FILIPPUCCI, ALESSANDRO FRANCESCO SAVERIO. - Jesuit missionary, born at Macerata on 5 Jan. 1632, died at Macao on 15 Aug. 1692. Admitted to the Roman novitiate in 1651, he left in 1660 for the missions in China. Greatly devoted to S. Francesco Saverio, whose name he had adopted after a miraculous recovery, he worked diligently, in Portugal and at Macao, to trace letters of the Saint, subsequently included in the editions prepared by Fr. Pietro Poussines.
Having arrived in China in 1663, F. was rector and master of novices at Macao (1663-70), missionary in the district of Canton (1671-79), provincial at Macao for the province of Japan (1680-83), superior at Canton (1683-1688), visitor for the provinces of Japan and China (1688-91), and at the same time, from 1690, provincial for Japan. An able sinologist, he defended his confrères in the controversy over the Chinese rites: Praeludium ad plenum disquisitionem an bonum vel mala fide impugnantur opinionum et praxe missionariorum Societatis Iesu in regno Sinarum ad cultum Confucri et defunctorum pertinentes (Paris 1700). A Sagitta retorta (1683) has remained in manuscript, as have many letters. A letter to Poussines is printed in the Monumenta Xaveriana (I, Madrid 1900, pp. 941-44).