António Francisco Cardim

[1] After requesting to be sent to the Far East as a missionary, Cardim sailed to Portuguese India in 1618 in the company of Bishop Diogo Correia Valente (1568-1633).

From 1626 until 1629, he lived in the Ayutthaya Kingdom, where he learned enough of the Thai language to write a catechism and a small treatise on the Christian faith.

[7] In February 1631, Cardim was sent to Tonkin along with Miguel Matsuda and Pedro Kasui (two Japanese missionaries who were later martyred in Japan),[6] where they were received with honor by King Trịnh Tráng.

Cardim translated some of his works from Latin into Portuguese and Italian, and composed several important monographs on the missions of the Society of Jesus.

"[13] Cardim documented this episode in Mors felicissima quatuor legatorum Lusitanorum quo Japponiae Imperator occidit in odium Christianae religionis, which was first published in 1646.

[14] On April 15, 1649, he boarded São Lourenço, a galleon which was subsequently wrecked off the coast of Portuguese Mozambique, where he passed the following winter.

He wrote a report on his travels, entitled Batalhas da Companhia de Jesus na sua gloriosa provincia do Japão, which he dedicated to King John IV.