Joachim Bouvet (Chinese: 白晋 or 白進, courtesy name: 明远) (July 18, 1656, in Le Mans – June 28, 1730, in Peking) was a French Jesuit who worked in China, and the leading member of the Figurist movement.

[1] Before setting out for their destination, he and his associates were admitted to the French Académie des Sciences and were commissioned by that learned body to carry on astronomical observations, to determine the geographical positions of the various places they were to visit, and to collect various scientific data.

[2] While engaged in this work, the two Jesuits wrote several mathematical treatises in the Tatar language which the emperor caused to be translated into Chinese, adding the prefaces himself.

These were deposited in the Royal Library, and Louis XIV, in turn, commissioned Father Bouvet to present to the emperor a magnificently bound collection of engravings.

[3] In 1699 Bouvet arrived in China for the second time, accompanied by ten missionaries, among them Joseph Henri Marie de Prémare, Jean-Baptiste Régis, and Dominique Parrenin.

In 1700, with four of his fellow missionaries, Bouvet presented a memorialto the emperor, asking for a decision as to the meaning attached to the various ceremonies of the Chinese in honor of Confucius and their ancestors.