Ôta Agostinho (1574-1631)

Clergy of the Society of Jesus who worked mostly in Japan. He was born in Urakami and died in Manila, on 17th September, 1631. Also known as Agostinho Vota, he joined the seminary in 1585. He accompanied the bishop D. Pedro Martins during his stay in Japan and went together with him to Macau, where he studied Examen of Consciousness for a few months. In 1598 he returned to Japan with the visitator Alexandre Valignano. Between 1599 and 1602 he was in Manila, serving as interpreter to the rector and as preacher. When he returned to Japan he entered the Society. In 1603 he was attending the second year of novitiate at Todos os Santos. When the novitiate ended, he worked at the Arie residence, where he still was in 1606-07. In February 1613 he worked at the Tone residence, in the Nagasaki area. He left for Manila in 1614 and in 1620 was transferred to Macau, where he worked as a brother until 1627. He may have returned to Manila, where he was ordained priest shortly before his death. He knew how to write Japanese and how to translate Japanese texts, and knew some Latin as well.

Bibliography:
Monumenta Historica Japoniae, dir. de Josef Franz Schütte S. J., Roma, Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu, 1975. COSTA, João Paulo Oliveira e, O Cristianismo no Japão e o Episcopado de D. Luís de Cerqueira, dissertação de doutoramento em História apresentada à Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Lisboa, 1998 (texto fotocopiado).


Translated by: Maria das Mercês Pacheco