Évariste Huc

Évariste Governed Huc or more simply Évariste Huc (1813 - 1860) was a French monk about the Lazaristes, which was missionary in China at the 19th century and carried out missions of exploration through the Mongolia ( Tartarie ) until the Tibet, of which it returned account in a book, published in 1854.

Biography

Affected in 1840 with the vicariate lately created of Tartarie - Mongolia, Évariste Huc was in charge of a voyage of exploration with the R.P. Joseph Gabet to study the practices of the Mongolian tribes for their evangelization.

Leaving their “residence” of the area of Beijing in company of a young person LAMA, they passed by Dolon-NOR, Guihuacheng (Kwei-hwa-ch' eng), the country Ordo, the Ningxia (Ning-hia), Went-shan, crossed the Great wall and reached Xining (If-ning), in the province of the Qinghai. (Kan-Known). They visited the Buddhist monastery of Kumbum Jampa Ling (Kun-Bum), and united with an embassy Tibetan which returned from Beijing. While passing by the Koukou-NOR (Ku-ku-NOR), Tsaidam, and the Bayan-Kara mountains, they arrived at Lhassa, the January 20th 1846, after 18 months of voyage.

They was the first foreigners to visit Lhassa since Thomas Manning, in 1811 - 1812, and 85 years before the passage of the first Western woman Alexandra David-Néel.

They were well treated by the Tibetans, but the Chinese regent Ki-shan, who had a tooth against the Westerners (he had been condemned to died then amnestied for its relations with the English during the Guerre of Opium), made them expel the February 26th under good guard of a Chinese escort which brought back them in reef tackle to Canton where they arrived at the end of September 1846.

Their account " Memories of a voyage in Tartarie and Tibet " , published in 1854 with Paris, and followed " Chinese empire " was a great success.

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