Joseph Edkins

Joseph Edkins
Missionary to China
Born	19 December 1823 Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, England
Died	23 April 1905 (1905-04-24) (aged 81) Shanghai, Qing China
Education	University of London
Spouse(s)	Jane Rowbotham Edkins (née Stobbs)

Joseph Edkins (Chinese: 艾約瑟; 19 December 1823 – 23 April 1905) was a British Protestant missionary who spent 57 years in China, 30 of them in Beijing. As a Sinologue, he specialised in Chinese religions. He was also a linguist, a translator, and a philologist. Writing prolifically, he penned many books about the Chinese language and the Chinese religions especially Buddhism. In his China's Place in Philology (1871), he tries to show that the languages of Europe and Asia have a common origin by comparing the Chinese and Indo-European vocabulary.

Born at Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, he graduated from the University of London in 1843. He was ordained on 8 December 1847. Sent by the London Missionary Society, he arrived in China on 22 July 1848 at Hong Kong, and reached Shanghai on 2 September. First he worked in the London Missionary Society Press in Shanghai under Walter Henry Medhurst. From 1852 to 1858 he edited the Chinese annual Chinese and Foreign Concord Almanach (華洋和合通書), later known as the Chinese and Western Almanac (中西通書). During this period of time, he collaborated with Li Shanlan, Wang Tao and others to translate many Western scientific works into Chinese. Besides this, he was involved in Bible translation and an active member of the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. In the 1850s he travelled extensively in the Shanghai and Ningbo regions. He also was involved in direct evangelism, and accompanied Hudson Taylor on some of his first canal-boat travels in China, distributing portions of Scripture and Christian tracts.