Eusebio Francisco Kino

Eusebio Chini Lucci or Eusebius Franz Kühn, also transliterable as Kuehn (Segno, Principality-Bishopric of Trent, August 10, 1645 – Santa María Magdalena de Kino, New Spain, March 15, 1711), also called Padre Kino for the approximate phonetic transliteration of his last name into Spanish, was a Jesuit missionary, explorer, cartographer, geographer, and astronomer. Austro-Italian, distinguished among the Indians in the Pimería Alta, what is now northwestern Mexico and the American Southwest for his methods of evangelization, founder of 20 missions or visitas and known for his ability to establish relationships between indigenous people and the religious institutions he represented.

Biography

Origins

Statue of Father Kino in Segno, Italy, his birthplace.

The epic of Father Kino (Kuehn) began in Segno, currently belonging to the municipality of Predaia, a small town in the mountains of Italian Tyrol, not far from the historic city of Trento. There he was born on August 10, 1645 in a typical stone and wood room.

Studies

The young Eusebio Francisco, having very soon shown gifts of exceptional intelligence, was sent by his parents to the Jesuit school in Trento, where he was initiated into the knowledge of letters and science. From there he went on to the Jesuit College of Hall, near Innsbruck, Austria, to further cultivate his interest in science and mathematics. At the age of twenty, Kino began the long path of the typical formation of the members of the Society of Jesus.

After completing his theological studies, the Duke of Bavaria invited him to hold the chairs of science and mathematics at the University of Ingolstadt. However, Kino had requested years before to be sent to China when he finished his studies. He was lucky that there were only two missions available, one for the Philippines and the other for Mexico. In order to decide who would go to Asia and who would go to America, a draw was made, and Padre Kino got the latter.

Desperating game

In mid-June 1678, with eighteen other companions, he embarked in the port of Genoa bound for Cádiz. They hoped to board the fleet that, in the summer, was leaving for the New World. Fog, currents and winds when approaching Gibraltar misled the Italian pilot, who could only reach the coast near Ceuta. The mistake made them lose precious time, because when approaching the Bay of Cádiz on July 13, the Spanish imperial fleet had just set sail for New Spain.

Padre Kino and his companions had to wait two years to get a new ticket. However, they took advantage of the time in learning the Spanish language and in other preparations.

Finally, the Jesuit missionaries were able to obtain a place on the Nazareno, a galleon in which they embarked in July 1680. The fleet weighed anchor heading for New Spain, but this time the ship ran aground in the “Gran Diamante” sandbank, at the exit of the bay of Cádiz. The boat was soon battered and smashed by the fury of the wind and waves. Completely discouraged and without luggage, Kino waited another six months in Cádiz, which he took advantage of to study the great comet of 1680, about which he later wrote and published a famous pamphlet, until he was finally able to cross the vast Atlantic and reach his destination..

In the Viceroyalty of New Spain

The Baja California peninsula was Kino's first mission territory. Although the colonization of the territory had been attempted several times since the memorable days of Hernán Cortés, no Spanish expedition to the inaccessible peninsula had been successful until then. But this time, finally the expedition — under the command of Admiral Isidro de Atondo y Antillón — disembarked in 1683 in La Paz. As had already been foreseen, the peninsula turned out to be hostile to the colonizers, who were forced to return to Sinaloa, from where they had started. Kino was deeply upset by the exasperated behavior of the soldiers towards the Indians, as well as by the decision of the settlers to abandon the city of La Paz, a decision motivated by the harassment of the natives.

During his stay he wrote a Astronomical exhibitionin response to Philosophical Manifesto against Comets (1681) of Carlos de Sigüenza and Góngora, who tried to demonstrate the lack of relation between human facts and comets as cosmic phenomena. Kino responded with a severe exhibition of the Tomist dogma, to which Sigüenza in turn dedicated a new and final refutation, in his famous Astronomical work (1690), from the most up-to-date scientific knowledge, of which Kino had no greater knowledge.

