[KS] Portuguese during Hideyoshi invasion?

[Ernie .]

Dear Frank,

As you mention, what is sure is that Gregorio de Cespedes y Simancas (born 
in Madrid, in 1551), arrived to Korea on December 27th, 1593, and stayed 
there with the (catholic) Japanese troops probably until February or March 
1597. Park Chul, but also Juan Ruiz de Medina (Origenes de la Iglesia 
Catolica Coreana desde 1566 hasta 1784. Institutum Historicum S.I., Roma, 
1986), have researched it in detail. I even would add there was another 
Spaniard, father Francisco de Laguna, how also, like Cespedes, travelled to 
Korea for a couple of months from December 1597 to January 1598 (as it can 
be read in Shütte, Josef Franz. Monumenta Historica Japoniae I, Roma, 1975, 
and again, in Park Chul or Ruiz de Medina).

Jesuit sources in Japan and Macao in late 16th Century are very efficient in 
telling us most of the things they were doing those days, but I haven’t 
found any input (neither in the Spanish sources) on some suppose Portuguese 
fighting with the Chinese and Koreans against Japanese in 1597, as I 
recently read in an article published by Choe Yong-shik in Korea Herald 
(¿Korea Times?) on May 26, 2000, mentioning the Annals of the Choson 
Kingdom. Could that be true? Is there any English translation where I could 
check it?

Thank you

E. de Laurentis



>From: Frank Hoffmann <hoffmann at koreaweb.ws>
>Reply-To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws>
>To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws>
>CC: http:
>Subject: Re: [KS] Portuguese during Hideyoshi invasion?
>Date: Tue, 10 Apr 2007 20:12:10 -0700
>
>>I wonder if any of you could confirm me the supposed participation of 
>>Portuguese mercenaries or soldiers fighting the Japanese at the end of 
>>Hideyoshi invasion along with Chinese and Korean troops.
>
>Indeed, this seems very unlikely and is probably based on the wrong reading 
>of a text composed in some archaic Portuguese -- a letter by Gaspar Vilela 
>from 1571. But Vilela never visited Korea, and no other Portuguese did at 
>the time. If at all, it were the Spanish Jesuits that were in Korea at that 
>time, and they were there with the Japanese, not the Chinese. One of the 
>three generals that let the Japanese invasion army was the daimyô Konishi 
>Yunkinaga, and he brought de Céspedes to Korea to care for the souls of his 
>15,000 Christian Japanese soldiers. See my 2002 posting about the same 
>topic here:
>http://koreaweb.ws/pipermail/koreanstudies_koreaweb.ws/2002-January/003055.html
>Many works do refer to de Céspedes erroneously as Portuguese national.
>For the date you mention, May 1597, I can't find any hint of any mention of 
>Portuguese either -- at least not in Chinese sources. And none of the 
>missionary and (Korean) Church histories do mention this.
>
>Frank
>
>
>--
>--------------------------------------
>Frank Hoffmann
>http://koreaweb.ws
>

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