ZOTTOLI, ANGELO. - Missionary in China and Sinologist, b. June 21, 1826 at Acerno (Salerno), d. at Shanghai Nov. 9, 1902.
After completing his literary studies at the Jesuit College in Salerno, he fled from his father’s house on May 2, 1843 and entered the Society of Jesus in Naples; the disturbances of 1848 forced him to take refuge in Malta. There, in the same year, he was joined by Fr. Renato Massa, S.J., who had come from Rome on business of the Kiangnan Mission in China, and with him he set out for that mission. Arriving in Shanghai on Sept. 27 of that year, he remained there until his death. Ordained priest in 1850, in the same year he founded the first Catholic college in China, where he served as prefect of studies for six years and rector for thirteen; from 1878 to 1902 he was spiritual father, master of native novices, and instructor in the third probation; to these duties he added the spiritual care of the religious of both European and Chinese communities in nearby convents. Between 1858 and 1871 he published some ten small ascetical works in Chinese; but the work that made him famous in the field of Sinology is his *Cursus litteraturae Sinicae* in five volumes of about 4,000 pages in all, published between 1879 and 1882, which earned its author the Stanislas Julien Prize from the French Academy. Demonstrating a unique mastery not only of the language of Confucius but also of that of Cicero, he succeeded in providing Westerners with a translation that was at once as literal and as exact as possible of the best books of the entire vast ancient Chinese literature, such as the *Family Instructions*, comedies, novels, the Four Books, the Five Classics, the great prose writers and great poets of all periods, constantly setting the Chinese text alongside its translation.