Back in Baja California

In the autumn of the same year (1683) the expedition returned to the Californian peninsula. This time they built their first mission, San Bruno, near present-day Loreto. From the new station the expedition gradually made its way through the rocky Sierra de la Giganta. Four months after the exploration began, Padre Kino finally reached the coasts of the South Sea (Pacific Ocean). This time the friendship of the natives was achieved: their languages would be studied and baptism was administered to the little ones and the dying. After a year of efforts, the mission in Baja California seemed consolidated.

But in San Bruno, a terrible drought in 1685 destroyed crops. With it, the great dream was also exhausted. Admiral Antillón then submitted to a vote the abandonment of that royal enterprise, with orders to save as much as possible on board the ships. The warm winds blew the boats away from the inhospitable peninsula, leaving behind Kino's dream of creating a string of missions in Baja California. Other missionaries, years later, would be the ones who with the cross in hand would colonize the peninsula.

Father Kino's interest in the evangelization of Baja was not in vain. His reports gave rise to the viceroy Conde de Paredes constituting, at the beginning of 1686, a board to study the colonization of that land, only nominally Spanish. Said board was made up of Admiral Antillón, Padre Kino himself and the prosecutor of the Royal Court. They agreed to ask the Society of Jesus to take charge of the project, offering them the sum of thirty thousand pesos per year. However, the Society of Jesus rejected the invitation to manage temporal goods, although it was willing to cooperate in the spiritual and send the priests that were necessary. Faced with the refusal of his Order, Father Kino would undertake the journey towards the Pimería Alta, where he began his apostolic work.

Kino would never return to Baja California, even if he prepared for the third time to be part of an expedition to that destination. Indeed, it was decided that Kino, accompanied by Father Juan María de Salvatierra, would lead the expedition. But already ready to sail, in the autumn of 1697 a native rebellion would break out in northern Sonora, which prevented Kino from undertaking the trip, since he preferred to remain in situ to contribute to pacification. The expedition, after crossing the elongated gulf known as the Sea of Cortez, disembarked and founded the Mission of Nuestra Señora de Loreto in the town of the same name today. This Mission, founded by Father Juan María de Salvatierra, would be called "Head and Mother of the Missions of Alta and Baja California", and from there the colonization of said regions would begin firmly.

Father of Pimería Alta

Ruins of Casa Grande, Arizona, visited by Father Eusebio Francisco Kino in 1694.

Father Kino, then a missionary without a mission, suggested to his provincial chief that he send him to work among the Seri tribes of Sonora, so that he would at least be close to the Baja California peninsula. The provincial agreed and Padre Kino rode off to what would be his life's mission.

Father Manuel González, a visitor to the northwest missions, had heard of the Italian missionary, recognized in him a privileged talent and thought that there was a place that suited Kino's spirit, the Pimería Alta, that is, the part northern Sonora and its unexplored deserts located northwest of New Spain.

Father Kino arrived in Sonora in 1687 and until his death in 1711 he rode founding missions throughout the north of the current Mexican state of Sonora and south of the current state of Arizona, United States. During his epic, he crossed the great Sonoran desert until he met the Colorado River at the confluence with the Gila River (Arizona), he tried to find a land route to travel to the Baja California peninsula and serve the natives of that area.. Likewise, he toured much of what is now known as the state of Arizona, evangelizing, exploring, and taking notes.

He began to explore this region entering the valley of the Río Alisos north of Imuris and Río Magdalena, where he began to congregate the indigenous people in the missions of San Ignacio de Cabórica, San José de Imuris, Nuestra Señora del Pilar, Santiago of Cocóspera and Santa María de Magdalena. He also established the mission of Nuestra Señora de los Remedios, north of Dolores, on the course of the San Miguel de Horcasitas river. The support of Father Antonio de Rojas was very important to carry out this work, since he donated grains and cattle and also facilitated the collaboration of indigenous Christians to help Kino in the work of catechists. Father Kino's work caused controversy among Spanish landowners and other religious in the region, who were skeptical about the possibility of civilizing the Pimas. This caused Father Juan María Salvatierra to be sent to Sonora from New Spain to observe the situation. The report was favorable to Father Kino, and he allied with Salvatierra in order to colonize California, who left for New Spain to promote the idea, while Kino promised to find routes by sea and land to carry out said mission..

