ABSTRACT
Matteo Ricci’s famous Map of the Myriad Countries of the World (Kunyu Wanguo Quantu, 1602) has received considerable scholarly attention as the first world map made in China that portrays the entire globe, including the newly found Americas. When they traveled to China, Ricci and his fellow Jesuit missionaries imported with them the most up-to-date geographic information and cartographic techniques developed in Western Europe since the late fifteenth century in response to the European exploration of the world. The Jesuit drew such maps in order to impress the Chinese and convert them to Christianity.1 At the same time, however, Ricci had to modify European base maps in order to draw his new map in a style that would appeal to Chinese readers. For example, Ricci placed China near the center of his map, a feature that differs from other contemporary European world maps but mirrored Chinese mapping traditions, in which China was always the center of the world. While the map’s texts clearly challenge sinocentrism by suggesting that the earth is round and therefore theoretically has no central point (in China), the centrality of China on the map itself could have mollified the shock that some Chinese might have felt. It also could have made the map more familiar, and thus more approachable and useful for readers accustomed to using maps with China at their centers. Another interesting feature, which has received less attention, is the presence of place names that are clearly imaginary. One of them is the country of women, which Ricci annotated: “The entry of the country of women: In old days there used to be this country, which also had men, yet generally when boys were born, they were killed. Today it has been annexed by (a country controlled by) men, and [the country] only exists in name” (see Figure 5.1).2
