Background
Eusebio Kino was born on August 10, 1645, in Segno, Italy. His parents were Franciscus Chinus and Margherita Luchi.
(Excerpt from Kino's Historical Memoir of Pimería Alta, Vo...)
Excerpt from Kino's Historical Memoir of Pimería Alta, Vol. 2: A Contemporary Account of the Beginnings of California, Sonora, and Arizona, by Father Eusebio Francisco Kino, S. J., Pioneer Missionary Explorer, Cartographer, and Ranchman, 1683-1711 Since the presidios were not helping as much as was desired in regard to the many invasions and hostilities,' About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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Eusebio Kino was born on August 10, 1645, in Segno, Italy. His parents were Franciscus Chinus and Margherita Luchi.
He attended Jesuit schools, and in 1663, having fallen seriously ill, he vowed that if he recovered with divine aid he would join the Society of Jesus and devote himself to work in foreign missions. Having recovered, he entered the Jesuit novitiate in 1665. During 13 years of additional study in Jesuit institutions, he displayed a special interest and ability in mathematics and geography.
After his requests for a missionary assignment had been repeatedly turned down, Kino and a German companion were accepted for foreign service; one was to go to the Philippines, the other to Mexico. Unwilling to make the choice, the two men cast lots, and the result of this "pious lottery" was that Kino drew Mexico. Because of various mishaps he did not arrive in Mexico until May 1681. During his stay in Mexico City, Kino published a pamphlet ascribing the character of a portent to the comet of 1680; this provoked a reply from the Mexican scholar Carlos Sigüenza y Góngora, whose Libra astronomica assigned a purely natural origin to the phenomenon. Meanwhile, Kino had left Mexico City to serve as missionary and cartographer on the Atondo expedition to Baja California of 1683. Food shortages and Atondo's rash attack on friendly Indians caused the failure and abandonment of this missionary and colonizing venture. In 1687 Kino began the peaceful conquest of the region then called Pimería Alta (modern northern Sonora and southern Arizona). This land of deserts and mountains was inhabited by the Pima Indian tribe. From his base at Mission Dolores in the southern part of the region, Kino, assisted by a few coworkers, pushed northward, establishing missions in one river valley after another until his network of missions extended into Arizona as far as the Colorado and Gila rivers. The intense, driving Kino personally baptized some 4, 500 Indians; a few years before his death he estimated that he and his colleagues had brought more than 30, 000 souls into the Church. A born planner and organizer, Kino provided a sound economic base for his missions, teaching the Indians not only Christian doctrine but cattle raising and the cultivation of new crops like wheat. He was himself a largescale rancher, supplying livestock both to his own missions and to those in Baja California, to which the Jesuits returned in 1697. The combination of sound economic planning and a broad tolerance for Indian customs was a major reason for Kino's success in his campaign of peaceful conquest. Kino found time amid his apostolic labors to explore Arizona as far north as the Casa Grande ruins and the Gila River and westward to modern Yuma and the Colorado River. His westward journeys convinced him that California was not an island, as was then commonly supposed. His maps, showing that California could be reached overland from Mexico, prepared the ground for the Spanish 18th-century missionary and colonizing thrust into that area. Kino was a prodigious letter writer; many of these letters, relating his achievements and trials, have been preserved and published. He was also the author of an autobiographic work, Favores celestiales (Kino's Historical Memoir of Pimeria Alta, 1919).
(Excerpt from Kino's Historical Memoir of Pimería Alta, Vo...)
Kino opposed the slavery and compulsory hard labor in the silver mines that the Spaniards forced on the native people. This also caused great controversy among his co-missionaries, many of whom acted according to the laws imposed by Spain on their territory.
Kino was also a writer, authoring books on religion, astronomy and cartography. He built missions extending from the present day states of Mexican Sonora, northeast for 150 miles (240 km), into present-day Arizona, where the San Xavier del Bac mission, near Tucson, a popular National Historic Landmark, is still a functioning Franciscan parish church. Kino constructed nineteen rancherías (villages), which supplied cattle to new settlements. Kino practiced other crafts and was reportedly an expert astronomer, mathematician and cartographer, who drew the first accurate maps of Pimería Alta, the Gulf of California, and Baja California. Father Kino enjoyed making model ships out of wood. His knowledge of maps and ships led him to believe that Mexican Indians could easily access California by sea, a view taken with skepticism by missionaries in Mexico City.