Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the production of presence of the body of St. Francis Xavier in Europe in 1614. Two objects—the Saint's arm, shipped from Goa to Rome, and an eyewitness account of his miracles printed in Lisbon—shed light on questions of proximity and distance in a global Iberian world.

Paper long abstract:

The mortal remains of St. Francis Xavier reached their permanent resting place in Goa in 1553. In the wake of their translation, local Christians fervently vied for any kind of contact with the Saint, calling him simply, "the Body." A concerted campaign was needed to foster the same kind of cult elsewhere: in addition to spreading hagiographical texts and images throughout Europe and beyond, the Jesuits decided to sever Xavier's right forearm and ship it to Rome in 1614. The relic was promptly displayed on an altar under a portrait of the Saint in the Jesuits' young Gesù Church, a powerful gesture in their final push for beatification and canonization. In that same year, an eyewitness account of Xavier's activities and miracles in Asia entered the public sphere in Lisbon as a licensed, printed book—Fernão Mendes Pinto's travel narrative, Peregrinaçam, which included several chapters on his first-hand contact with the Saint, had been sitting in obscurity in manuscript form for about forty years. I contend that the princeps edition of Peregrinaçam is configured, both with visual cues on its title page and narrative devices throughout, as a testimony to the life of Xavier that complements and supports the act of translating his arm into the European continent and imaginary. Read together, these two objects—body and printed book—shed light on questions of proximity and distance in a global Iberian world. A 1653 English edition of Peregrinaçam erases Xavier completely, revealing inter-European conflicts as well.