author
G. J. de Groot
A pioneering Dutch scholar of China, he spent years in Xiamen and turned close observation into major studies of Chinese religion, custom, and social life. His best-known work, The Religious System of China, helped introduce generations of Western readers to Chinese traditions.
1 Audiobook
Schetsen uit Napels en Omgeving De Aarde en haar Volken, 1909
by G. J. de Groot
About the author
Jan Jakob Maria de Groot (1854–1921), often cited as J. J. M. de Groot, was a Dutch sinologist and historian of religion. After studying Chinese in Leiden, he traveled to Amoy, now Xiamen, in the 1870s, where he deepened his knowledge of language and local life through firsthand experience.
That direct contact with Chinese society shaped the work he became famous for. De Groot wrote extensively on religion, ritual, popular belief, and social customs, and his large multi-volume study The Religious System of China remains the work most closely associated with his name.
He later taught at Leiden University and then at the University of Berlin. Although some of his interpretations reflect the assumptions of his era, his writing stands out for its ambition, detail, and lasting importance in the early Western study of Chinese religion and culture.