The article offers a study on the first translation of the Chinese philosopher Mencius in a Western language, made between 1582 and 1588. This Latin translation was the work of the Jesuit Michele Ruggieri (1543-1607). Until now it has been only preserved as manuscript and never published.

In the first part of the article, I offer an in-depth presentation of the classical formation of a young Jesuit in the 16th century. In the second part I provide examples to inquiry whether Cicero’s or Seneca’s Latin vocabulary influenced this translation so that the Jesuits, perhaps unintentionally, made Mencius’s text more similar to those of ancient Roman philosophers than it really is.