filipino responses to spanish colonization and evangelization
TRANSCRIPT
Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
The Initial Encounter Vol. 1
A History of Christianity in the Philippines
T. Valentino Sitoy, Jr.
New Day Publishers, Quezon City, Phil. 1985
Chapter 5
Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
In previous chapters, some indication had been made of the nature of the Filipinos' response to the Spanish conquest and the initial evangelization efforts of the Augustinian friars. This present chapter will carry the narrative of the first quarter century of the Spanish domination of the Philippines up to about 1590. While this terminal date is arbitrary, in terms of the Filipinos' responses to Spanish temporal objectives, this date may be considered significant, for it marked the end of the troubles immediately connected with the conspiracies of 15871588, a rather widespread resistance movement, which though poorly coordinated and ultimately unsuccessful, did cause no small tremor on the part of the Spaniards. In terms of evangelization, 1590 also seems to mark the end of one era, characterized by an initially slow and then moderately paced advance in conversions, the next era being ushered in by a new Spanish program to hasten and intensify the evangelization of the islands.
VISAYAN RESPONSES (15651571): A RESUME
As will be recalled, after initial friendliness which lasted only a few days, it was hostility and defiance which the people of eastern Visayas accorded Legazpi's fleet, especially as the latter coasted southward from Samar to the central Visayan islands. The Spaniards' subsequent discovery of the cause of this unfriendly welcome provided Legazpi a scapegoat for his
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subsequent troubles, and up to 1571 he would still be blaming the Portuguese for leaving the Spaniards "so badly accredited" with the local peoples, apparently unable to appreciate the fact that the Visayans could have justified reasons of their own for abhorring the Spaniards' presence.
The Cebuanos, with whom the Spaniards would have the most contact during the first five years, likewise met the Spaniards with hostility and defiance, and as late as 1574 the conquistadors would still hark to the fact that the Cebuanos themselves had initiated the battle which led to the destruction of Sugbu, forgetting that it was their sudden appearance and their demands which had provoked such reaction from the local people. As would be recalled, even after the Spaniards' capture of Sugbu, the Cebuanos continued to engage them in guerrillatype action at Mandawe and what is now Compostela, and then in the nightly raids on the Spanish camp. The murder of Arana, which brought down heavy Spanish reprisals, was part of this continuing defiance, aggravated by Spanish forages in the countryside and the desecration and robbery of local burial grounds. It was not until the capture of important hostages and Legazpi's skillful use of these as pawns in the ensuing negotiations that Rajah Tupas and his chiefs were forced to submit. Thus, despite subsequent Spanish claims, the submission of the Cebuanos was neither voluntary nor the fruit of Legazpi's diplomacy, but was rather the result of duress and distress. Legazpi did employ his diplomatic skills, but only aftewardsin outmaneuvering the local chiefs in the subsequent negotiations, so that not only were they inveigled to agree to an unequal treaty but also to hand over their own settlement.
From this time onwards, two distinct Filipino responses may be discerned the first was from those who would not surrender on any account to the Spaniards, and the second, from those who were forced to submit and live "in peace" with the latter.
DEFIANCE AND DECAMPMENT
The Cebuanos who had not submitted to Legazpi, or those who, after submission had promptly renounced it, generally took the course of
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decampment, withdrawal, and avoidance, and at times, but only when it could not be helped, armed resistance. Thus, the people of Mactan fled to Leyte rather than be forced to submit to Legazpi, and Spanish accounts indicate that others took similar flight to other islands. The people who remained on the island of Cebu either took to the mountains and secluded valleys, or else congregated themselves in those settlements farthest from Spanishoccupied Sugbu. As a Spanish account of 1582 would indicate, Sugbu, which previously had probably up to 4,000 inhabitants, could boast of no more than 800, and was not much larger than two or three of the bigger settlements elsewhere on the island at that time,l when the Spaniards could account for only a total of 3,500 people on the entire island.
When contact with the Spaniards was unavoidable, the Visayans resorted to various strategems, such as profession of friendship or pretense of having earlier submitted to Legazpi, as did the people of Cabalian and Calabazan; an outward show of submission, as did Datu Siumbas of western Negros, when cessation of further Spanish entradas was sought; ambush of Spanish expeditions whenever a favorable opportunity arose, as did take place in eastern Negros where one soldier was lost, or in southern Leyte where another seven were slain; and in general, a systematic endeavor to deprive the Spaniards of food resources. As would be recalled, this policy of avoidance by the Visayans was such that the Spaniards would discover in 1570 that in many places, less than a sixth of the population earlier reported to be in existence were actually there by that time.
SUBMISSION AND SUBTERFUGE
On the other hand, the response of those Visayans who were forced to submit and live in peace, or at least, without open hostility, visavis the Spaniards, presents an interesting case of coping through wits and wiles. Although Spanish documents generally speak of such people as docile, submissive, and friendly, a closer look into the more detailed accounts actually show them to have taken the course of oblique resistance to Spanish domination, their leaders sometimes proving to be skillful diplomatic artists,
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blending submission and subterfuge, duplicity and dissimulation, in their dealings with the Spaniards.
The best examples of these were perhaps Rajah Tupas himself and his brother, Datu Simaquio. Unable to do anything about their earlier submission to Legazpi, they sought to gain as much as they could, while giving as little as possible in return, in their interactions with the Spaniards. One would recall, for example, Tupas' false alibis and lame excuses in being unable to bring the Mactan islanders to submission to Legazpiand this after he had advised them to flee forthwith across the sea to Leyte! Or one can take Simaquio's knavish transactions with the Spaniards. As a guide, he was hopelessly unhelpful, and as a "friend," frustratingly vexatious. He could be distressingly literal in his contractual dealings, when it suited his purpose, as when he took Goyti's punitive expedition to Leyte and promptly left them after arrival, on the ground that he had already accomplished his part of the bargain to guide them across the sea. Or he could be tricky and mendacious, as when he took a foodhunting party to eastern Negros, and on the pretext of preparing the people to welcome the Spaniards, convinced the latter of allowing him to go ashore aheadwhereupon he apparently tipped off the local inhabitants who forthwith headed for the hills. But perhaps Simaquio's greatest exploit in calculated deception, the subsequent telling and retelling of which may have given the Cebuanos a whole bellyful of laughter, was in the way he duped Legazpi of one cannon and gold for nine loads of rice by unlikely alibis and plain lies, as told in an earlier chapter.
These artifices and chicaneries, of course, made the Cebuanos look inveterately perfidious in Spanish eyes. But their actions, although not excusable, are understandable in a people forced to put up with unwelcome guests, whom they could not dislodge by force or by persuasion.
If the subjugated Sugbu people appeared to be docile vassals of King Philip II, it was perhaps mainly because they did not have the means to raise a viable armed opposition against the Spaniards. Thus, their resentment took form in other ways. As would be recalled, for example, they did not have any
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foodstuffs to share or sell to the Spaniards during the lean months at the end of 1565.
But they suddenly seemed to have pigs, chickens, and rice to spare when Muslim traders came from Manila to purchase these items of merchandise, which the latter promptly sold to the Spaniards at much inflated prices.
With the wider extension and increasing harshness of Spanish entradas, especially, as it would seem, toward the closing years of the 1560s, it is difficult to imagine the people of Central Visayas as having any but heightened animosity towards the Spaniards.
This was apparently the reason – apart from the Augustinians' admission that they had hesitated to baptize more people on account of the uncertainties regarding King Philip II's future plans for the Philippines – why so few Cebuanos were baptized during the period 15651570.
MOTIVES OF THE EARLY CONVERTS
Any study of the early conversions to Christianity among the Filipinos would have to deal with those factors which, while they were still heathen, convinced them that it was desirable to accept the Christian faith as it was taught to them. Hence, the motivations for conversion and baptism at that time can perhaps be best understood only from the standpoint of the Filipinos' preChristian beliefs and outlook. The further task of the missionaries was to get the new Christians to understand through religious instruction what old Christians would consider to be the "proper" and "genuine" motivations for accepting baptism.
What drew the earliest Filipino converts in the 1560s to accept Christianity? Were the motivations connected with spiritual conversion, or otherwise? A closer look at the pertinent circumstances is instructive and revealing.
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The very first convert of the Augustinians, the young woman subsequently named Isabel, had reportedly asked for baptism upon arrival at the Spanish camp, and after Legazpi had given her European clothes and had spoken to her something about the Christian faith. Her response, although desired, seemed too soon that the father prior, Fray Diego de Herrera, "deferred it for some days, to instruct her on what it meant to be a Christian, and what she had to believe and keep after she would be baptized."2 Only upon seeing her perseverance did Herrera baptize her and the two children with her. It seems clear from this account that Isabel, for some peculiar reason, had asked for baptism before she understood what it meant.
As to the other young women who subsequently came, wanting to be made Christians, soon after Isabel's baptism and marriage to the Greek caulker Andreas, it was apparent, as the Spanish account in fact puts it, that they did so simply "in imitation of her" (a imitacion suya).3 Thus, the friars did the wise thing in merely giving them some instruction in doctrine and in the basic prayers, but refusing them baptism. As will be recalled, the only other individuals baptized in 1565 were some seven or eight children of native women serving in the Spanish camp, and this at the point of death. If these baptismal figures typified the ratio of children to adults among the 100 or so baptized between 1565 and 1570, it would seem that the number of adult conversions at that time cannot have been more than a few score, if not a few dozen, at the most. As will later be seen, more or less the same ratio of children to adults among those baptized continued to obtain by 1577, a dozen years later.
In the absence of any other perceptible motive, the only ones that can be attributed to Isabel's request for baptism, were gratitude for what Legazpi had given her, and perhaps also the impression that being a Christian was part and parcel of belonging to the Spanish camp. Since her uncle, Rajah Tupas, had given her to serve Legazpi, she now belonged to the Spanish community.
Something not too different may have been the understanding of Christian baptism by Tupas, his son, and the other chiefs baptized in 1568,
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although in this instance, it may have been more of a case of political identification with the Spaniards. Their initial refusal to be baptizeduntil they were assured that Spaniards would not go away and leave them to face the consequencessuggests that they saw baptism as a further rite to confirm their alliance with the Spaniards. Magellan had connected baptism with attendant political blessings that would accrue to Rajah Humabon, if the latter would become a Christian. The same impression may well have been received by Rajah Tupas and his chiefs. In the Moluccas, the Portuguese had attached Christian conversion to political alliance and commercial partnership, so that it came to be believed by the various local islanders that if one wished to have trade relations with the Portuguese, they could initiate this intercourse by asking for Christian missionaries.4 Could the same impression not have been conveyed by the Spaniards in the Philippines?
As it eventually turned out, Tupas and his son, and some other chiefs, were baptized by Herrera on March 21, 1568, although the Spaniards had not answered their earlier objection, for Spanish women, whose presence would indicate the Europeans' intention to stay, would not arrive until 1570. Perhaps the Cebu chiefs had acquired a more spiritual understanding of baptism, unless they were convinced, in other ways, of the Spaniards' intention to stay. Of the real motives and reasons, one can only hazard a guess, though one would also hope that these were related to genuine religious conversion.
Of the early converts at Cebu, perhaps the one who came closest to having the proper motivation and understanding was the Bornean interpreter Camotuan. As the Spaniards' local interpreter, he would have been the best person to understand more correctly the meaning of Christian conversion. His previous Islamic understanding, however little or however much, would have helped him to appreciate better the monotheism of Christianity, while any residual beliefs of preIslamic Bornean animism on his part, with its concepts of the various intermediate divinities and spirits, would have made appealing the Catholic veneration of the Virgin Mary and the saints. Without unnecessarily detracting from the real successes of the
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Augustinian friars, considerations such as the above cannot be entirely dismissed, in seeking to understand the early conversions among the Filipinos.
There is one other element, however, at once significant and decisive, and it is that the Filipinos seem to have been genuinely impressed with the truly religious character of the Spaniards' faith. ' As would be recalled, many heathen Cebuanos daily knelt and crossed themselves, in imitation of their newly baptized neighbors, before the large wooden cross erected in front of the Augustinians' church at Cebu.5 This, at least, is evidence that, although uninstructed or only partially instructed in the Christian faith, they did recognize the cross and the ceremonial gestures done before it as powerful religious symbols, perhaps in warding off evil or in seeking protection against its malevolent effects. There is thus the further suggestion that the heathen Cebuanosand perhaps even the baptized converts, at least in the earliest stages immediately following their baptismmay have appropriated Christian symbols and usages for their own still heathen understanding and purposes, in the manner of what modern Catholic anthropologists have termed "Christopaganism."6 The fact that during a fire in 1566, the blaze had stopped short of that cross, was seen as proof of the invincibility of the Christians' God.7
BAPTISMS OUTSIDE CEBU, 15701571
As shown in the previous chapter, the disruptions and desolation on Panay, much more chaotic and intense than the troubles earlier experienced by the people of Cebu, could not have been conducive to winning any local inhabitant to the Christian faith. As noted in that chapter, hardly any local inhabitant, if ever, had been baptized on Panay during Legazpi's sojourn there of nearly two years.
