. Contents with light to moderate browning. With a stamp ('Kristen Collection') on title verso, causing a small defect (repaired) on the recto.
The rare first edition of two Jesuit reports on the persecution of Christians in Japan in the years 1628-1630, written by Father Cristóvão Ferreira, who would later renounce his faith under torture. In 1633 Ferreira was captured by the Japanese and was hung upside down in a pit, a form of torture devised to force Christians to either renounce their faith or die a slow death. Ferreira broke under the strain and apostatized. He spent the rest of his life living in Japan, married to a Japanese wife, and adopted the name Sawano Chūan.
“The news of Ferreira’s apostasy came as a great shock to the Catholic world. Up to that time nothing had come from Japan except reports of heroic martyrdoms . . . and the news of Ferreira's fall from grace was so much greater since he had, until then, been regarded as a courageous martyr for the Faith.”(Cieslik, p. 17)
Written at the peak of the persecutions, the reports in this volume, for 1628-1630, include graphic descriptions of torture and execution of dozens of Christians, both Japanese and European, including a pregnant woman. Most chapters include detailed descriptions of individual martyrdoms, with the names, genders, and ages of the victims often stated. Some of them died for their Christian faith, while others were put to death for sheltering or assisting Christian clergy avoid capture. These reports include details on events in the Kingdom of Fingo (present-day Higo), Nagasaki, Shimo (Shimogata), Miye (Mie), the Prison of Ximabara (Shimabara) and elsewhere.
This is one of just two books by Ferreira to be appear in print. The other, his report for 1627, was published in a collective volume of reports in 1632.
The Pit:
A contemporary report from the Philippines describes the pit torture devised by the Japanese: “They dug a pit some feet deep, and above it they erected a frame from which the body was hung up by the feet. To prevent the blood flowing into the head and causing death too quickly, they tied the body tightly with ropes and cords. The hands were tied behind the back, and the prisoner was lowered into the pit down to his belt or navel or even down to his knees and legs. The pit was then closed by two boards which were cut in such wise that they surrounded the body in the middle and let no light enter. In this fashion they kept the man hanging upside down without food, poised between life and death and in doubt about the final outcome, until the slowly rising blood pressure brought about complete exhaustion, or else hunger entirely sapped his physical strength. Or until, worn out by the torment, loneliness and solitude, he finally succumbed to this deadly torture and renounced his faith while there was still life left in him.”(Quoted in Cieslik “The Case of Christovao Ferreira, p. 14)
Ferreira had joined the Jesuits in 1596; he sailed for Japan from Macao in 1609 and in 1617 was named secretary to the Jesuit provincial, Mattheus de Couros. From 1627 to 1632, Ferreira compiled accounts of the martyrdom of numerous Christians, including a description of the torture suffered by the Japanese Jesuit Antonio Ishida and his companions, who refused to apostatize despite being tortured.
In October 1633 Ferreira was arrested with a group of priests and religious in 1633 and led to “The Pit” at Nagasaki. The band included Antonio de Souza, the Superior of the Dominican friars, Julian Nakaura (the Jesuit who had set out for Rome in 1582 as one of the four youthful Kyushu legates), Giovanni Battista Adami, Lucas del Espiritu Santo, the Japanese Brothers Pedro and Matteo (who had entered the Society of Jesus while lying in prison), and a certain Francisco (who had become a Dominican friar in the same circumstances).
“The governor of Nagasaki had high hopes of dealing a destructive blow against the Christian mission by torturing this outstanding group, and the result surpassed his keenest expectations. After hanging in the pit for five painful hours, Cristóvão Ferreira gave in. It is not known how he indicated his decision, but he was pulled out of the pit and released from his bonds. Whether or not he tried to retract his decision is also not known, but he was provided with a house in Nagasaki and obliged to live with the Japanese widow of an executed Chinese merchant. Ferreira adopted the name Sawano Chiuan, under which name he is known in Japanese records and documents. He was 53 years old at the time and had spent 37 years as a Jesuit.”(Cieslik “The Case of Christovao Ferreira”, 16-17) Ferreira would go on to write books on astronomy and medicine, and teach Western philosophy and sciences to the Japanese.
Another Italian edition of these reports was printed at Rome and Milan. Editions in Latin (Antwerp) and French (Paris and Douay) were published in the same year as the Corbelletti printing (1635). While published without attribution, Ferreira himself confirmed his authorship in a letter on the sufferings of the Christians who were boiled alive on Mount Unzen in 1631 (see Sommervogel).
Cordier, Bib. Japonica, 323; Backer-Sommervogel, III, col. 681; Laures, Kirishitan Bunko Database, JL1635-2-417; Streit, Bibliotheca missionum, Vol. 5, p. 542, no. 1503