The exhibition ‘Journey to the Ends of the World: Michele Ruggieri and the Jesuits in China’ is jointly organised by the Cultural Affairs Bureau, Macao Museum and the National Archives of Rome. Michele Ruggieri was the first Jesuit to learn Chinese and was approved to conduct missionary work in China’s inland cities. The Atlases of China drawn by Ruggieri and others is the key element of this exhibition, since it was the first map of China drawn by the West, although never officially printed.

In 1987, the Atlases were found in the National Archives of Rome in Italy. In 1993, the Atlases were formally published. These Atlases firstly introduced the geographic locations, rivers, agriculture, mining, education and culture of different provinces in China to the Western World, illustrating the importance of the southern region of China. The exhibition will display the original Atlases and other maps of China drawn by the Jesuits, and also the astronomical instruments that they used showing the great significance of Chinese learning spreading to the West and Sino-Western cultural exchange.