The only other baptisms outside Cebu during this period were those of a few chiefs in the Bicol peninsula, administered by Fray Alonso de Jimenez about 1571 in the five small villages which later formed the town of Nabua. The rather precipitate fashion in which these baptisms were made suggests
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the absence of any real Christian conversion. It is said that when Captain Andres de Ybarra's expedition came to the village of Lupa, which was headed by a petty chieftain of Bornean ancestry named Datu Panga, Jimenez had raised up a makeshift altar and said mass, apparently with some local people watching the proceedings. At the next village, also under the rule of the same Panga, Jimenez erected a small shed of nipa and bamboo, where he put up a cross, for which reason the place subsequently came to be known as "Antacodos" (a local corruption of the Spanish Santa Cruz, that is, "Holy Cross"). At this village, Jimenez remained for a few days to evangelize and "baptize a few" inhabitants. Ybarra's party next came to another village called Caobnan, ruled by another petty chief named Datu Bonayog. But without tarrying, the Spaniards moved on to the village of Bua, or Nabua, ruled by a chief named Datu Tongdo. Here the Spaniards gathered together the inhabitants of two other nearby villages, namely, Binoyoan, ruled by one Datu Magpaano, and Sabang, headed by one Datu Caayao. Just before Ybarra's men moved further on, Jimenez baptized a few inhabitants and convinced the three chiefs to put up a rr.akeshift church.8
How did the first Bicol Christians understand their baptism? The available information is so scanty that one cannot make a definite judgment on the matter. In any case, it is difficult to say that those baptized in the course of a Spanish reconnaissance trip in the district could have understood, to any imaginably satisfactory degree, the meaning of Christian baptism. What did they understand of Jimenez's preaching? Did he know enough of the Bicol tongue at this time for him to sufficiently communicate the most basic doctrines of the Christian faith, or did he have to use interpreters? If so, was the substance preserved in the process?
However these questions are to be answered, it seems fair to say that the Bicol "converts" responded to the friar's preaching in terms of their own traditional understanding of religion, and not necessarily in Christian terms as the Spaniards would have supposed.
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AUGUSTINIAN MISSIONS IN THE MANILA BAY AREA
The first Augustinian mission among the Tagalogs was naturally in Manila. One of Legazpi's first acts after occupying the site of Rajah Soliman's former settlement was to grant the friars a parcel of land for their convent and church, both dedicated to San Agustin on completion. The Augustinian property, which at that time was outside the Spanish town, was inland toward the east, at the same place where there stands today the Augustinian's mother convent and church. Since Herrera was then the father provincial, it was the aged Alba who was named the first prior of the Manila convent. By this time, there were six Augustinians in the Philippines, as two more, Fray Diego de Ordoñez de Vivar and Fray Diego de Espinar, had arrived in 1570,9 to join Herrera, Rada, Alba, and Jimenez.
With the arrival of five more friars on May 31, 1571,10 and two more a few months later, the Augustinians were able to expand mission work with greater ease. Immediately, a second convent was established at Tondo, with Fray Agustin de Alburquerque, one of the recent arrivals, as the first prior. In the next few months, two more Augustinians arrived, while some four or five novices among the local Spaniards were also admitted to the Manila convent about this time. Thus, despite Herrera's departure (to present in person before King Philip II the friars' complaint about the conquistadors' unjust treatment of the Filipinos), Legazpi could report in August, 1572 that there were twelve Augustinian priests in the colony.11
By 1572 the Augustinians had five established convents and centers of mission, namely, Cebu, Oton (in Panay), Baco (in northern Mindoro), Manila, and Tondo. Two years later, new Augustinian houses had been established at Bai (Vahi) in the lake area (Laguna), and at Bombon in Batangas, although the friars in these two places were not able at once to begin the task of evangelization. By 1575 two more Augustinian convents were established, at Pasig, further up the river from Manila, and at Lubao in Pampanga. Thus, a decade after Legazpi's arrival, the Augustinians had nine centers of mission in the Philippines.
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MISSION TO THE CHINESE AND JAPANESE IN MANILA
It is interesting to note that the first baptisms performed by the Augustinians in Manila were not of Filipinos but of Chinese and Japanese. When Goyti first came to Manila in 1570, he discovered some forty married Chinese traders and twenty Japanese. The presence of Chinese women surprised the Spaniards, but as they subsequently found out, when the Chinese traders fled their country, apparently in consequence of the Manchu invasion, they "brought their wives along with them." 12
The discovery of this SinoJapanese merchant community caught the special attention of the Spaniards, and soon led to the establishment of a "Chinese mission." As would be recalled, the first Spanish contact with Chinese traders was in 1569, when the former rescued two such traders from Bornean pirates. From one of these, named Zanco, who lived for nearly half a year in Fray Martin de Rada's house in Cebu, it was learned that most of the Chinese traders in the Philippines came from the port of "Chianciu" (Chuangchou?) and the province of "Hocchin" (Hookien, or Fukien).13
During Legazpi's brief stopover of a fortnight at Mindoro while en route to Manila, he had ransomed from slavery some thirty Chinese traders, who were among the crew and passengers of two junks shipwrecked near Bombon (Batangas Bay) the previous year. The hapless men had been taken captive by the local Tagalogs and sold into slavery in the various settlements within the immediate region. Legazpi's act of kindness in giving them not only their freedom but also a boat to take them home to China,14 was apparently in atonement for his grandson Salcedo's unprovoked attack on the two Chinese junks at Baco in 1570.
What was even more surprising for the Spaniards was the discovery that two of the Japanese were "baptized Christians" (cristianos bautizados)15
both baptized in Japan by a Jesuit missionary.16 One was named Anton, and the other, Pablo; the latter had reportedly manned one of the native cannons during the battle of Manila in 1570.17 This incidentally raises the question whether Soliman's artillery men learned gunnery skills not only from the
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Borneans, but also from the Japanese! In any case, what is certain is that the Spaniards had accidentally come in contact with two Kirishitans (Japanese for "Christian," from the Portuguese "Christao" or "Christan"). Though Pablo "adored an image, and asked for some beads,"18 when Goyti first met him in 1570, it appeared to Legazpi that neither knew anything of the Christian faith except to make the sign of the cross. It was observed, however, that they immediately fell on their knees upon being shown a cross or an image of the Virgin Mary. Since neither had been confirmed, Anton and Pablo were promptly given Christian instruction – through the medium of what language is not certain and subsequently confirmed in their faith.
With this as an initial point of contact with the SinoJapanese community (the Chinese, their wives, and their children alone numbered about 150),19 the Augustinians evangelized the rest, so that by the middle of 1572, more than forty Chinese had been baptized. One Spanish account says that "being more reasonable," they had easily "recognized the truth of divine law" and began to "live as Christians," in contrast to the native Tagalogs who, "being Muslims," proved more difficult to convert to the Christian faith.20
Thus, the first significant number of conversions in Manila – reminiscent of Camotuan's conversion in Cebu – came from a foreign merchant community rather than from the local people.
Before long, however, a handful of Tagalogs received baptism, and it is instructive to examine the circumstances under which these conversions took place.
TAGALOG RESPONSES TO EVANGELIZATION
The very first Tagalog convert was the Muslim trader Mahomat, a native of Manila, whose friendship with Legazpi's men dated back to the end of 1565 when he supplied the starving Spaniards with muchneeded provisions, though at exorbitant prices. Perhaps the converted Bornean interpreter Camotuan himself was instrumental in Mahomat's conversion,
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for in speaking of the latter, an anonymous Spanish account dated May 8, 1570 says that "when the camp was in Zebu, this Moro, and his wife and son, had become Christians," and that he "has had intercourse with the Spaniards for many years and is well known among them."21 He and his family, however, were baptized only in 1570, in Panay. In fact, it was he who served as interpreter for Goyti in 1570, and Legazpi, in 1571, when they came to Manila. In the account of the peace treaty between Legazpi and the Manila chiefs, he is referred to as "Juan Mahomat" and described as a "native Christian interpreter" (yndio cristiano interprete).22
CONVERSION OF THE RAJAH MATANDA OF MANILA
After Juan Mahomat, the next Tagalog to be baptized – in whose conversion the former almost certainly had had a hand – was Laya, the Rajah Matanda of Manila. In Legazpi's very last letter before his death, dated August 11, 1572, he said: "The Old Rajah, who was one of the three chiefs of this city, and the better and more welldisposed of them all, fell ill, and thus sick, he asked for baptism, was baptized, and then died."23 This event may have taken place late in 1571 or early in 1572; for the anonymous "Relacion" of the conquest of Luzon, dated April 20, 1572, speaks of Laya as already dead – “he died a Christian” (murio cristianamente).24
The author of this "Relacion," who evinced a markedly sympathetic attitude towards the Augustinian friars,25 also added that the local inhabitants of Luzon
are people who easily are converted to our faith, and in the short time that those friars have been on this island, they have reaped much fruit, in that they have baptized many people, men and women and children, who have all been baptized and no chief nor commoner of this land contradicts our faith, but rather ... says that it is very holy and very good. 26
It is the cautious judgment, and perhaps the more accurate one, of an accomplished modern Augustinian historian, however, that
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the work of conversion by the missionaries was perhaps not as simple as the author of the "Relacion" and other contemporary documents would have us believe. Aside from the difficulty of language, the missionary would have to penetrate into the mind of the native, it not being an easy thing to dispossess him of his (old) beliefs, surely deeply rooted in his soul, in order to substitute for these the truths of Christianity.27
Indeed, not all his contemporaries agreed with the author of the "Relacion." One of Legazpi's captains, Juan Pacheco Maldonado, who, unlike the general run of the Spanish soldiery at that time, was especially distinguished for his singular saintliness,28 wrote in May, 1572 that the people of the Manila Bay area, being morns (Muslims), had up to that time largely frustrated the friars' evangelistic efforts "on account of their resistance" (por su rresistencia).29 Three months later, Fray Martin de Rada himself would write that, because the Tagalogs were an indomitable people who had never known how to obey nor to be subject to anyone, they therefore "come in very few at a time" (entrales muy poco a poco), although "some" had been converted, and God has done and daily makes miracles through holy baptism, in that the hopelessly sick have recovered upon being baptized."30
INITIALLY SLOW PACE OF CONVERSIONS
By the middle of 1572, three sons of Lakandula had been baptized. Two of these are known by their Christian names – Dionisio Capulo (Capulong) and Felipe Salonga. One prince named Magat Salamat is also known to be Lakandula's son,31 though, because he did not carry a Christian name till the Spaniards had him executed in 1588, it is not clear whether he was one of the three baptized princes, or a fourth son who had refused to accept Christianity. All these nobles were to figure prominently in the "Tondo Conspiracy" of 15871588.
While not discounting the possibility that these conversions could have been sincere, or that a truer understanding of baptism may have soon been
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gained, the fact that Lakandula himself would not be baptized until apparently much later (being then named "Don Carlos")32 raises the question as to whether these were not simply, or at least initially, "political baptisms." Did Lakandula and his sons in 1572 understand Christian baptism in the same way as Humabon in 1521 and Tupas in 1568 had understood their acceptance of it? In any case, by giving his sons over to be baptized, Lakandula may have succeeded in deferring his own submission to the Christian faith for some time, a step which probably was at that time thought quite acceptable for his sons to take, though not for himself. Events in 1574, as will soon be seen, would tend to show that many conversions in Tondo, especially among the chiefs, were not as profound as they would appear.
The more patently religious conversions were those of a few others referred to by Fray Martin de Rada in his letter of August 10, 1572, where he mentions eight Tagalog converts by their Christian names – a boy named Diego, two old people (probably husband and wife) named Andres and Maria, a woman named Ines, one Anton, one Nicolas, and two Pedros.33 In one specific case, which seems to have particularly struck Rada and was one of those "miracles" he had mentioned, the person was very ill and "more dead than alive," so that his relatives had begun "to mourn for him and had finished his coffin." But when an Augustinian came to administer a deathbed baptism, the person promptly recovered.34 Rada then alluded to "many other persons," who, though not responding as dramatically as the moribund convert above, were apparently cured of their various illnesses upon baptism. In later years, the popular belief that Christian baptism had miraculous healing powers would stand out as the one single factor that drew most Filipinos to baptism.35 Aside from the account of Rajah Humabon's nephew in 1521,36 this is the first clear reference to Filipinos responding to Christian baptism as a healing ceremony, reminiscent of the sacrifices for the sick in preSpanish times, and a factor which will increasingly assume paramount importance in the subsequent mass conversions of the Filipinos.
In 1572, however, there did not seem to be more than a few dozen converts in Manila, at the most. Because of his previous statement that
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conversions and baptisms among the Islamic Tagalogs came in trickles and driblets, Rada's phrase, "many other persons" (otras muchas personas), is probably in relation to the one dramatic case of healing rather than a description of the general response of the people. Indeed, the general tone of Rada's letter does not encourage the impression that conversions among the Tagalogs at that time were more than a few handfuls, and his mention of the converts by their Christian names suggests that he could account for all of them easily in that manner.
Rada gave as the most important reason for the paucity of desired results the "great lack of ministers and interpreters," although the very poor witness given by the lay Spaniards themselves to their Christian faith was not much less a restraining force in evangelization. Indeed, the Spaniards' actuations were seen to be "very contrary" to the word preached to the natives, so that it was "in those places where the Spaniards appear least frequently that the word of God makes the greatest impression." Rada lamented, however, that the friars could not sojourn at length and evangelize the people in these more receptive places, because they [the friars] had no means of either supporting themselves or building their own houses.37
These receptive places of which Rada spoke were apparently not the more remote territories where the people would have been inevitably hostile to the Spaniards, but those areas already subjugated but only occasionally visited by the latter, and where the inhabitants, moreover, might have had the opportunity to observe and distinguish between the friars' work and that of the soldiers.
For the Filipinos to make this important distinction was a major step in the evangelization of the islands, but in the early 1570s, this was apparently but dimly perceived. The historical evidence rather seems to point to the fact that the more prevalent response of the Tagalogs at this time was resistance rather than attraction to the Christian faith. There is also evidence suggesting that this resistance continued to be both political and religious, fueled by agitation coming from Brunei.