In 1691, he founded the town of Bisanig, as well as the mission of Guevavi on the Santa Cruz River. The following year he continued to travel this river to the north, establishing the missions San Javier del Bac, with his visit town, San Cosme del Tucsón, today Tucson, Arizona. Kino's work was made difficult by the lack of missionaries who could help him; in 1689, for example, he received 4 auxiliaries who soon left him. In 1693, Father Agustín de Campos arrived, who would help him a lot, becoming his friend. In the year 1694, Father Kino began exploring the "unknown lands", where he managed to see, along with his companion Captain Juan Mateo Mange (who would call these lands that way), the California coast from the top of Mount Nazareno, where the Magdalena River flows.

Between 1694 and 1695 Father Eusebio Kino carried out an exploration of the northern territories of the Kingdom of Nueva Vizcaya, accompanied by the Jesuit priest Antonio de Heredias Pacheco, he would have the help, as a guide, of the chief Concho Phelipe, Being escorted by the prison forces of General Juan Isidro Pardinas Villar de Francos, Captain Francisco Ramírez de Salazar being in command, the expedition would leave the Sinaloa Prison, of this length he made a geographical report, the existing natural resources, regions inhabited by the various indigenous nations, his journey took him to the Casas Grandes Valley, the Cuquiárachi region, the town of San Matheo, the Santo Domingo region, the Moqui region of the New Mexico Territory, the regions of Taravilla, Bera de Guaches, Santa María, Dolores, from the San José de Terenate river, Becanueche, Tunicache, passing by the Janos Prison, the towns of Llerena, San Diego del Monte, El Cerro de Nacore, by the Cuencamé Prison, the Conchos River Prison... returning from the Presidio del Parral to Sinaloa. This journey allowed Father Eusebio Kino to contact the indigenous people of the Janos, Jocomes, Ópatas, Pimas, Oriental Pimas, Sobaipuris, Tarahumaras, Conchos, Apaches, and various groups of Chichimecos. His report would serve to establish the control activities of all these towns, given that since the 1640's many of these towns were in open resistance to the Spanish claim to dominate them and seize their lands, in this sense the Spanish were clear invaders of the territories where more than 200 indigenous nations lived.

In order to cross the arm of the sea that separated him from California, construction began on a ship at the Caborca mission. That same year he traveled to the banks of the Gila River.

In 1694 he was the first European to visit the pre-Hispanic ruins of the Hohokam Big House, which he described as a four-story, mud-built structure with windows on three walls, now considered to be for astronomical observations.

In 1695 the Pimería Alta missions became independent from the authority of the rector of the Río Sonora and Río San Miguel missions. With this action, Kino managed to improve the administration of this mission district, which was named Nuestra Señora de los Dolores. That same year the first indigenous rebellion was recorded. The movement began in Tubutama and spread through Caborca. It resulted in the murder of the Jesuit Francisco Javier Saeta and his two opatical assistants. In response, the mayor of Sonora, Captain Domingo Gironza Petris de Cruzat, cracked down heavily on the rebels. Facts of this type made Father Kino's job difficult, since he had to win back the trust of the indigenous people.

Between 1697 and 1702 Kino made many expeditions in the region in search of routes to reach California (what we now know as Baja California). He is credited with having discovered that California was connected by land with the rest of the continent, thanks to an expedition carried out in the Sierra del Álamo, near Caborca. During this time, he visited Casa Grande and went down to the mouth of the & # 34;Rio Grande & # 34; to Santa Clara.

He founded the missions of San Marcelo de Xonoydag in 1698, in what is now known as Sonoyta; That same year he created the missions of San Ambrosio del Búsanic and Tucubavia on the Altar River. It was in 1702, during his last trip to the Colorado River, that Kino became convinced that he had found a way by land to reach California; thus he informed his superiors, who brought it to the attention of King Felipe V.

In the first half of 1704, Eusebio Francisco Kino led another expedition, this one to the Pimería Alta region to verify the uprisings of the Pima Indians. In this action, the death of two fathers near Cocóspera, attributed to Apaches, Kino informed about these that they had a constant action of Apache spies in Terrenate. But it was also verified that part of the towns were in a peaceful life, in this sense he highlighted that in the Indian town of San Ignacio the prison troops were received friendly, who passed through two lines of pimas-women on one side, men on the other. Kino would render his report pointing out the main geographical features, mountains, rivers, streams, forests, land animals, birds, fish that the pimas fed on, he also managed to obtain data on the ways of life, customs, ideas and amounts of inhabitants of the various towns visited, which turned out to be an excellent document of ethnographic and historical importance.

