Ferdinand Verbiest
Between 1597 and 1762 it had immense influence on the learning of Eastern languages and culture by missionary Jesuits, making Macau a base for the spreading of Christianity in China and in Japan. Its academic program soon became comprehensive and equivalent to that of a university: it included core disciplines such as theology, philosophy, and mathematics, geography, astronomy, and Latin, Portuguese and Chinese. Many famous scholars taught and learned at this college, that became home to the first western sinologists such as Matteo Ricci, Johann Adam Schall von Bell and Ferdinand Verbiest.