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EFFECTS OF ANNUAL RUMORS OF BORNEAN INVASION
As would be recalled, as early as 1571, while Legazpi was still en route to Manila, rumors of Bornean intervention were peddled around as a counterweight to the Spanish intrusion. In 1573 news was heard from some Muslim merchants newly arrived from Borneo that the previous year, the sultan of Brunei had mustered a large fleet to attack the Spaniards. This force had reportedly actually embarked, but had to return only due to heavy storms at sea. Fresh rumors also reached Manila in 1573 that the sultan was once again preparing for a new invasion, and that some of his Portuguese allies would be joining this expedition.38 Another report had it that leading the invasion were two of the sultan's own sons,39 a piece of news that later would lead to tragic consequences. If the dreaded attack did not materialize, it was because some datus in Maguindanao, who seemed more interested for the moment in what they could obtain from the Spaniards (namely, trade and probably also modern war technology), had counseled the sultan against such a venture.40 Nevertheless, this rumor so alarmed the Spaniards that Governor Lavezares took the unprecedented measure of recalling the troops that had gone on pacification campaigns in the provinces, particularly in the Bicol peninsula and the Ilocos coast. He also sent a spy mission to Borneo, guided by a Tagalog pilot, to find out what the sultan really had in mind. This party came within eight leagues of Brunei and took captive six local traders, who informed them to their relief that there was serious doubt about the sultan being able to launch an attack on Manila that year.41
The following year (1574), however, new rumors were once again heard that the Borneans had forged an antiSpanish pact in concert with four other Muslim nations, and were reportedly sending to Manila an invasion force of 300 war vessels. In March of that year, Lavezares sent a Tagalog as Spanish envoy to Borneo, with letters offering safe conduct for any Borneans who might come to trade with Manila.42 But this Spanish effort came to naught, for as it would appear from the circumstances, the sultan of Brunei, despite whatever outward posture he might have taken, still recognized the authority of the former native rulers of Manila, who were his vassals, and regarded the
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Spaniards as intruders and usurpers.
These constant rumors of Bornean invasion kept Tagalog hopes burning that sooner or later, the men of Brunei would come to help them throw off the Spaniards. Under these circumstances also, the evangelistic efforts of the friars could not gain more than little, hesitant response from the Filipinos.
ADVANCE DESPITE DIFFICULTIES
Due to lack of assistance from the encomenderos and the adverse effects of the Spaniards' abuses, some friars soon became discouraged and as early as 1572 had expressed the desire to return to Mexico. In his letter of August 11 of that year, Legazpi said that he believed that a number of Augustinians "would be happy to go home" (holgaran de bolverse).43 Rada himself in June, 1574 would also say that "some of the friars wish to return to New Spain, and that he had only scarcely prevailed on them to stay, in the hope that the next ship of the annual voyage from Mexico would bring the necessary decrees from King Philip II or the Viceroy that would remedy the situation."44
Thus, despite various difficulties, the Augustinians labored on, so that by June, 1573 Governor Lavezares would write King Philip II that “everyday these natives are being baptized and receive our faith.”45 He then asked the king to send more Augustinians and Franciscans, though later, after the conflict between him and the former came into the open, he would specifically ask for Jesuits in their stead.
The Augustinians, however, were not as sanguine as Lavezares regarding the Filipinos' response. In a memorial addressed to King Philip II or his Royal Council of the Indies, dated about 1573, they affirmed that because of the abuses of the Spaniards, “very few” (muy pocos) Filipinos had been baptized, “except in Cebu” (fuera de çubu).46 Not until 1574 would Fray Martin de Rada write to the viceroy that, although the friars are few, "the faith marches on, and the natives come into it everyday; there are already
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many Christians (muchos cristianos) here in Manila, in Tondo, in Lubao, in Mindoro, in Oton, and in Cebu."47 By that year also, Augustinian monasteries had been established at Bai (Vahi) in Laguna, Bombon in Batangas, Calumpit in Bulacan, and Binalbagan on the island of Negros,48 though none, or very few, converts had yet been gathered in these new places.
CONDITIONS IN THE VISAYAS
As previously noted, most of the conversions at this time in all the archipelago were still largely confined to the island of Cebu. As a result of a fresh burst of missionary activity, nearly all the inhabitants of that Island were soon baptized. Thus, the treasurer Andres de Mirandaola would enthusiastically report in 1574 that within a few months, the people of the entire island had been baptized, except for two chiefs, the same wily Datu Simaquio and Datu Batungay, and their retainers. Their refusal was attributed to these chiefs' unwillingness to divorce all their other wives, of whom Simaquio had two, and Batungay, three.49
Not everything was well, however, as Mirandaola would here suggest. There is evidence to show that some Cebuanos not only resisted conversion, but even turned hostile to those who had accepted baptism. Thus, one Mamicoan, a leading man of the village of Jaro (laterday Carcar), and himself a Christian, complained to the Spanish alcaldemayor of Cebu, Don Pedro de Luna, that when he was away, his neighbor had burned his house down, and with it his aged father and mother. The reason was simply because Mamicoan had become a Christian and had been married by a Christian priest in the town of Cebu.50
Elsewhere in the Visayas, there was also hardly any peace. It was reported in 1572 that except for the islands of Cebu and Negros, all the other places, especially Leyte and Samar, continued to resist Spanish rule, although many river districts therein had already been partitioned into encomiendas.51 In Bohol, the local people murdered their encomendero, one
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
Bexarano, because of the latter's excessive exactions. In reprisal, the Spaniards, finding the village where Bexarano was killed completely abandoned, passed on to another village (Baye, or Vahic) further up the mountains, and summarily beheaded seven local inhabitants, simply because they had confessed to having known of the plot to kill the unjust encomendero.52 In Marinduque also, the local people killed their encomendero Pedro de Mena and three other Spaniards when they came to collect the tribute sometime in 1572 or 1573, for which cause Governor Lavezares sent Captain Luis de la Haya to desolate the islands of Marinduque and Banton. For some reason, a similar destruction was also visited upon the village of Guimbal on Panay by another punitive expedition.53
As the Augustinians had time and again lamented, Spanish rule had not established peace and order in the Visayas. As illustration, they cited the case of a Jalaur village chief named Dahmil, who had gone to Ajuy, and while he was feasting with the local inhabitants, was treacherously set upon by the latter. Fortunately for this Dahmil, he managed to escape, though badly wounded by lance thrusts. About the same time, the chief of "Tanae" (Tanjay) on eastern Negros had gone to hog on the opposite coast. But the people of Ilog, though supposedly on friendly terms with those of Tanjay, massacred the chief and his retainers.54 Yet all these were allowed by the Spanish secular authorities to go unpunished.
It was also reported in 1573 that a pirate named Carabis ravaged annually the islands of Samar and Masbate, while the Tausogs of Sulu also raided continually the coasts of the entire Visayas and the Camarines. Mention was also especially made of corsair raids on Ilog and Binalbagan in southwestern Negros, without the Spaniards being able to restore order or redress the local people's grievances.55 As late as 1577, Fray Martin de Rada would also write that pirate raids were especially frequent during the months of October and November, and then from February to April, with the corsairs sweeping the coasts with impunity.56 To substantiate the friars' charge that the Spaniards themselves had only compounded the people's misery with
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their abuses, mention was made in 1573 of the case of a native woman slain by a Spaniard named Luis Perez; and the other case of another woman of high status who was "imprisoned" by another Spaniard named Godinez, as well as that of a man, perhaps a relative of the woman, who was also slain by the same Godinez.57 Although it is not stated exactly where these specific cases of injustice took place, it seems from the context that these occurred either in Panay or in Albay.
With this disorderly situation, it is no wonder that the friars could not extend their evangelistic work very far from their doctrinas or mission stations established within the shadow of the Spanish garrisons. Thus, the Augustinians of Cebu confined their efforts largely to that island, and those in Oton, not much farther beyond the immediate vicinity of that town. While some missionary beginnings had been attempted in Binalbagan and Ilog in 1572, it was not until 1576 that work in these well populated districts of southwestern Negros could be carried on more or less permanently.
DISTURBANCES DURING THE LIMAHONG INVASION, 1574
Although there was disorder and lawlessness in the Visayas, the unrest in those islands, however, was not as potentially dangerous to the Spaniards as that in southern Luzon. This was mainly because, due to the insular character of the Visayans, they did not seem to have as cohesive and extensive political organization as did the Tagalogs and their immediate neighbors. The explosive situation around Manila Bay threatened to flare up into a general revolt during the sudden attack on Manila by the Chinese corsair "Limahong" (Lin Feng) at the end of November, 1574. The pirate came with a fleet of more than seventy vessels of 150 to 200 tons each, and a force of 4,000 soldiers and sailors, accompanied by their women who numbered 1,500.58
The Filipinos could not miss the significance of the fact that during Limahong's initial probe of Manila's defenses, the first Spaniard to fall was none other than the masterofcamp (or commanderinchief) Martin de Goyti.59
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The situation was aggravated by the murder of two "very highranking youths" (mozos muy principales), whom one rumor gave to understand were Bornean princes, but whom Lavezares at one point also identified as "two chiefs of this bay" (dos principales desta uaya), obviously referring to Manila Bay. Although the position of one of them, named Lumanatlan, cannot be ascertained, the other was obviously very highranking, for the Spaniards referred to him by the title raxa el uago. This was almost certainly a Spanish rendition of the Tagalog Rajah Bago, meaning "The New (or Young) Rajah," itself the exact equivalent of the Malay Rajah Muda.
As Lavezares' report would put it, he had ordered the youths arrested, for Lumanatlan had taken some gold "to another chief" (a otro principal), probably a vague reference to some conspiracy; while the raxa el uago was seized, because he and Lumanatlan were "thought to be Borneans." While in prison, "they said they knew the coming of the Borneans," and for this reason were executed by an overzealous prison official.60 Thus reads the terse report of Governor Lavezares.
His successor, Governor Francisco de Sande, however, gave a slightly different, though perhaps complementary, version of this episode. The Tagalogs had apparently withheld food supplies from the Spaniards at the coming of Limahong. The two princes, reported Sande, were held as hostages, so that the people might be forced to give the needed provisions. But when the Tagalogs revolted, a Spanish lieutenant named Sancho Ortiz de Agurto, took matters into his own hands, and had the youthful chiefs and their retainers slain in prison.61
Who was this Rajah Muda? Was he the son (or nephew) of Rajah Soliman, who had gone to Borneo after the Spaniards took Manila, but was now back on a delicate mission connected with a TagalogBornean plot? It is known from other sources that Soliman, according to custom, had married a Bornean princess. Or, was the youth in question not, in fact, the Rajah Muda of Brunei, son of the reigning sultan? As would be recalled, the rumors circulating in 1573 would have two sons of the sultan of Brunei leading a 300vessel expedition against the Spaniards in Manila. Were the Rajah Muda and
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Lumanatlan, in fact, these youths? In any case, there seems little doubt that the two were close kinsmen of Soliman and Lakandula, and their murder in prison might have aggravated the Tagalog revolt, the seriousness of which may not have been given sufficient justice by the sparse reports of the disturbances during the Limahong invasion.
Indeed, thinking that Limahong would soon vanquish the Spaniards, some 10,000 Tagalogs – Governor Sande would call them moros, indicating the extent of the continuing hold and influence of Islam in the Manila Bay area at the time – came out in their praus, ready to pay homage to Limahong, to whom they had previously sent messengers. They also spread the word of revolt around, saying that Limahong had taken Manila and that all the Spaniards, including Governor Lavezares, had been slain.62 Even the Cebuanos, who had hitherto been peaceful, also raised the standard of rebellion.63 Moreover, rumors circulated afresh that the Borneans and four other nations – probably referring to the Tausogs, the Maguindanaos, the Samals, and the Malays – were coming to invade Manila.64
In the ensuing turmoil, the Augustinians, some of whom by this time lived in friaries in the larger native villages, suffered the worst. A number of friars were taken prisoners by the revolting populace, subjected to insults, and threatened with death. Governor Lavezares would later report to King Philip II that Lakandula, of Tondo, conspired with several other lesser chiefs, "to renounce the obedience and service of Your Majesty," despite the fact that "most of them were already baptized as Christians."65 They tormented one of the two Augustinians at the Tondo convent by jestingly threatening him: "Padre, you baptize us with cold water; wait awhile, and we shall baptize you with boiling water."66 One night, his captors began heating water, and the hapless friar was placed in such dread for his life that he went out of his mind.
Other Tagalog rebels profaned churches, smashed altar stones and religious statues, and, as a deliberate affront to what the friars had taught them, sacrificed "on the altars pigs and goats."67 Those of the northern Mindoro coast also sacked the Baco convent and seized and threatened to kill
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the prior, Fray Francisco de Ortega, and his companion, Fray Diego de Mojica. The chiefs of Bombon in Batangas also went to the extent of making arrangements for the appropriation of the local Augustinian monastery and its properties. Ortega and Mojica were eventually released, but this episode eventually caused the abandonment of the Augustinian mission in Mindoro, where they were caring for a total of 1,300 catechumens at Baco and Naujan.68
When Limahong's main attack force besieged Manila, during which the churches of the Augustinians and of the secular clergy were burned, some 5,000 Tagalog warriors, "with banners flying," menacingly stationed themselves across the river from Manila. While waiting for the outcome of the battle, they busied themselves by slaying those slaves and servants of the Spaniards who fled in their direction during the three hours of the Chinese onslaught.69
But though the Spaniards were in no position to withstand a prolonged siege, Limahong failed to press his advantage by not launching a sustained attack. The Tagalogs likewise failed to pursue their revolt, partly due to lack of preparation and cooperation, and partly to Limahong's just as sudden retreat to Lingayen in Pangasinan, causing the abortive Filipino revolt to fizzle out.
