Unlocking Jesuit History: The Power of the Annual Catalogues

For anyone delving into Jesuit history, especially biographical research, there exists a surprisingly rich source: the annual catalogues produced by each Province of the Society of Jesus. These catalogues are not only essential for tracing individual Jesuits but also offer insights into the shifting landscapes of Jesuit missions, development of Jesuit communities, and movement of Jesuits across Provinces.

Catalogue Title page for 1940 British Province

What Are the Jesuit Catalogues?

Each year, every Province of the Society of Jesus publishes a catalogue listing all its houses, residences, and colleges. These lists indicate which Jesuits are assigned to each location and the roles they hold within their respective communities. Beyond this administrative overview, the catalogues provide valuable biographical details: dates of birth, year of entry into the Society, year of final vows, and—in later editions—ordination dates where applicable.

These catalogues thus form a near-continuous record of Jesuit lives, often from entry into the Society through to death or departure. For researchers faced with elusive names, especially those not appearing in other sources, these catalogues can confirm that an individual entered the Society—even if they left before taking final vows.

A Word of Caution: Accuracy and Timing

It's important to remember that these catalogues are accurate only at the time of their production. For example, the British Province catalogues are generally compiled and circulated towards the end of each year. Changes—such as transfers—can occur shortly afterwards, making the records slightly outdated almost immediately. Over the years I have observed (from a distance luckily!) the mammoth task that is undertaken each year by the administrative team in compiling and repeatedly checking the catalogues and although every care is taken to ensure these are as accurate as possible there may be errors. Researchers must be aware of such limitations when drawing conclusions from the data. A more accurate picture of a Jesuit's movement can be established using other archival sources such as the Province Registers and the curriculum vitae in curia files.

Map showing the Salisbury Mission of Zimbabwe in 1949 Catalogue

Additionally, the catalogues include information about any regions or missions under the care of the Province. For the British Province, this means catalogues until very recently include Guyana and South Africa—key areas of missionary activity for British Jesuits. Catalogues occasionally contain maps for the Province and regions which can be helpful in visually understanding the geographic distribution.

A further note of caution: the early catalogues were produced in Latin and therefore knowledge of this language is important as names were latinised. The jobs assigned to individuals can also include a long list of Latin abbreviations. Over the years we have complied a reasonably comprehensive list of the most commonly occurring ones along with a translation of what these meant. Just a few examples are given here:

Ann x mag. Xth year of teaching

Cur. Val. Sick man

Instr. Neophyt. Instructor of converts

Praef. Odei In charge of choir

Oper. paroch. On the parish

Visit. med. et exam. Visitor meditation and examen (went around at night time to see you were saying prayers)

For example, someone may be described in the catalogues as:

Præf. stud. inf. et lect. ad mens, Catech. Class. I, Conf. conv. et dom., Cons. ann. 8

Which means he was "Prefect of studies, prefect of reader at table, doing catechism in class one, hearing confession in school/attached building and in house and has been consultor for 8 years".

This demonstrates how useful this source can be in determining not only where a Jesuit lived over the years but also the roles of responsibility he held.

If you encounter abbreviations you are unable to decipher, you are welcome to contact us and we will try to assist in identifying what this means.

Research Applications: More Than Just Names

While the catalogues are indispensable for tracing individuals, they offer broader research potential as well. For instance, I’ve been using them to track British Jesuit involvement in Guyana—a mission under the British Province from 1857 until 2023. Though my analysis is ongoing, a few trends are already apparent. The number of Jesuits in Guyana steadily grew during the 1950s, and by the 1960s, Jesuits from other Provinces began appearing. A peak in mission numbers occurred in the 1970s, while the 21st century saw increasing reliance on Jesuits from outside the British Province, with these largely coming from Indian Provinces. By 2013, the Catalogue began identifying some members as explicitly belonging to "Guyana” with the number of ‘British Province’ Jesuits dropping to single digits. The other thing that struck me was that there were few brothers on the mission and scholastics were assigned to Guyana only from the late 1950s. Further research is necessary to explain these trends, although I suspect this follows the trend in the Province, and perhaps British religious life more widely, with less men available to send to Guyana from the 1980s.

Graph showing the number of Jesuits in Guyana as per the annual Catalogues

While the catalogues offer useful statistics, researchers should note the inconsistencies in how data is presented across the years. The criteria for inclusion—such as whether to count Jesuits assigned to Guyana but living elsewhere—varies, and sometimes these figures are split by Province while in other years they're aggregated. As I compiled these statistics alongside other work, it’s possible that my approach changed over time. Consequently, these figures should be considered indicative rather than definitive, and anyone wishing to use them is advised to verify the data for their own purposes.

The other thing that struck me while studying the catalogues was that this source alone could demonstrate the growth within the region and not just because of the increasing number of Jesuits listed. Over the years more parishes and communities get listed. Again there is a change in how these are listed from alphabetical to regional. However from the first basic list of names contained on less than a page, to pages and pages of communities, it is evident that there is growth. It could be interesting to do more localised studies to see how much the communities altered from year to year.

As well as studying the overall situation for Guyana I am using the catalogues to learn more about the individuals stationed there. A lot of the Jesuits arrived and stayed for decades, whilst others appear in only one catalogue indicating they did not last more than the year. So far the longest serving Jesuit spent 50 years in Guyana with several others also nearing this length of service! Their names become familiar as you work your way through the years and it is nice to see them appearing again and again, and when they disappear you wonder whether this was due to ill health returning them to Britain or whether they may even have died.

The catalogues themselves are also a testament to the changes in administration and technology. In some of the earlier Guyana catalogues I found a few instances were it had clearly not yet been determined who would be assigned to a certain community as the name has been left blank but all the responsibilities that this individual would hold had been filled in. Sharing updates for the catalogues from such a physical distance without modern communication methods might account for such gaps. There are also one or two instances where individual Jesuits are named as being part of the Guyana mission at the end of the community lists without having been assigned to one as they have not yet arrived-travelling by boat was of course much slower than modern air travel!

A Resource Waiting to Be Explored

The real takeaway here is that these catalogues are more than just administrative lists. With careful study, they can reveal trends in missionary work, community growth or decline, and the international collaboration within the Society. Yet their potential remains largely untapped by many researchers.

Thanks to the Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu (ARSI), the catalogues for the new Society post restoration in 1814 have been digitised up to 1950 and are freely available online here. Some earlier years are included, for example the earliest British one is for 1803, and there are some gaps.

For post 1950 catalogues, the British Jesuit Archives holds a complete set for the British Province and a reasonably complete set for other Provinces which is available to researchers in the reading room.

Further Sources

The focus here has been on the annual catalogues for the new Society. There are of course annual catalogues for the old Society. Copies of these, which are held in ARSI, have been included in publications such as Monumenta Angliae, which is available in our reference library. However, for English and Welsh Jesuits before 1650, Fr Thomas McCoog SJ’s Catholic Record Society volumes 74 & 75 (which are available freely online here) are invaluable, and for post-1650 individuals Holt’s listings (published as CRS vol 70) provide some coverage, though McCoog rightly notes their limitations—Holt primarily consulted the English Province catalogues, whereas McCoog worked with a broader range.

Conclusion

Whether you're pursuing a single Jesuit or charting the rise and fall of a missionary effort, the annual catalogues are a cornerstone of Jesuit historical research. Their wealth of data, both personal and communal, opens possibilities well beyond biographical inquiry. As more of this material becomes accessible online and through archives, researchers have an exciting opportunity to explore the living history of the Society of Jesus.

If there are other useful sources you would like us to explore in a blog post, please get in touch archives@jesuit.org.uk