«Robbe d’Europa»: Global Connections and the Mailing of Letters, Money, and Merchandise in the Eighteenth-Century China Mission

Abstract

Manuscript reports and letters written in China by the Propaganda Fide and Jesuit missionaries criss-crossed the oceans and the continents to reach Europe on ships, carts, horses, mules, and palanquins, using both European systems of transportation provided by the various East India Companies and governments, and other local public and private postal arrangements. Missionary agencies also mailed from the West robbe d’Europa («European things»), such as silver coins, foodstuff and drugs (chocolate, wine, cheese, olive oil, tobacco), medicines, galanterie (luxury items), books, devotional objects and prints. Chinese goods (tea, silk, medicines, luxury items, books) were sent in the opposite direction to please patrons in Europe. Without this multi-layered, imperfect, yet workable mailing system, the flow of information and articles fuelling early modern globalisation and, within it, the Chinese missions, would have been impossible.