The Augustinian friars subsequently played an important role in restoring peace and order, and in mollifying the rebels. Thus, Fray Francisco de Ortega's intercessions saved the lives of half a dozen rebel leaders in Mindoro, whom the Spanish captain Gabriel de Rivera had intended to hang. Fray Geronimo Marin was also credited with softening the hostility of Lakandula and Soliman, who, during the abortive revolt had reportedly moved their residence to a place some three hours travel beyond Navotas, probably Polo in Bulacan.70 But if the raxa el uago was indeed a close kinsman of the chiefs of Manila and Tondo, it would have been impossible for them to easily forget the murders of the youths in prison, which one Spanish account specifically identifies as the immediate cause of the revolt.71 It should be added, however, that perhaps with a touch of poetic justice, Sancho
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
Ortiz de Agurto was one of the Spanish officers killed during the Limahong invasion,72 though whether by the Chinese corsairs or the Filipinos is not known.
The disturbances occasioned by the Limahong invasion showed the precariousness of missionary work unless the political situation were stabilized. As in the past, if it was not stiff opposition that the friars encountered, it was sullen withdrawal on the part of the Filipinos, especially in areas where the Spaniards could exercise no more than nominal control. As Governor Francisco de Sande would lament in 1576, the Filipinos were elusive, "like deer, and anyone who goes out to find them must necessarily lie in wait to seize one of them, who must then call back the others who had fled to the mountains."73
AGITATION FROM BRUNEI
The Filipinos' resentment and resistance to the Spaniards were abetted by the continuing agitation from Borneo, itself a reaction to the Spaniards' conquest of what the sultan of Brunei, Seif urRijal, considered his vassal territories. Indeed, as Legazpi had apparently foreseen, it was the sultanate of Brunei which offered the largest threat to Spanish control in the Philippines. Brunei had the naval capability to challenge the Spaniards, who could not have forgotten that their fiercest sea clashes in the Philippines were with the Islamic peoples to the south, as the battle with the Bornean junk at Bohol in 1565 and later that between a combined BruneiSulu fleet of twenty cannonarmed caracoas and nine Spanish galleys in the Mindanao Sea in 1569.74 Moreover, since 1571, hardly a year passed without some rumor that the Borneans were coming to attack the Spaniards in Manila.
Indeed, Filipino traders who went to Borneo were induced to wreak havoc on the Spaniards, while the Brunei sultanate itself continued to collect tribute from their vassals, though these were now also claimed by the Spaniards to be subjects of King Philip II. As the Spaniards would learn from a Christian chief of Balayan named "Magachina" (Magat Sina), the sultan of Brunei also continued to send Muslim preachers to Cebu, Luzon and other
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
islands, to spread Islam or to incite the local peoples to armed resistance against the invaders.75 This is reflected in a letter of 1578, written in Spanish with accompanying translations in the Arabic and Tagalog scripts and presented by Magat Sina and another Balayan noble named Magat, in which Governor Sande told the Brunei sultan:
In Manila, Zubu and other districts, it has been reported that you have tried and are trying to do us harm and make war upon us, and that you have sought and are inducing the natives of Luzon and other districts to rise and revolt against us, sending spies to Zubu and other districts, and that you have embarked with a fleet to make war against us....
What you must do is to allow preachers of the holy Gospel to preach the Christian faith in complete safety in these parts, and also to give liberty and permission to any natives of this land to listen to the Christian preachers, and allow no harm to come to anyone who desires to become a Christian.
At the same time, I want you not to send preachers of the Mohametan sect to any part of these islands, nor to the heathens who live in the mountains and other parts of this island, for it is an evil law and that of Mahoma is a false and evil sect (falsa y mala la seta de mahoma), and only the religion of the Christians is true, holy, and good.76
Governor Sande, whose disposition was to attack first the enemy who might be likely to attack him, himself led a preemptive strike to Borneo in March, 1578, despite the objections of the Augustinians against the enterprise.77 Sande's force consisted of forty vessels and 400 Spaniards, supported by 1,500 Filipino auxiliaries. On arrival at Brunei, they were joined by some 300 men of the Pangiran Sri Lela (Boung Manis), the rebellious halfbrother of the sultan.78
It was not surprising that the Brunei sultan should reject Sande's arrogant and triumphalist letter. In fact, he had Magat Sina ordered killed, denouncing the victim as an unfaithful vassal who had left his service for that of the Spaniards. In the subsequent battle, however, Sultan Seif urRijal
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
was forced to flee. Sande then sacked his palace and all of Brunei town (modern Bandar Seri Begawan), razing to the ground most of its 4,000 houses and seizing some 170 pieces of artillery (one of which weighed 30 quintales, or 3 tons, and another, 2.6 tons); a great supply of ammunition, sulphur, saltpeter, and gunpowder; and some twentyone galleys and galiots, one small galleon, five caracoas, and more than forty frigates – all belonging to the sultan's fleet.79
Sande then declared Brunei a vassal state of Spain, and left a puppet, the Pangiran Maharaja diRaja, on the throne, with the Pangiran Sri Lela (the latter's cousin) as adviser. The Spaniards also brought back with them to Manila as hostage Sri Lela's daughter, who was married to Agustin de Legazpi, grandson of Lakandula and one of the Tagalog chiefs in the expedition. The Spaniards also rescued from Bornean slavery more than 300 male captives from Luzon, along with their women, and more than 50 Christians from Cebu and other Visayan islands, about 10 Chinese merchants, and 2 Malabar Christians from India.80
For years, the Portuguese had sought to incite against the Spaniards not only the Borneans, but also the Maguindanaos and the Tausogs of Sulu, providing them with European arms and ammunition. With this same view in mind, King Sebastiao, of Portugal, had also written to the sultan of Brunei on March 7, 1573.81 Not surprisingly, a Portuguese contingent led by one Captain Antonio de Brito helped Sultan Seif urRijal in returning to power within a few months of the Spaniards' return to Manila. By this time, there was constant friendly contact between the Borneans and the Portuguese. When Sande's expedition first arrived in Brunei, they had learned that there were in town eight Portuguese with their retainers, a Spanish woman, and a Dominican friar who perhaps was also Portuguese.82
The Pangiran Sri Lela soon died from poisoning, and the Maharaja di´Raja was sent to exile in southern Borneo. When a small Spanish force once more came to Brunei in 1579, they found the Borneans hostile, forcing them to withdraw without accomplishing anything.83 In 1581, the next Spanish governor, Gonzalo Ronquillo de Penalosa, sent a fresh expedition to Brunei.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
But far from bringing the Spaniards any advantage, it only hardened Bornean antagonism.
Failing to subdue permanently the sultanate of Brunei, the Spaniards tried to bring to heel the Islamic areas in southern Philippines. This objective was of serious importance to the Spaniards, for the constant threat from these areas made doubly threatening any unrest in those districts already under nominal Spanish control. That the Spaniards could not afford to be complacent was shown in what seems to have been the threat of a fresh revolt even while Governor Sande was blockading Brunei Bay. As a result, he had to detach from his fleet a total of fourteen vessels with 70 Spanish arquebusiers and perhaps up to 400 native allies, whom he sent back to Manila by way of Palawan, Cebu, and Panay.84
When it was learned also that the sultan of Sulu (Muhammad ulHalim Pangiran Buddiman, the Brunei sultan's brotherinlaw), who was then at Brunei when Sande came, had evaded the Spanish blockade and escaped back to Sulu, Sande late in May 1578 sent Captain Esteban Rodriguez de Figueroa with thirteen vessels and more than 100 Spanish soldiers and the usual complement of native auxiliaries to attempt to subdue Sulu and Maguindanao.85 In 1581, Governor Ronquillo also sent Captain Rodriguez once more to exact tribute from Sulu and attempt to bring the Maguindanao chiefs to submission. The latter objective, however, ultimately proved fruitless. A subsequent expedition to Maguindanao led by the Spanish captain at Cebu, Gabriel de Rivera, succeeded in meeting with Datu Bahandre, of Slangan. But the Spaniards failed to establish a Spanish settlement there, because the climate proved uncongenial to the Spaniards' health.86
All these Spanish military ventures naturally outraged the Borneans and their Philippine allies and strengthened the resolve of the deposed rulers of Manila and Tondo to throw off the unwelcome intruders. The destruction and injuries that most of the subjugated areas had suffered were painfully recalled each time the Spaniards made new entradas. If the Tagalogs joined as mercenaries in the various Spanish expeditions, as that to Borneo, this seemed to have been motivated more by the hope of plunder and gain rather
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
than love and loyalty to the Spaniards. Thus, Lakandula's grandson, Agustin de Legazpi, had a personal reason for going to Brunei, namely, to seek a wife, and in fact had cause to rue later on his association with the Spaniards, as will be seen shortly. Suffice it to say for the moment, that within another decade, Filipino resentment would soon flare up to revolt.
HINDRANCES TO EVANGELIZATION: 1570S
The Augustinians' efforts continued to bear fruit, although this seemed to come ever so slowly. In a letter of June 5, 1577 to the Augustinian provincial of Mexico, Fray Martin de Rada would report that in the Philippines, "some ten or twelve thousand had been baptized, and the greater number of these are children, because the adults are prone to taking off for the hills."87 (italics supplied). The other reason, Rada added, why not more had been converted was that the natives were "scattered throughout the islands." Thus, from Rada's statement, one may deduce that the number of adult converts by 1577 probably stood somewhere between 3,000 and 4,000 – not much more than the reported total population of the island of Cebu at the time. While the reference to the dispersion of the people throughout the islands explains much of the geographical difficulties encountered by the Augustinians, the description of the people as montaraces, that is, "wild," or better perhaps as "prone to taking off for the hills," provides an insight into the response of the Filipinos to the friars' evangelization efforts at the time.
There were other reasons, however, for the comparatively slow growth in missionary results during those years. These reasons, which had more to do with the handicaps confronting the friars, were as follows: scarcity of missionaries, the barrier of language, and the scandal of the lay Spaniards' conduct.
SCARCITY OF MISSIONARIES
As would, be recalled, in 1572, there were only twelve Augustinians in the Philippines serving as missionaries, plus five secular priests ministering to the Spanish community and four or five Augustinian novices. In response
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to urgent appeals for more missionaries, Philip II began sending more Augustinians. Three arrived in 1574, and a similar number, in 1575. Yet the distance from Spain or even Mexico, the hazards of the long journey across the Atlantic and then the Pacific, illnesses and deaths while en route, and various other factors worked against the easy reenforcement of missionary personnel in the Philippines.
Illustrative of the difficulties and dangers in sending missionaries to the Philippines was what happened to the Augustinian mission of 15751576. This mission was originally composed of forty friars led by the commissary Fray Diego de Herrera, who left Seville in June. 1575. Upon arrival in Mexico, the greater majority refused to go on to the Philippines, reportedly in protest against the injustices and abuses perpetrated against the Filipinos by their encomenderos. The ten who went on with Herrera across the Pacific reportedly "had to be made to go almost by force" (casi por fuerga los auia hecho yr).88 As an ultimate irony, this muchneeded contingent of missionaries was struck by an unexpected tragedy upon their arrival in Philippine waters.
Shipwrecked on the treacherous coasts of the island of Catanduanes in April, 1576, all but two of those who managed to escape drowning by swimming ashore from their illfated ship, the Espiritu Sancto, were slain by the islanders whose hostility had been aroused by Captain Pedro de Chaves' brutal conquest of the island two years earlier. Aside from the Augustinians, there were more than a hundred other men on board the ship. The only survivors were one Geronimo Albez and another unnamed Spaniard. Both were spared, because, having previously lived in the Philippines, they were able to make themselves intelligible to the local inhabitants. The two were made slaves, until they were subsequently released by Captain Chaves, who made a reprisal raid against the Catanduanes islanders.89
Word of the tragedy, which was obtained only through accident by Spanish troops stationed in the Camarines, came also just as rumors were rife that Brunei had entered into a conspiracy with the states of Siam and Patani against the Spaniards. The royal officials at Manila described it as
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
"the saddest news and greatest grief imaginable for us."90 For the Augustinians, it was a particularly painful and heavy blow, for with the loss of this group of missionaries, they had to give up even certain areas already evangelized.
In the Actas of the Augustinian provincial chapter held at Manila on April 20, 1574, there had appeared the names of nineteen friars distributed among the fifteen residences then maintained by their order.91 But various deaths soon began to thin out their ranks. With the passing away of Francisco Merino in 1575, Alonso de Alvarado and Sebastian de Molina in 1576, and Alonso de Jimenez and Juan de Orta in 1577, the aged Juan de Alba, who himself was to pass away at 79 some three months later, remarked in June, 1577, that "everyday the Christians increase, though the ministers decrease."92 That same year, Governor Sande would also report that only thirteen Augustinian priests (frayles de myssa), five novices, and one secular priest had remained.93 There was such "great lack of religious instruction," that even the sick among the Spaniards had no priests to receive their confessions.94
Fortunately, three more Augustinians arrived in 1577, namely, Fray Alonso de Castro, Fray Diego de Ochoa, and Fray Juan de Quiñones. Fray Martin de Rada, at that time the most experienced missionary in the Philippines, would perish on the return voyage of the Spanish expedition to Borneo in 1578. But later that same year, nine more Augustinians, led by Fray Andres de Aguirre who was returning for the first time since he accompanied Urdaneta to Spain in 1565, would arrive in Manila with the first Franciscan mission of fifteen friars.95 The situation slightly improved with the arrival of these new friars, but still their numbers were far from sufficient for the vast needs of the mission field.