His apostolate

Statue of Eusebio Francisco Kino at the Capitol of the United States, the work of sculptor Suzanne Silvercruys.

Padre Kino built missions in Sonora and Arizona, introduced cattle ranching and modern farming methods; He explored a vast region, verified that Baja California is a peninsula and not an island as some thought at the time, baptized thousands of natives (gentiles), thwarted intrigues, obtained privileges for his beloved Indians, preached the Gospel, was a diplomat prudent, he made astronomical observations (he had been appointed royal cosmographer), learned the native languages, taught thousands of people to read and write; he tamed spirits, lands and horses, and also knew how to find time to write. In his book & # 34; Heavenly Favors & # 34; he recounts the adventures and misadventures of his life from 1687 to 1706, five years before the death of him

In his prolific missionary life, Padre Kino founded:

• The Mission of Our Lady of Dolores (1687).
• The Mission of Our Lady of the Remedies of Doágibubig (1695 - 1704).
• The Mission of Our Lady of Pilar and Santiago de Cocóspera
• Santa Maria Suamca (1693). Visit of Cocospera.
• The Mission of San Ignacio de Cabórica.
• San José de Imuris. There is currently the temple. But there are no traces of the above.
• The mission of Santa María de Magdalena (Sonora, Mexico). Place where their remains rest in a mausoleum.
• The Mission of Saint Peter and Paul of Tubutama.
• The mission of San Antonio Paduano del Oquitoa.
• Santa Gertrudis del Sáric.
• The mission of Saint Teresa of Atil.
• The Mission of La Purísima Concepción de Nuestra Señora de Caborca.
• San Diego del Pitiquí Mission. Pitiquito.
• The Mission of San Cayetano de Tumacácori (Arizona, United States).
• Mission of Los Santos Angeles de Guevavi.
• Mission of San José de Tumacácori.
• The Mission of San Xavier del Bac (Arizona, United States).
• The mission of San Marcelo de Xonoydag.
• Other small missions called Visitswhich are on both sides of the US and Mexico border.

Rise of the Legend

Cripta where the remains of Father Kino lie in Magdalena de Kino.

Father Kino had gone to town to celebrate and dedicate the first mass and to sing it, in the chapel that his friend Father Agustín de Campos had built in honor of Saint Francis Xavier. During the celebration he felt ill and Father Campos assisted him in his final minutes. He expired at almost midnight on March 15, 1711 in the town of Santa María Magdalena, present-day Magdalena de Kino, Sonora, and died during the night; there he was buried by Father Agustín, who 26 years later and thanks to his example, consolidated what Kino had started.

For almost 250 years, the exact place of his tomb was unknown, during many years of the last century his remains were unsuccessfully searched for by Mexican and American anthropologists and historians. On May 19, 1966, his remains were found under the Magdalena de Kino main square, thanks to investigations ordered by the then Governor of Sonora, Luis Encinas Johnson, and the then Mayor of Magdalena Sonora, Gerardo Nava. Garcia. His remains were found after a long search, in the facilities of what was the municipal palace located in front of the town square.

The building and the square were replaced by a monumental square, which includes the church, the new chapel for San Francisco, some portals for the sale of handicrafts, gardens, the mausoleum dedicated to Kino where his remains rest today, today in the same place where he was buried, under the Mausoleum. The place is visited and one of the factors to be named as a magical town.

The state of Sonora has honored his memory in many ways: it named the bay where Padre Kino disembarked one day as Bahía de Kino and the town where he died as Magdalena de Kino, while the state of Arizona in 1961 decided to honor the memory of Padre Kino by asking the United States Congress to accept the statue of Kino as the second representative sculpture of the state of Arizona in the National Statuary Hall of the United States Capitol. United States, a place where each state of the American Union can place the statues of two of its distinguished citizens (prominent citizens).

The library of the Mexican Province of the Society of Jesus bears his name.

