Józef Kowalewski, a founding father of Mongolian studies in Russia, stayed in Beijing
from November 1830 until July 1831. He stayed with the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission
and, being a Catholic himself, Kowalewski was very interested in the history and current
state of Catholicism in China. In those years Catholicism in China faced severe persecution.
All European missionaries were expelled from China with the exception of Bishop
Gaetano Pirès Pereira, who was allowed to stay at the Russian Mission because of his
old age. Kowalewski is said to have written a history of Catholicism in China which
was destroyed by fire. However, unpublished diaries of Kowalewski, which survive in
the Russian archives, contain much interesting information about Catholic cemeteries
in Beijing, the life of Chinese converts, the Jesuit library and records of his talks with
the last Catholic bishop.
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