Indeed, as early as 1575, the Augustinians had to temporarily adopt a policy of retrenchment, and abandon their doctrina at Libon in the Bicol peninsula, with the transfer of Jimenez to Cebu, and Orta to Manila. At their triennial chapter in Manila on August 6, 1578, the Augustinians also decided to abandon "the residences in Mindoro and Balayan, Lubang, and Jalaur, and
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
all those in the Visayas, except those located in well populated places such as Cebu and Oton."96
THE LANGUAGE BARRIER
In 1572, Rada remarked that "the greatest lack is in ministers and interpreters."97 Next to the scarcity of personnel, the barrier of language was apparently the greatest problem faced by the early friars in the Philippines. As the pioneer missionaries, the Augustinians encountered no small difficulty in learning the various Philippine tongues, starting as they did from scratch. There were no dictionaries nor grammars, and they had to study patiently the vernacular in each linguistic area where they had doctrinas, struggling with sounds quite unfamiliar to Spanish ears.98 Legazpi opined in 1572 that lack of knowledge of the native languages was a major hindrance to Augustinian work.99 In 1576, Governor Sande also wrote to Philip II: "I do not know if any of them [the Augustinians] has learned well the language of the natives."100 Two years later, the provincial Fray Agustin de Alburquerque, in a circular to all Augustinians in the Philippine province, identified the "greatest" concern as the need for all friars who did not as yet know the local language in their respective districts to exert as much effort as possible in language study.101
Sometime earlier, Fray Martin de Rada had prepared what was apparently a simple vocabulary in Cebuano. By 1578, two language study works, each comprising of vocabulary, grammar, and a confessional, were produced by Augustinians who had arrived only the previous year. The first, in Tagalog, was prepared by Fray Juan de Quiñones, and the other, in Pampango, by Fray Diego de Ochoa.102 But not until the last two decades of the sixteenth century did language study become more systematic with the appearance of several other works – notably the Tagalog grammar and the TagalogSpanish dictionary, both by Fray Juan de Plasencia, O.F.M., later revised and augmented by his fellow Franciscan, Fray Juan de Oliver.103 The other publications which came out at this time were printed tracts by the
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Augustinian Fray Juan de Villanueva, and two other tracts, consisting of one piece in Haraya and another in "Visayan" (perhaps Cebuano) by the Jesuit, Father Mateo Sanchez; as well as another Visayan publication by another Jesuit, Father Cristobal Jimenez. But what was undoubtedly the most important publication at this time was the Doctrina Christiana, a manual of Christian doctrine for converts, printed by woodblocks in Tagalog and Spanish, and also in Chinese and Spanish, both bilingual editions coming out in 1593.104
Although there were a good number of missionaries who had a gift for languages, there were also cases of friars, usually older men, who seemed unable to learn the local Philippine tongue. One could cite the particular case of the Franciscan, Fray Juan Pacheco (1510c. 1590), who in 1586, when he was seventysix, could simply not learn any Tagalog, so that his assigned task at Morong was simply to administer the sacraments.105 There was also the case of the Dominicans, Fray Alonso Jimenez (not the Augustinian of the same name) and Fray Pedro Bolaños (c. 15251588), who were described by a fellow Dominican as both being too old to learn Tagalog.106
The language barrier constituted a problem serious enough that King Philip III in 1603 had to instruct the archbishop of Manila to see to it that every friar or Jesuit who performed the duties of curate had the necessary language skills, and to remove those "who do not know enough of the language of the Indians whom they are to instruct."107
THE CONQUISTADORS' RELIGIOUS LAXITY AND ABUSES
“The word of God makes greater impression on those places least visited by the Spaniards,” said Fray Martin de Rada in 1572. In the same breath, he complained that the actions of the conquistadors were seen by the Filipinos to be "most contrary" (muy contrarias) to the word preached to them. This was one reason why not many natives at that time had been converted. A year later, an Augustinian memorial also lamented that "in general there is very little Christianity among the Spaniards, who pay very little attention to divine worship and its ministers ... and there is much
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dissoluteness with women, even though these are heathen."108 Moreover, the friars deplored the fact that the scandalous lives of the Spanish soldiers militated against missionary work. As one vexed Augustinian was constrained to say, when he preached that "God's law commands that a Christian must neither rob nor kill, and must be clean in both body and soul, they [the natives] would then answer, 'Then how come that the Spaniard does not follow this?'” 109
Thus, there is probably truth to an Augustinian account of 1585 that some Filipinos refused to avail themselves of the promises of reward in heaven, because of their hostility to the Spaniards. As this account puts it, on being urged to receive baptism so that they might join the ranks of those destined for the "delights and happiness" of heaven, where "no one entered, or could enter ... unless he were baptized according to the preaching of the Castilians," some Filipinos refused, "saying that because there were Castilian soldiers in glory, they did not care to go there, for they did not wish their company."110
The Augustinians themselves also complained that contrary to King Philip II's expectations, the encomenderos had given them "neither favor nor assistance" in the preaching of the Gospel, for the former neither placed them among the natives nor built convents for them. To their proposal that they be allowed to work in the various encomienda territories, the friars were reportedly generally rebuffed with the excuse that it was "yet too early"111 to introduce the Christian faith and urge the natives to abandon their heathen rites. Whatever merit, if any, this argument might have, the fact is that the Augustinians found to their dismay that whatever missionary success they might have achieved was often promptly eroded by the brutal policies of the encomenderos.
These conditions continued to obtain when the next friar order, the Franciscans, arrived on the scene in 1578.
p. 227
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[The following paragraphs deal with the details of the arrival of the Franciscans, Jesuits, Dominicans, and the expansion of Agustinian missions in Luzon. 15781586.
p. 245
THE ERECTION OF THE DIOCESE OF MANILA
Until the creation of the Bishopric of Manila in 1579, the Church in the Philippines was governed by an Augustinian (and in 1578 by a Franciscan) deputy ecclesiastical judge, in line with a privilege that Pope Paul III (15341549) had granted to the missionary orders in the overseas possessions of Portugal and Spain. A controversy on the matter, however, arose when the archbishop of Mexico, to the dismay of the Augustinians, designated as deputy judges two of the early secular priests in the Philippines.174 The matter was finally settled only with the consecration of the first bishop of Manila in 1579.
THE FIRST BISHOP OF MANILA
As would be recalled, the Augustinians had hoped that the first bishop of Manila would be a member of their order, and at various times had suggested the names of Fray Diego de Herrera and after Herrera's tragic death, Fray Francisco de Ortega. But the man eventually chosen was a Dominican, Fray Domingo de Salazar. By the bull Illius fulti praesidio (February 6, 1579),175 Pope Gregory XIII created the Diocese and Cathedral Church of Manila. After his consecration, Bishop Salazar and his entourage sailed for the Philippines, arriving in Manila in 1581, in the same ship that brought the first Jesuits and a number of Augustinians and Franciscans.
The creation of the Manila diocese and the arrival of Bishop Salazar was largely a Spanish affair; the early Filipino converts could not have caught their significance. While Salazar's coming may have brought
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ecclesiastical order to the Philippines, his presence was not welcomed by the Augustinians. As a modern historian of that order has put it: "Fray Domingo de Salazar, first bishop of the islands, from the moment of his arrival in Manila did not have friendly relations with the Augustinians, nor they with him, as the Augustinians believed that being the pioneers in the Philippines, no one should have barged into (entrometerse) what they considered their exclusive field."176
The first conflict between Salazar and the Augustinians took place at the end of 1581, within months of the bishop's arrival, when he and the Augustinians, Fray Diego de Mojica, prior of Tondo, clashed over the question as to who had jurisdiction over a Filipino who had been arrested, apparently for a violation of some ecclesiastical regulation.177 Early in 1582, Salazar and the Augustinians again clashed on the question of jurisdiction over the Chinese merchant colony, for whom the latter had founded in 1581 a new mission in Tondo, where they evangelized the Chinese using the local Tagalog tongue.178
SALAZAR AND FILIPINO RIGHTS
Bishop Salazar was to render important service to the Filipinos, in the way he boldly spoke out for the latter against the abuses of the encomenderos. Thus, in 1583, he wrote a letter of complaint to King Philip about the continuing harsh treatment of the natives, especially in connection with the collection of the annual tribute. The Spanish tribute collectors, Salazar said, always demanded the finest gold, using the heavier measure of weight as their whims desired. If the local chief could not hand in the tribute exacted from his village, as when some of his people would take flight to other places, or when the resources of the chief himself and those of his people who had remained would not suffice, the collectors, reported Salazar,
crucify (aspan) the unfortunate chief, or put his head in the stocks, . . . and they lash and torment the chiefs until they give the entire sum demanded from them. Sometimes the wife or daughter of the chief is seized, when he himself does not appear. Many are the chiefs who had died of torture
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in this manner which I have stated.179
Citing a few specific cases, Bishop Salazar recounted that when he was at the port of Ybalon in the Bicol peninsula, some local chiefs from the surrounding districts came to him to report that a tribute collector, angered at not receiving the amount he had demanded, hanged the late chief of Ybalon by the arms, as if a crucifix, and tortured him to death. Bishop Salazar later saw the perpetrator of this deed at Nueva Caceres (Naga), and learned that the man had simply been fined fifty pesos and then set free. In another instance, an encomendero sold a man as a galley slave for thirtyfive pesos because his village chief was short of nine pesos of tribute. Salazar remonstrated before the ship's steward to have the man released, but the bishop's efforts came to no avail.180
Moreover, although only heads of families were supposed to pay tribute, the collectors, said Salazar, sometimes assessed even children, old men, and slaves.181 Great must have been the Filipinos' desperation indeed, for as Salazar added, many "remained unmarried, because of the tribute, while others kill their children,"182 whom they feared they could not support. Furthermore, the forced labor exacted from the subjugated populations took the men away from their farms for considerable lengths of time, in such jobs as cutting timber for shipbuilding, rowing in the galleys for four or six months in a year, or working at the gold mines in IIocos where many died. Thus, in 1580, so many men of Pampanga were at the mines during the planting season that a great famine afterwards ensued. In Lubao alone, more than a thousand died from hunger in the encomienda of exGovernor Lavezares.183 Salazar was little comforted that only in the immediate environs of Manila, where there were missionaries, did many of these abuses cease. "But in remote places and some not very far away," he added, "what I have stated occurs, and even worse things are done."184
SALAZAR'S REASONS FOR SLOW EVANGELIZATION RESULTS
Salazar was of the opinion that the excessive requirement for Filipinos to render personal services was one reason for the slow progress of the
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missionary program. As he once again complained to King Philip II in 1583, the Filipinos
have no opportunity to attend religious instruction. It sometimes happens that while these miserable creatures are being instructed for baptism the Spaniards force them to go to the tasks that I have mentioned; and when they return they have forgotten what they know; for this reason there are today many Indians to be baptized. In some cases when I have gone to a village to administer confirmation, I have returned without confirming anyone, because the Indians were not in the place but were occupied in labors ordered by the alcaldemayor, and I could not collect them together.185
What specially scandalized Bishop Salazar was the apparent fact that the Filipinos seemed to have received far better treatment under Islam than under Christianity. After noting that "a large number of pagans have turned Moros" as a result of Islamic preaching from Brunei, Bishop Salazar lamented that
those who have received this vile law keep it with much pertinacity, and there is great difficulty in getting them to leave it. Moreover.... to our shame and confusion ..., they were better treated by the preachers of Mahoma than they have been by the preachers of Christ [i.e., the encomenderos and alcaldesmayores]. Since, through kind and gentle treatment, they received that doctrine willingly, it took root in their hearts, and so they leave it reluctantly. But this is not the case with what we preach to them, for, as it is accompanied with so much bad treatment and with so evil examples, they say "yes" with the mouth and "no" with the heart; and thus when occasion arises they leave it, although by the mercy of God, this is becoming somewhat remedied by the coming of the ministers of the gospel, with whose advent these grievances cease in some places. 186
FILIPINO RESENTMENT AND RESISTANCE
The coming of the Spaniards had brought not only political and social dislocation, but also economic inflation as well. The prices of prime commodities in Manila tripled, or at least doubled, during the first three years of the 1580s.187 Resentment continued to rise against the harsh
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tribute and the frequently cruel means of collecting these exactions, not to mention the onerous burden of personal services. All these would eventually lead to the conspiracy of 15871588, which threatened to flare up into the most extensive resistance that the Filipinos had yet mustered against the Spaniards.
RANCOR AMONG THE FILIPINO UPPER CLASSES
While the common people suffered from the harshness of the encomenderos and the alcaldesmayores, the ruling classes (datus or maginoos) and the freemen (in Tagalog, maharlikas) just as distressedly felt the sudden social changes imposed on them by the Spaniards. These upper classes seethed with rancor and illwill, due largely to their displacement from the former positions of privilege that they had enjoyed. While they were exempt from personal tribute and statute labor,188 and their lands up to this time were largely left untouched by the creation of encomiendas, the Spaniards had nevertheless largely diminished their power and prestige. The tribute which they had customarily received from their people, and the anchorage fees they had levied on visiting trading vessels, had now been channeled into Spanish coffers. By a Spanish proclamation, they also lost their slaves, the possession of which was formerly considered a measure of importance. More than this, since many of their own people had fled to other places to escape the tributethus, in Tondo, Capaymisilo [Meysilo], and other nearby places, one third of the total population had left by 1582189 – the chiefs were forced to pay from their own coffers the tribute that would have been paid by those who had gone away.
Thus, the ruling classes not only found their incomes greatly reduced; they were also forced to gradually sell their lands and properties little by little just to remain solvent.190 The consequence of these land sales may be partly seen in the fact that eventually many, if not most, of the descendants of Soliman and Lakandula left Manila and Tondo, and took up residence in the province of Bulacan (particularly in the towns of Bulacan, Quingua, Polo, and especially Calumpit); while a few others chose to live in Pampanga.191
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In the end they gave voice to their complaint. There exists an official Spanish document which records the visit to Bishop Salazar on June 15, 1582, of several leading persons of Tondo and Meysilo, namely, Luis Amanicalao, Martin Panga, Gabriel Tuambakar, Juan Bautangad, and Dona Francisca Saygan, who were all Christians; and Salalila, Calao, and Amarlangagui, who were heathens, to complain of the abuses of the rapacious alcaldemayores, whose number had multiplied fourfold to sixteen during the administration of the new governor, Don Gonzalo Ronquillo de Penalosa. These chiefs specifically asked Bishop Salazar to present their complaints to King Philip II, who was, as Salazar assured them, "a most Christian king who considers well their intentions, and has commanded that they be welltreated, and will order punishment for those who maltreat them."192 Not long afterwards, other chieftains from as far as Mauban came to lay their complaints before Salazar.
