Born 1580,
Portugal
Died 1634,
Goa. India

Following the first Portuguese expeditions to India in the early 1500s, the Roman Catholic church established several missions on the subcontinent and achieved some success in converting Indians to Christianity. The most successful missions were those founded by the Jesuit order. In 1615 the Jesuit missions were placed under the leadership of Father Antonio de Andrade, a native of Portugal. At the time rumors were circulating among the Jesuit missions that Christian communities existed in Tibet, north of the Himalayas. Andrade was determined to discover the truth.

Journey to Tibet

In March 1624 Andrade and a lay brother named Manuel Marques joined the entourage of the Mogul emperor Jahangir and traveled from the Indian capital at Agra more than 115 miles north to Delhi. In Delhi they adopted disguises and attached themselves to a caravan of Hindu pilgrims headed for Kashmir, a...