VALIGNANO, ALESSANDRO

He would have graduated in law at Padua around 1558. After spending some time in Rome hoping for promotions, he returned to Padua to continue his studies; he was there in November 1562 when he was accused of having wounded a young woman, imprisoned and tried, and sentenced to a heavy fine and banishment from Venetian territory for four years. On 29 May 1566 he entered the Society of Jesus in Rome, and then on 18 May of the following year he moved to the Roman College, where he studied philosophy (1567-69) and theology (1570-72). Ordained priest at the Lateran on 25 March 1570, he became on 1 September 1572 rector of the College of Macerata. In August of the following year he was appointed by the Superior General Mercurian as visitor, that is, superior of all the Jesuit missions in Asia. Having made his profession on 8 and 11 September 1573, around the 20th of that same month he set out for Genoa and Lisbon, from where he sailed on 21 March of the following year, at the head of 41 Jesuits, and arrived in Goa on 6 September 1574. After making a double visitation of the missions in southern and northern India, on 20 September 1677 he undertook a long journey that first brought him to Macao on 6 September 1578. There he conceived the plan of opening China to the Gospel and for this purpose immediately summoned Michele Ruggieri from India. Continuing his journey, he first arrived in Japan on 25 July 1579. After visiting the mission and establishing the vice-province of Japan, on 20 February 1582 he departed again in the company of four young Japanese nobles whom, at the invitation of Valignano, certain Japanese “daimyō” or rulers, already Christian, were sending as ambassadors to the Roman Pontiff. While he was in Macao (9 March - 31 December 1582) he summoned M. Ricci (v.) from India for the mission to China. Having arrived in Goa on 10 November 1583, he relinquished the office of visitor and became provincial of India until 1587.