DIFFICULTIES OF LIVING UNDER SPANISH RULE
Aside from their resentment against abuses and cruelties, the ruling classes also had trouble living under the new laws instituted by the Spaniards. While it is true that the Spaniards had made them petty governors (governadorcillos) of their own villages, they nevertheless no longer enjoyed the sovereignty which they earlier had. But accustomed as they were to ruling with a free hand, they not infrequently ran into trouble with their own overlords. Thus, Agustin de Legazpi, grandson of Lakandula and former gobernadorcillo of Tondo, was charged and pronounced guilty of maladministration and spent some time in prison. Earlier, this same Tondo nobleman had gone to Brunei to seek a wife from among his kinsmen, as was customary, but he was rebuffed and made to feel guilty for having accepted Christian baptism.193
If he got all these troubles for becoming a Christian and submitting to Spanish rule, why should he continue to live under such a debilitating circumstance? It was not surprising then that upon his release from prison, he began to plot against the Spaniards – the sooner the better, before the latter completed their work of fortifying Manila began by Governor Sande in
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the aftermath of the Limahong invasion. The plot was not only politically motivated, but apparently also had religious undertones, with the intention of reinstituting the Islamic faith in the Manila Bay area. Governor Santiago de Vera would later describe this plot as directed "against the service of God, our Lord, and against his [Philip II's] Majesty."194
THE "TONDO CONSPIRACY" OF 15871588
The conspiracy began to materialize about July, 1587,195 when a Japanese trading junk from Hirado arrived at Manila, to establish friendly and commercial relations with the Spaniards and to bring letters from the Japan Jesuits to the Jesuit superior at Manila, Father Antonio Sedeño. The envoy and captain of the junk was a Kirishitan named João Gayo, a samurai of the daimyo or feudal lord of Hirado, Matsuura Shigenobu. With Gayo's crew was another Kirishitan named Gabriel, through whose Christian zeal eight of his other companions had been converted during the voyage. It was Bishop Salazar himself who baptized these new Japanese Christians at the Jesuit's church, with Governor Vera and other highranking personages acting as the baptismal sponsors.196
Gayo, a soldier of fortune, claimed to be a commander of 500 samurai warriors at home and a friend of another Christian daimyo named "Dom Agostino," apparently referring to General Agostino Konishi Yukinaga, the Japanese strongman Hideyoshi's foremost general who would command the First Division of the Japanese expeditionary forces in Hideyoshi's Korean Campaign of 15921598. Gayo offered himself and as many as more than 6,000 samurai warriors from Hirado and other fiefs in Kyushu as mercenaries for any Spanish military venture in Borneo, Siam, Moluccas, or China.197
Startling as they might have been, Gayo's claims did have a ring of truth. Though Matsuura was not a Christian, half of the other daimyos in the southern Japanese island of kyushu were by this time Christian or in the process of being converted. By the time of Hideyoshi's Korean invasion, all but 3,000 of the 18,700 men of the First Division under General Konishi came
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from Christian fiefs. So did the 12,000 men of the Third Division under another Christian general, Damian Kuroda Nagasama, and his fellow daimyo Constantino Otomo Yoshimune. Thus, out of the initial Japanese invasion force of 138,900 men, some 27,700 or onefifth of the whole, came from Christian fiefs in Kyushu.l98 Since Japanese Christian daimyos had adopted since 1574 the European principle of cujus regio, ejus religio ("who reigns, his religion"), the compromise formula adopted by Protestant and Catholic princes in 1555, the troops from the Christian fiefs in Kyushu were practically all Christians, or at least nominally so.
Governor Vera, however, being more concerned with consolidating Spanish power in the Philippines, was not as enthusiastic about foreign adventures as were his predecessors. He kept the interview with Gayo a wellguarded secret, lest knowledge of it arouse the suspicion and animosity of the Chinese merchants in Manila. But treating the Japanese with "special hospitality," he thanked Gayo, explained that King Philip II, though king of both the Spaniards and the Portuguese, was "not now thinking of the conquest of China or other kingdoms;" but should the Spaniards require to execute such a plan, they would ask the Japanese for assistance.199 His enthusiasm considerably dampened, the disappointed Gayo bided his time in Manila, and soon made the acquaintance of the disgrunted Agustin de Legazpi, through another Japanese Christian named Dionisio Fernandes, who knew Tagalog.
THE FILIPINOJAPANESE PACT
Gayo and Legazpi quickly struck a close friendship. With the Spanish refusal of Gayo's offer, the latter immediately warmed up to Legazpi's initial inquiry as to whether he would not be interested in governing the Philippines, with the local chieftains as his lieutenants, in the event that the Spaniards were driven out of the country. This overture was made at a meeting in Legazpi's home, where there were present his brother Geronimo Basi; his uncle Magat Salamat, Lakandula's son who, still having no Christian name, had probably refused to be baptized; Felipe Salalila, chief of Meysilo; and Salalila's son, Agustin Manuguit. All these chiefs and nobles
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were close relatives and members of the former ruling families of Manila and Tondo.200 Salalila, as would be recalled, was one of the chiefs who had complained to Bishop Salazar of Spanish abuses in 1582.
The plan that was accordingly hatched was for Gayo to fetch from Japan more samurai warriors and weapons, and for them to come to the Philippines under the guise of traders. They would then join the Tagalogs in a concerted attack, and massacre all the Spaniards. On attaining victory, the Filipino chiefs would then choose Agustin de Legazpi as rajah, but would render homage to Gayo as their overlord, channeling to him a sufficient portion of the tribute presently being collected by the Spanish usurpers. Gayo readily assented to the bargain. Although there were several uncertainties about the arrangement, the plotters were apparently content for the moment to consign these questions to the future. Both parties then sealed their pact according to the traditional Tagalog custom of breaking an egg over their oaths – may they suffer destruction as the egg, if they proved false to their promises! As proof of his own fidelity, Gayo presented to Legazpi a few Japanesemade arquebuses and samurai swords (katanas), as well as a quantity of samurai shields with special markings by which the Japanese might later recognize their allies.201
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CONSPIRACY
After Gayo returned to Japan, Agustin de Legazpi, now emboldened, decided to enlarge the circle of conspiracy. He gave some of the Japanese shields and weapons to Amaghikon, chief of Navotas, who apparently still seethed with rancor over the ruthless attack on his village by Goyti in 1571. Legazpi also brought into his confidence another Tagalog chief, Martin Panga, who was probably the "Don Martin" which a Franciscan source identified as the son of the Rajah Calamayin, of Namayan, ruler of the districts east and south of Manila.202 Martin Panga was Legazpi's first cousin and successor as gobernadorcillo of Tondo. Panga himself had been exiled by the Spaniards to Tambobong on a charge of adultery, apparently because he had refused to live by the Christian concept of monogamy. Legazpi also recruited other nobles who had spent time in Spanish jails for various
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reasons, including his own brother, Gabriel Tuambakar, the latter's son Francisco Acta, and Pitong Gatang, a maharlika of Tondo, all of whom eagerly joined the plot.
At a great feast, lasting three days, which Martin Panga gave at his home in Tambobong, he and Agustin Legazpi invited to come other chieftains around Manila and their retainers. As a result, the circle of conspirators thereafter included Legazpi's uncles (Dionisio Capolo [Capulong], chief of Candaba, Pampanga; Felipe Salonga, chief of Polo, Bulacan; and Magat SaIamat, all sons of Lakandula); Legazpi's brother Geronimo Basi and Gabriel Tuambakar; as well as Francisco Acta; Luis AmaniKalaw, of Tondo, and his son Kalaw; Pedro Balinguit, chief of Pandacan; Amaghikon, chief of Navotas; Pitong Gatang; Felipe Amarlangagui, chief of Catangalan (part of what is now Polo, Bulacan); and most importantly, also apparently Amarlangagui (perhaps Felipe's father), chief of Baybay, who was masterofartillery and maestredecampo, or commanderinchief, of the Spaniards' Tagalog auxiliaries,203 to mention only the chief leaders.
TWO FATEFUL INTERLUDES
Though the weeks dragged on and still no word came from Gayo, there were two events late in 1587 and early in 1588, which , served to strengthen the plotters' resolve. The first was a Bornean assault on the crew of a Spanish ship which had called at Brunei, and the other, the sudden appearance in Philippine waters of an English warship, the first to make such visit.
About November, 1587, a Spanish ship bound for Malacca and Europe was forced by contrary winds to seek shelter at "Mohala" (the present Muara), some two leagues from Brunei. On board were two Spanish Franciscans, Fray Francisco de Santa Maria and Fray Miguel de Talavera, bound for Madrid and Rome on business of their order. In response to their overtures of peace, the Spaniards were promised welcome by the sultan of Brunei, who made them to understand that he would provide them with the necessary provisions for their onward journey. Inasmuch as the zealously
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Islamic Atjehs of north Sumatra were reportedly besieging Malacca and were patrolling the sea lanes, the Spaniards decided to remain in Brunei until after threat had subsided.
At first there was no indication of any impending trouble. When the sultan asked Santa Maria to discuss with him certain religious questions, the latter took the opportunity to proclaim the Christian faith with much zeal and fervor, which quickly earned for him, however, a number of enemies. Unknown to the Spaniards, moreover, plans were already afoot for a concerted attack on Manila by the Tagalogs and Borneans and their allies. One night when Santa Maria and Talavera were up on a hill to meditate and observe the holy hours, a band of hostile Borneans, including one of the sultan's brothers, attacked the Spaniards who had gone ashore, killing all but three. Santa Maria himself barely had time to warn Talavera to flee back to the ship, before he was lanced to, death and his body decapitated. The sultan subsequently promised to punish the guilty parties, though this was apparently no more than a diplomatic attempt to disown the deed. The result was that the murder of Santa Maria and the other Spaniards committed the Borneans to a hostile confrontation with the Europeans, which the Tagalogs now exploited to advance their own intentions.204
Early in 1588, the Spaniards were also thrown into consternation with the sudden appearance of an English warship, the Desire, commanded by the youthful Captain Thomas Cavendish, who was to become the third circumnavigator of the globe. The Spaniards in Manila were soon to learn to their dismay that since this ship and two others had left England by way of the Atlantic, they had plundered sixteen Spanish vessels off the coast of Peru. Only one English ship was lost, and the other, subsequently separated from Cavendish during a storm. But near the California coast, the Englishman had captured and burned the Spanish galleon, Santa Ana, which was on its regular run from Manila. The English had spared and put ashore the crew and passengers of the galleon, except for a canon whom they hanged, and a pilot and several skilled mariners whom they forced to guide them to the Philippines.
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The Desire sailed undetected into Visayan waters, captured a Spanish sailor who had been unsuspectingly cruising in a small boat, and then attacked the Spanish shipyard at Lauigan in northern Panay. Cavendish then sailed southwards to Mindanao, where he left on an island the captured sailor, so he could inform his superiors in Manila of their misfortunes. While the Spaniards, including Bishop Salazar himself, seethed with anger against the "Lutherans," the Tagalog conspirators hoped that Cavendish would shortly sail back for an assault on Manila. The Englishman sailed on to Java, without the local chiefs being able to make contact with him. But the news of the Spaniards' defeat at the hands of this single English vessel removed the aura of invincibility around the former and boosted the courage of the Filipinos.205
DELAYS AND INDECISION
At this stage, a new but impatient member of the conspiracy, one Esteban Tael, chief of Bulacan, demanded of the leaders in Tondo why they had to wait for some foreigner to help, when they could, if only they had the determination, exterminate the Spaniards in one blow. Offering to rouse to arms himself the towns from Tondo to Bulacan, he encouraged Martin Panga to do the same for those in the south as far as Cavite. The conspirators also decided to enlist the participation of the peoples of Bataan, Komintang (Batangas), and the villages around the lake of Bai. Indeed, they won over to their side the villages of Malolos and Guiguinto in Bulacan. The more headstrong among the conspirators were for making an immediate rendezvous at Tondo, and then cross the Pasig River in force to attack Manila.
When some Pampanga chiefs came to Manila to petition the Spanish governor to suspend an edict emancipating their slaves, at least until after the forthcoming rice harvest, the Tagalogs tried to win their support. The negotiations, however, fell through, because they could not agree as to who would be the overall commander for the campaign. The Tagalogs themselves found out that they could not muster enough men, until after the rice harvest.
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As weeks passed, the Tondo chiefs returned to their original plan of waiting for the Borneans and the Tausogs of Sulu, this time with or without the Japanese. They apparently thought that these forces would suffice, even without their Visayan and Maguindanao allies, who by this time seemed to have assented to the conspiracy but had so far not been able to coordinate their plans with the other allies. The Borneans, who were reportedly completing their construction of seven new caracoas and other war vessels for the enterprise, were expected to be ready within a short time.