Regarding the self-appointed "Francisco"

It is said that, during the period in which Kino lived in Europe (that is, before traveling to evangelize America) he prayed to Saint Francis Xavier to free him from a deadly illness. After a while, he was cured of the disease and added "Francis" to the word. to his name, between his birth name (Eusebio) and his last name.

In addition to this, the admiration that Kino felt for this same saint is evident in numerous works and works. He thus names in honor of his homeland as Nueva Navarra one of the provinces that are members of the General Command of the Internal Provinces.

Beatification process

His beatification process has been open since May 2006, and he has been declared a Servant of God since that same year.

Pope Francis on July 11, 2020, approved a decree that recognizes the heroic virtues of Eusebio Francisco Kino. With the recognition of his heroic virtues, he becomes a venerable Servant of God and begins the canonization process.

New king of the New Navara with his confinantes other kings (1710) preserved in the National Library of France

This map, which was hand-colored by the cartographer Nicolás de Fer, was originally created by Kino in 1696. His name is California or New Carolina: Place of the Apostolic Works of the Society of Jesus in North America.

Works

The publication of his complete works is an open and ongoing project that began in 1750 when Juan Antonio Baltasar, a Swiss Jesuit who arrived in New Spain eight years after the death of Fr. Kino, already perceived the relevance of collect the opera omnia (complete works).

Cartography

Regarding the cartographic work, Ernest J. Burrus identifies 31 maps of the 28 corresponding to California and the Pimería Alta. Some of them would be:

• In 1683 he made nn map of the southern region of Baja California which is preserved in the General Archive of Indias of Seville.
• In 1684 he produces three new maps with the contours of Baja California and the northern part of New Spain.
• In 1685. A map of California published by Scherer in its Atlas. Munich, 1703.
• In 1695-96. Map of “the whole island of California” and much of the Mexican continent. This map served to illustrate his biography of the missionary Francisco Javier Saeta. He drew another similar map published by Nicolás de Fer in Paris, between 1705 and 1720, not to mention the author's name.
• In 1696-97 he made another map used in Saeta's biography on the Missions of Pimería and was reproduced on several occasions.
• In 1701 he traces a map «product of his travels to search for the land passage to California. »
• In 1702 he made two maps whose originals have been lost being one of them published in Germany in 1726.
• In 1704 he prepares four maps of Baja California and Pimeria that remain in unknown whereabouts.
• In 1705-06 he draws another map of the Pymeria that is not known where it is.
• In 1706-08. On the occasion of the discovery of the island of Santa Inés (Angel de la Guarda), he drew a map to register the discovery.
• In 1710. He made a last map to illustrate the Heavenly favors where the peninsula of California appears, the islands of Saint Vincent and Saint Inés, that of the Presentation, the rivers Gila and Colorado with its tributaries, the whole Pimeria Alta calling it New Navarre, and New Mexico. It was published in France in 1722 as an anonymous map. It was copied in 1724 and the copy is kept in the National Library of France (Paris), within the Collection D’Anville. Hundreds of editions followed where the name of the author is omitted.

