FROES, Luis Lettera annua del Giappone dell’anno MDXCVI. Scritta dal P. Luigi Frois, al R.P. Claudio Acquauiua Generale della Compagnia di Giesù. Tradotta in Italiano dal P. Francesco Mercati Romano della stessa Compagnia.

Rare edition of this letter addressed from Japan by the Jesuit missionary Froes to Father Acquaviva in 1596.

This remarkable account gives a detailed description of the progresses made by the Christian missions in Asia in the years 1595-1596, and of the state of the Church in Japan just before the persecutions. Pages 82; not in Cordier.

Luis Froes (1528-1597) is a Portuguese Jesuit who was intended for the missions and who followed Father Barzeo on his trip to the Indies in 1548. After a one-year mission in Malacca, Froes came back to Goa and in 1563 he was sent to Japan : his evangelical successes followed him.

A very attractive copy of this work preserved in its contemporary limp vellum.

This book is not recorded in any French institution.

OCLC only lists 3 copies: at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, at the University of Maastricht and at the Universtity of Minnesota.

The only other copy to appear at auction in the last thirty years was sold for £ 7 800 on the 25th of June 1992 by Sotheby’s London, that is to say € 13 000 more than 15 years ago.