The conspirators' plan was for the Borneans and the Tausogs to make a feint at Cavite, in order to draw the Spanish cannons in that direction. As the Spaniards had always done in times of crisis, it was expected that they would send for levies from the subjugated provinces. The Tagalog chiefs would then pretend to respond with great zeal by sending as many warriors to Manila as possible. But once in position, they would quickly fall upon the Spaniards. Even if the latter retreated to their citadel, the chiefs were confident of victory due to sheer numbers, just as the Moluccans had done in successfully wresting the strong Portuguese fortress at Ternate years earlier.206
By this time, a few more new members had joined the conspiracy. These included Luis Balaya, chief of Bangos; his nephews Agustin Lea and Alonso Digma; Daulat, chief of Castilla; and Juan Basi, chief of Taguig. But their earlier indecision and inability to launch an immediate attack had increased the chances of discovery of the plot by the Spaniards. Indeed, by October 1588, some fifteen months since the conspiracy was first hatched, the Spaniards had become suspicious that something sinister was afoot. They had apparently heard of the secret meetings and ostensibly festive gatherings, where the various Tagalog chiefs were ominously present. They also knew that Agustin de Legazpi, Magat Salamat, and Martin Panga had been selling their landed estates, the huge sums of money paid out by individual Spanish buyers raising speculations about some sinister plan involved. It would also seem that the Spaniards who had survived the Muara massacre in Borneo brought back to Manila newsbits that could not but be
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regarded as ominous.
THE SPANIARDS' DISCOVERY OF THE CONSPIRACY
Finally, the conspirators agreed that Magat Salamat, his brotherinlaw Juan Banal, and Agustin Manuguit, should go to the Calamian Islands, attempt to win the local people to their cause, and from there send forthwith for the Borneans. They brought along as presents some of Japanese arquebuses and shields. During a stopover at the Cuyo Islands, Magat Salamat persuaded the local chief, Datu Sumaelob, to join the conspirators, the latter promising to send to Manila some 2,000 men.
The next move, however, proved fatal. For when the conspirators tried to win Antonio Surabao, chief of the Calamianes, over to their cause, the encomendero of those islands, Captain Pedro de Sarmiento, managed to extract from Surabao knowledge of the plot. Sarmiento quickly rounded up Salamat, Bana1, Manuguit and Sumaelob, and brought them back to Manila in chains. The rest of the Tagalog chiefs were just as quickly arrested. From the separate testimonies wrung out from each, the Spaniards gradually pieced together the whole plot. The chiefs were accordingly tried, their individual testimonies used to incriminate one another.
Agustin de Legazpi and Martin Panga, as the chief conspirators, were condemned to be dragged by horses, hanged, and decapitated, their heads being stuck on pikes inside iron cages and exposed to public view as a stern warning to anyone who might in the future dare to oppose the might of Spain. Their houses were also torn down, and the sites plowed and sown with salt, so that no green thing might grow on it. Also sentenced to death, with the loss of all their properties, were Magat Salamat, Amaghikon of Navotas, Geronimo Basi, Felipe Salalila, Esteban Tael, and the Japanese interpreter Dionisio Fernandes.207
Exiled to Mexico for varying periods from two to six years, and further individually penalized with the loss of half of their properties or fines of 20 taels of fine gold, were Pitong Gatang, Felipe Salonga, and Agustin
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
Manuguit. Also exiled for varying periods from two to six years, some losing half their properties or fined up to 15 taels of fine gold, were Pedro Balinguit, Felipe Amarlangagui, Daulat of Castilla, Juan Basi, Dionisio Capulong, Luis Balaya, and the following Tondo nobles: Gabriel Tuambakar, Luis AmaniKalaw, his son Kalaw, Francisco Acta, Juan Banal, and Amarlangagui, the maestredecampo or commander of the Tagalog auxiliaries. At the time the report was made in 1589, Sumaelob had not yet been sentenced, though it would appear that he too did not escape punishment. The only ones acquitted were the nephews of Luis Balaya, namely, the brothers Agustin Lea and Alonso Digma.208
Of those exiled to Mexico, only Dionisio Capulong, son of Lakandula, is known to have definitely returned. In 1594, he reportedly guided the Spanish expedition to Ituy sent by Acting Governor Luis Perez Dasmarinas.209
THE AFTERMATH
Only after the conspiracy had been crushed did a Japanese junk arrive with Gayo in 1589, laden with more than 500 arquebuses, as many samurai swords, and some battle axes. By then the Spaniards had been expecting such a vessel. It was promptly boarded, its cargo seized, and the officers and crew thrown into jail. Finding the Filipinos' cause hopelessly lost, Gayo and his men tried as best they could to extricate themselves from their predicament and gave the alibi that the weapons were destined for sale in Siam. Not wishing to alienate Hideyoshi, who had ordered in 1587 the expulsion of Christian missionaries from Japan, the Spaniards decided to take Gayo's word at face value, and offered to release the prisoners, provided the arms would be sold in Manila. Thus, the matter was decided to the satisfaction of both parties, the Spaniards only too glad to acquire these weapons for their armory, and the Japanese just as happy to gain their freedom. 210
With such measures as the above, the Spaniards successfully put an end to the most serious threat posed by the Tagalog ruling class. Though the hope of a successful resistance movement with Bornean aid continued into
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
the next century, the power of the Tagalog chiefs was definitively broken in 1589. In 1643, one Pedro Ladia, apparently a descendant of Lakandula,211
tried to rouse the people of southern Luzon to revolt, but this came to no avail. The Tausogs of Sulu and the Borneans also seem to have kept up the claim to the throne of Manila, at least nominally, until the second half of the eighteenth century.212 But not until the closing years of the nineteenth could the Tagalog provinces substantially put up a challenge against the might of Spain.
ENSUING REVOLTS OF OTHER FILIPINOS
The historical evidence suggests that the Tagalog chiefs had been in communication not only with the Borneans and the latter's Islamic allies in Mindanao, but also with the Visayans and the people of the Cagayan Valley in northern Luzon, and perhaps also with the inhabitants of the Bicol peninsula. In the Visayas, the people of Leyte rose in revolt in 1588, under the leadership of one local chief who killed the Spanish encomendero of Abuyog. Similar disturbances also arose at the same time in Cebu and Panay.213
THE CEBUANO REVOLTS OF 1589
As in Leyte, the people of Cebu began their revolt by slaying some encomenderos and their military escorts when these came to collect the tribute for 1589. The Cebuanos then seized "the women" 214 – apparently referring to the female members of the Spaniards' households. These were detained and were not rescued until the alcaldemayor of Cebu, leading some fifty or sixty Spanish soldiers, and a number of native mercenaries, launched a successful counterattack. A good number of the Cebuano warriors were killed in the encounter, and the captured leaders were later hanged.
But in June, 1589, the alcaldemayor discovered a new Cebuano conspiracy, hatched in concert with the peoples of the neighboring islands, to burn the Spanish city of Cebu and massacre all the Spaniards. Acting quickly, he arrested the chief conspirators, and dealt with them in the same
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
harsh fashion as Governor Vera had done to the Tagalog chiefs. Five of the top Cebuano leaders, probably including Rajah Tupas' son Pisuncan, were beheaded, while the rest were exiled, imprisoned, or otherwise punished.215
THE CAGAYAN REVOLT OF 1589
In 1579, a Spanish party under Captain Juan Pablo de Carrion had attempted to establish a settlement, which they called Valladolid, at the mouth of the Cagayan River. They soon had to abandon the effort, however, when nearly all of them fell ill..
216 Beginning 1581, the region became a source of concern to the Spaniards, due to rumors that the Japanese had occupied the mouth of that river. At that time, the chief Japanese import from Luzon was a type of native earthen jar, which was discovered to be an excellent container for keeping tea, without losing its desired taste and aroma. In Japan, these jars were usually lined on the outside with beaten gold and decorated with typical Japanese designs. Highly valued by wealthy Japanese, these jars often fetched fantastic prices, so that the strongman Hideyoshi himself claimed a strict monopoly over their import.217
Unable to countenance this rival intrusion into Luzon, the Spaniards determined to oust the Japanese. When Captain Carrion and a force of seven galleys and frigates returned to Cagayan in 1582, he encountered the Japanese as soon as he rounded Cape Bojeador at the northern end of the IIocos coast. Near that cape, he engaged and grappled with a Japanese vessel bearing 200 men. The battle was furious, and the Spaniards suffered serious casualties, though in the end, the Spanish superiority in numbers prevailed and only eighteen Japanese survived to surrender. As Carrion entered the Cagayan River, he found another eleven Japanese vessels, a fortified settlement, and reportedly about 1,000 Japanese warriors and traders. After an unsuccessful initial attempt, Carrion finally forced an entry into the river mouth, and fortified himself in a suitable location some six leagues (nearly thirty kilometers) upriver.218 Eventually, the Spaniards drove out the Japanese and established a Spanish settlement, called Nueva Segovia, near
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
the mouth of the Cagayan River. The first missionaries which accompanied this expedition were Bishop Salazar's vicargeneral and fellow Dominican, Fray Cristobal de Salvatierra, and an Augustinian, Fray Francisco Rodriguez.219
Early in 1589, two Spanish soldiers came rushing to Manila from Nueva Segovia to report that the entire province of Cagayan was up in arms. The rebels had been reportedly bold enough to enter the Spanish settlement, slaying many Spaniards, including the encomendero, Captain Martin de Barrios. In response to the urgent request of the alcaldemayor of Cagayan, Governor Vera sent the masterofcamp Pedro de Chaves, with 60 Spanish soldiers and more than 800 native auxiliaries. Chaves devastated the Cagayan countryside, cutting down coconut trees and burning rice fields, and forcing the people to return to their villages. In retaliation, the people burnt their homes and took to the mountains.220 Twice a Spanish punitive expedition went to Cagayan, but on each occasion achieved nothing substantial, since the people had free access to their mountain retreats.221
SPANISH ASSESSMENT OF THE SITUATION
In describing the stern measures he adopted to suppress the conspiracies and uprisings in 15871589, Governor Santiago de Vera wrote to King Philip II in July, 1589:
Without any fuss whatever, I beheaded seven of the authors of this rebellion [i.e., the "Tondo Conspiracy"] – sons, nephews, and grandsons of the lords of this land. Others who were not as guilty I punished with exile to Nueva España and with other penalties, so that it seems that this disturbance is now over. After that, in the province of Cebu and in that called the Pintados, the chiefs held a conference, and plotted to kill the Spaniards. The majority of those who took part in this have been imprisoned, and proceedings are being instituted against them. I think this will cause us but little trouble.222
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
It need only be added that, in the case of the Cebu uprising, the Spaniards ultimately had to execute, as in Manila, the chief leaders of the rebellion, to insure the nonrecurrence of trouble in the future.
Not as confident, however, was the opinion expressed by the fiscal of the Royal Audiencia of Manila, Don Gaspar de Ayala, who wrote to the king two days afterwards. As Ayala put it:
I am ready to certify that there are few places in these islands where the natives are not disaffected. When there is any uprising they communicate with one another, make allies, and send messengers to keep up relations. This is because the Indians know that they are separated from one another, and that their punishments are not inflicted as they formerly were, under a military regime, but by a judicial order.223
Ayala added that the drastic measures Governor Vera had taken against the rebel leaders had made the people "somewhat cowed," but he himself was not too sure of that.224 That antiSpanish sentiment at that time was widespread may be gleaned from a line in the Royal Audiencia report of July 13, 1589, which says: "In many other parts and provinces, there are disturbances, and [hostile] yndios kill many Spaniards and peaceful native inhabitants, all these giving them temerity (atrevimiento) to see how few [our people] are and with what difficulty do we mete out punishment due to the extreme poverty of the royal coffers."225 Indeed, it was not until after 1591, under a new governor, Don Gomez Perez Dasmariñas, that the Spaniards were able to bring the situation under control. When the hitherto unsubdued Zambals began harrassing nearby pacified areas, Dasmariñas, backed by the religious orders who thought that such provocation sufficed to wage a just war, ordered in 1591 a force of about 126 Spaniards and up to 3,500 Pampango native auxiliaries to devastate Zambales. The military expedition slew or took captive more than 2,500 Zambals of both sexes; 400 of the male captives were thereafter promptly made galley slaves.226 Nevertheless, succeeding years would show that the people of Cagayan and the Zambales were far from having been completely subjugated.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
IMPLICATIONS FOR EVANGELIZATION
These episodes raise an important question with regard to the missionaries' continuing task of evangelization. Simply put, in the light of the apparently widespread discontent and hostility towards the Spaniards, how could the friars be able to carry on effectively their task? The measures taken by Governor Vera may have broken once and for all the power of the upper classes of the Tagalogs and the Cebuanos. But this destruction of the native ruling classes was something that would take decades for the Spaniards to live down and for the Filipinos to forget. Undoubtedly, these measures inspired fear but certainly did not elicit loyalty to the conquistador.
What is immediately apparent is that the missionary task was made doubly difficult. Bishop Salazar blamed the sorry state of affairs during the years immediately before 1590 on the indifference of the secular authorities towards their religious duties, as well as the abuses and excesses committed in connection with the collection of tributes. For even those people who had already been baptized were reportedly so harassed by forced labor on various public projects and personal enterprises of many Spaniards that these baptized converts hardly had any time to receive religious instruction. There was also so much shifting of population, even within the immediate vicinity of Manila itself, as people tried to avoid the tribute and were forced later, so that many people could not be given systematic instruction in their newly embraced faith.
The pentup resentments of the Filipinos finally erupted in the conspiracies and revolts of 15871588. As the last decade of the sixteenth century unfolded, the overarching question might have been: how could the missionaries somehow make the Filipinos understand that their purpose did not quite completely coincide with that of the conquistador?
– p. 262
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
N ot es
Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
1. Miguel de Loarca, "Relación de las Yslas Filipinas por Miguel de Loarca. Tratado de las yslas Philipinas en que, se Contiene todas las yslas y poblagones que. estan Reduçidas. Al seruiçio de la magd. del Rey Don phelippe nro seiior y las poblagones de. estan fundadas de españoles y la manera del gouierno de Espaiioles y naturales con Algunos condiçiones de los yndios y moros destas yslas" (with accompanying English translation), in BRPI, V: 38.