La Astronomical exhibition (1681), work of Kino

Posts about her figure

• Kino Eusebio Francisco. Chronicle of the High Pymeria. Heavenly favorsfirst published in 1913-1922 by the Government of the State of Sonora, in 1958 (2nd ed.) and in 1985 (3rd ed).
• Astronomical exhibition of the comet, which the year of 1680: for the months of November, and diziembre, and this year of 1681, for the months of January and February, has been seen all over the world, and has observed him in the city of Cadiz, Mexico: By F. Rodríguez Lupercio, 1681.
• The Spanish Admiral D. Isidro de Atondo, and Antilo[n] entered the Great Island of California this year from 1683 to 31 de março extracted from a letter from that Admiral of 20 and Father Eusebio Fra[n]cisco Kino de la Co[m]pañia de Iesus of 22 April, his dates in the port of Peace. Mexico: By Bernardo Calderón's widow, [1683]
• From the state of this New Earths of this dilated Pimeria and other nations and the conquest, reduction and spiritual and temporal remedy of this North AmericaApril 15, 1699.
• Relation of the second entrance of the Californias or carolinas, from 1685 hazia to the Southmanuscript.
• Very brevable ratio of the large entrance from the coast, to the opposite coast of the Californias or carolinas, which was made from 14 of Dize., from 1684 to 13 of Henero from 1685manuscript.
• Brief relation of the entry that since 13 March 1687: was made to the nation and the Gentile Indians Pimas and good principles of their reduction to our holy Catholic faith, Sonora, Mexico, January 25, 1688.
• Passo por tierra a la California: y sus confinantes nuevos países y nuevos missiones de la compa. Iesus in North America1701.
• Delineatio nova et vera partis australis Novi Mexici: cum australi parte insulae Californiae saeculo priori ab hispanis detectae[München]: [Typis Mariae Magdalena Rauchin], [1703]
• Tabula Californiae, anno 1702: ex autoptic observatione delineata a R. P. Chino e S. I. [Augsburg]: [P. Martin, und J. Veith], [1726]
• Exempla luce picta. N.a S.a de los Dolores, 18 Oct 1701 and 2 February 1702.
• Art of the nevome language: which is called pima, Sonora's own: with the christian and confessional doctrine added. San Augustin de la Florida: [s. i.], 1862. There is modern edition (New York: AMS Press, 1970)
• Theatre of the apostolic works of the Compa. of Jesus in North America, 1696manuscript.
• Christian doctrine and confessional in the nevome language, that is, the pyma, the tip of Sonora. San Augustin de la Florida: [s. i.], 1862.
• Letters and relations of Father Eusebio Fco. Kino. Mexico, Vargas Rea, 1953.
• Correspondence of Father Kino with the Generals of the Society of Jesus, 1682-1707. Mexico: Editorial Jus, 1961.
• The missions of Sonora and Arizona. Understanding: The Chronicle entitled: "Favors of Heaven" and the "Daily Relation of the Northwest Entrance"Mexico: Editorial "Cultura", 1913-1922.
• Life of Fr. Francisco J. Saeta, S.J.: heal missionary in SonoraMexico: Editorial Jus, 1961; others ed., Rome, 1971 and Mexico: Instituto Sonorense de Cultura, 2001.
• Kino reports to headquarters: correspondence of Eusebio F. Kino, S.J., from New Spain with Rome, Rome: Institutum Historicum Societatis Jesu, 1954.
• Kino writes to the Duchess: Letters of Eusebio Francisco Kino, S.J., to the Duchess of Aveiro: an annotated English translation, and the text of the non-Spanish documents, Rome: Jesuit Historical Institute / St. Louis: St. Louis University, 1965.
• A Kino keepsake: facsimile of an original Eusebio Francisco Kino field diary, preserved at the University of Arizona Library, describing Southern Arizona in 1699. Tucson: Friends of the University of Arizona Library, 1991.
• Jesuits at sea: logbook of Eusebio Francisco Kino from Genoa to Seville 1678. Guadalajara: Centro de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades de la Universidad de Guadalajara, 2008.
• Adventures and deventures of Father Kino in the Pimeria. Mexico: Ministry of Public Education/National Association of Freemasons, 1986.
• Letters to the Mission Prosecutor by Eusebio Francisco Kino. Mexico: Universidad Iberoamericana, 1987.
• Chronicle of the High Pymeria: heavenly favors. Hermosillo: Government of the State of Sonora, 1985 and Mexico: National Council for Culture and Arts - Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia / Buenos Aires: Estudio Roque González de Santa Cruz, 2013.
• P. Fco report. Maria PiccoloMexico: Vargas Rea, 1953.
• Father Salvatierra's coming to Hyaqui's missions. Mexico, Vargas Rea, 1953.
• Los quiquimas de la California. Mexico, Vargas Rea, 1953.
• Letters and Relationships about California. Mexico, Vargas Rea, 1953-
• Adelantamiento de la California. Mexico, Vargas Rea, 1953.
• First from the gulf to the Pacific: the diary of the Kino-Atondo peninsular expedition, December 14, 1684-January 13, 1685. Los Angeles, Dawson's Book Shop, 1969.
• Eusebio Francesco Chini: epistolary 1670-1710. Bologna: EMI, 1998.
• Report and Relation of the New Conversions, 1710. Wisconsin: Historical Society Charles Scribner's Sons, 2003.