2. See "Relación mui circunstanciada de lo ocurrido en el Real y campo de la Isla de Zebu de las Islas Philipinas desde 1 de Junio de 1565, que su Gobernador Miguel Lopez de Legazpi despacho la Nao Capitana de su Armada a descubrir la Navegacion de la vuelta para Nueva España; y de los varios descubrimientos y conquistas que hizo en aguellas Islas hasta el mes de Julio 1567 ... ," in CDIU, 2nd series, III: 122.
3. Ibid., 122.
4. This practice seems to have begun about 1538, with the conversion of three, and later seven, entire villages on the island of Amboina. A further example was the case of the people of Makassar (modern Udjung Pandan) in southern Celebes, who, in seeking an alliance with the Portuguese. at Ternate, also agreed to be evangelized. On the evangelization of these places, see Hubert Jacobs, "Brief Notes on the Vicars and Other Secular Clerics of the Portuguese Fortress in Maluku up to 1605," Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft, XXXI (1975), 217f.
5. Juan Martinez, "Relación detallada de los sucesos ocurridos durante el viaje de la nao San Jerónimo que salio de Acapulco bajo el mando de Pero Sanchez Pericon y por piloto a Lope Martin, con el objeto de llevar auxilios a Legazpi, y la noticia de arribo a Nueva España del navio San Pedro. Fue escrita dicha relacion en Cebu a 25 de Julio de 1567, por Juan Martinez, que iba de soldado en la propia nao. Narrase en ells ademas lo ocurrido en aquel campo desda su llegada hasta la fecha de la misma relacion," dated Cebu, July 25, 1567, in CDIU, 2nd series, III: 465.
6. On the idea of "Christopaganism," see William Madsen, Christopaganism: A Study of Mexican Religious Syncretism (New Orleans: Middle American Research Institute, Tulane University, 1957); and Tetsunao Yamamori and Charles R. Tauber, eds., Christopaganism or Indigenous Christianity? (South Pasadena, Cal.: William Carey Library, 1975).
7. "Relación mui circunstanciada de lo ocurrido en el Real," 126.
8. Fray Felix de Huerta, O.F.M., Estado geográfico, topográfico, estadístico, históricoreligioso, de la Santa y apostólica provincia de S. Gregorio Magno, de religiosos menores descalzos de la regular y más estrecha observancia de N.S.P. S. Francisco, en las Islas Filipinas (Binondo: Imp. de M."Sanchez y Ca., 1865), 183184.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
9. Fray E. P. Jorde, O.S.A., Catdlogo biobibliográfico de los religiosos agustinos de la Prouincia del Santísimo Nombre de Jesús de las Islas Filipinas desde su fundación hasta nuestros dias (Manila, 1901), 910.
10. For the names of these Augustinians, twelve in all by 1571, see HPAF, I: 158159.
11. Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, "Copia de carta que el general miguel lópez de legazpi strive al virrey de la nueva españa, fecha en la ciudad de Manila a XI de agosto de 1572," dated Manila, August 11, 1572, in HPAF, XIV : 129.
12. See "Relación anónima de la conquista de la isla de Luzón; de la expedicion que hizo el capitan Juan de Salcedo; de las costumbres, trajes, etc., de los naturales de esta isla cuya situation describe, asi como la de Mindanao y otras," dated Manila, April 20, 1572, in HPAF, XIV: 96.
13. Fray Martin de Rada, O.S.A., "Copia de una carta quel Padre fray martín de Rada, prounçial de la orden de San augustín, que reside en la China, escriue al Virrey de la nueua españa; fecha en la çiudad de manilla a 10 de Agosto de 1572 años," dated Manila, August 10, 1572, in HPAF, XIV : 111.
14. Legazpi, "Copia de carta que el general miguel lópez de legazpi strive al virrey de la nueva españa," in HPAF, XIV: 124.
15. Ibid., 126. See also "Relation of the Voyage to Luzon," dated May 8, 1570, in BRPI, III: 101102.
16. Legazpi, "Copia de carta que el general miguel lópez de legazpi strive al virrey de la nueva españa," in HPAF, XIV : 126.
17. "Voyage to Luzon," in BRPI, III: 102.
18. Ibid.
19. "Relación anónima de la conquista de Luzón," 96.
20. Juan de Maldonado, "Carta en relación de Juan de Maldonado tocante al viage y población de la isla de Luzón en Filipinas, que emprendió Martín de Goyti por mandado del Gobernador de la isla de Panae en aquel pays, López de Legazpi," dated Rio de Panay, May 6, 1572, in HPAF, XIV: 106.
21. "Voyage to Luzon," in BRPI, III: 92.
22. [Riquel, Fernando (Hernando)], "Pacificación y amistad hechan entre el Rey y los naturales de Manila, fecha en la isla de Luzón a 18 de mayo, y posesión que se tomó a nombre de su magestad el general miguel lópez de legazpi de Manila," dated Manila, May 18, 1571, in HPAF, XIV : 70.
23. Legazpi, "Copia de carta que el general miguel lópez de legazpi scrive al virrey de la nueva españa," in HPAF, XIV : 126.
24. "Relación anónima de la conquista de Luzon," 79.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
25. The anonymous author thus spoke approvingly of Fray Diego de Herrera who, while still in Panay, "preached to us everyday and pleaded much in the sermons which he did in public and in private that the island be relinquished, and the people be not allowed to suffer so much want." Then again, he said that he would have to give very little credit to the many chroniclers among the Spaniards, save Fray Diego de Herrera and Fray Martin de Rada, who, "being friars ... shall write all the truth." (See ibid., 83, 96).
26. Ibid. 93.
27. Isacio Rodriguez Rodriguez, O.S.A., in HPAF, XIV: 93n., citing J. M. Echevarria, O.R.S.A., "Origenes de las misiones de Agustinos Recoletos en el Extreme Oriente,"Missionalia Hispanica, X (1953), 127128.
28. See Andrés de Mirandaola, "Carta a Felipe II de Andrés de Mirandaola, dándole importantes noticias de las Islas Filipinas," dated Mexico, April 1, 1574, in HPAF, XIV : 177.
29. Maldonado, "Carta en relación de Juan de Maldonado," 106.
30. Rada, "Copia de una carta quel Padre fray martín de Rada," in HPAF, XIV : 113.
31. An unpublished document given the title "Lakandula, the Ruler of Tondo," notarially authenticated back to the original, which is dated Manila, November 24, 1660, says that Lakandula "had Don Dionisio Capulong and his other sons baptized, as the said Lacandola was afterwards himself, at which baptism the said Lord Governor showed him great honor by ordering the artillery and arquebuses which are now in the City discharged." As quoted by William Henry Scott, Cracks in the Parchment Curtain and Other Essays in Philippine History (Quezon City: New Day Publishers, 1982), 261262.
In Governor Santiago de Vera's report, dated Manila, May 25, 1589, he spoke of Felipe Salonga, chief of Polo in Bulacan, as the "brother" Dionisio Capulong, chief of Candaba in Pampanga. Magat Salamat is also described as a "son of the old ruler of this land." See the footnote material supplied by Father Pablo Pastells, S.J. to Francisco Colin, S.J., Labor evangelica: ministerios apostólicos de los obreros de la Compania de lesus, fundación, y progressos de su provincia en las Islas Filipinas [1663]. New ed., illus., annotated, and documented Father Pablo Pastells, S.J. (Barcelona: Imprenta y Litograffa de Henrich y Compaiiia, 19001902),1: 173n.176n.
32. Scott, Cracks in the Parchment Curtain, 261262.
33. Rada, "Copia de una carta quel Padre fray martín de Rada," in HPAF, XIV : 113.
34. Ibid.
35. Ibid.
36. Antonio Pigafetta, Magellan's Voyage Around the World, by Antonio Pigafetta, trans. and annotated James Alexander Robertson, 2 vols. + index (Cleveland: The Arthur H. Clark Co., 1906),1: 160.
37. Rada, "Copia de una carta quel Padre fray martín de Rada," in HPAF, XIV: 113.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
38. Guido de Lavezares, "Carta a S.M. del Governador de Filipinas, Guido de Lavezares, dando cuenta de sus servicios, de la situación de la isla de Luzón, conversiones operadas entre los naturales, y recomendando a otras personas," dated Manila, June 29, 1573, in HPAF, XIV : 151.
39. Andrés de Cauchela and Salvador de Aldave to King Philip II, dated Manila, July 17, 1574, in AGI, Audiencia de Filipinas, 29; as cited by HPAF, XIV : 197n.
40. Guido de Lavezares, "Carta del Governador General de Filipinas, Guido de Lavezares, a S.M. dándole relación del estado de dichas Islas, necesidades que padecen, quejas que ha tenido de los agustinos por causa de los tributos," dated Manila, July 30, 1574, in HPAF, XIV : 198.
41. Lavezares, "Carta a S.M. del Governador de Filipinas, Guido de Lavezares," in HPAF, XIV : 151.
42. Lavezares, "Carta del Governador General de Filipinas, Guido de Lavezares," in HPAF, XIV : 197.
43. Legazpi, "Copia de carta que el general miguel lbpez de legazpi scrive al virrey de la nueva españa," in HPAF, XIV : 129.
44. Fray Martfn de Rada, O.S.A., "Carta al Virrey de México del P. Martín de Rada, dándole cuenta de cómo Juan de Salcedo fué a la conquista de Vicor e IIocos, atropellos que se cometen con los indios, aumento de la doctrina, de las viruelas, y clases de esclavitud," dated Manila, June 30, 1574, in HPAF, XIV : 185.
45. Lavezares, "Carta a S.M. del Governador de Filipinas, Guido de Lavezares," in HPAF, XIV : 152153.
46. [Augustinians]. "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente de cosas quel padre fray Diego de Herrera á de tratar con su magestad o su Real consejo de yndias," dated [Manila, 1573?], in HPAF, XIV: 167.
47. Rada, "Carta al Virrey de Mexico del P. Martín de Rada," in HPAF, XIV : 184.
48. Rodriguez, HPAF, X: 28n., citing Archivo de la Prouincia agustiniana del Smo. Nombre de Jesús de Filipinas (Madrid), Libro de Gobierno de la Provincia, I, fol. 19rv.
49. See BRPI, III: 60n., citing the report of Mirandaola.
50. "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV: 164.
51. "Relación anónima de la conquista de Luzón," in HPAF, XIV: 97.
52. Agustinians. Memorials., "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV: 165. Cf. "Relación del orden que la gente española, que por mandado de su magestad salió de la nueva españa para las islas Philipinas, á tenido y tiene en pacificar la tierra y sustentarse en ella," dated September 17, 1574, in HPAF, XIV : 229.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
53. Augustinians. Memorials., "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV : 165166.
54. Fray Martfn de Rada, O.S.A., "Carta del P. Martin de Rada, OSA., al P. Alonso de la Veracruz, OSA., drandole noticias de las costumbres, ritos y clases de esclavitud que hay en las Filipinas, con otras informaciones importantes de las Islas," dated Calompit, July 16, 1577, in HPAF, XIV: 486.
55. Augustinians. Memorials., "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV : 164.
56. Rada, "Carta del P. Martin de Rada, OSA., al P. Alonso de la Veracruz," dated July 16, 1577, in HPAF, XIV: 479.
57. Augustinians. Memorials., "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV : 167.
58. Lin Feng ("Limahong") was a native of Kwangtung province, and as a pirate was pursued by elements of the Chinese army and navy under the command of his viceroys of Fukien and Kwangtung provinces. Some Chinese accounts claim that Lin Feng operated under the command of a more notorious pirate chief named Lin Taochian, before coming to Luzon on his own. See Wu Chinghong, "A Study of References to the Philippines in Chinese Sources from Earliest Times to the Ming Dynasty," Philippine Social Sciences and Humanities Review, XXIV (1959), 130131.
For contemporaneous Spanish accounts of the Limahong invasion, see Fray Agustin de Alburquerque, "Carta del P. Agustin de Alburquerque comunicando el suceso del corsario Limahon, que habia ido contra la isla de Luzon con 70 navros," dated Campo de Pangasinan, June 5, 1575, in HPAF, XIV: 234262. See also Francisco de Sande, "Carta a Felipe II del Gobernador de Filipinas, doctor Sande. Da cuenta de su llegada y accidentes de su viaje; de la que falta que hay alli de todo, y habla de Religiosos, minas, de la China, Mindanao, Borneo, etc.," dated Manila, June 7, 1576, in HPAF, XIV: 389403. Cf. "Copia de una carta que escrive la qiudad de Manila, de las Islas Philipinas, al Visorrey de la nueva Espaiia," dated Manila, June 2, 1576, in HPAF, XIV: 365375.
59. See Sande, "Carta de Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 393, 396.
60. As Lavezares himself put it: ". . . tenia yo presos a dos principales desta uaya, el uno que se decia lumanatlan, porque aura tornado igierta cantidad de oro a otro prinqipal para que lo boluiese, y al otro se decia raxa el uago, porque al ynstante que los sangleyes vinieron se hallo conmigo, y entendiendo que eran burneyes los mande lleuar a la carcel, a los quales mataron estando presos en la carcel, diciendo que ellos sauian la benida de los borneyes," (I had as prisoners two chiefs of this bay, the first, named Lumanatlan, because he had taken a certain quantity of gold to another chief, and so that this might be returned; and the other, called the New Rajah, because the moment the Chinese arrived I found him around, and understanding that they were Borneans, I ordered them placed in jail; both were killed in prison, they having said that they knew of the coming of the Borneans.), in La Ciudad de Dios, XXXV (1894), 435, as quoted by FlPAF, XIV : 243.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
61. Sande, "Carta a Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 395.
62. See HPAF, I: 167, citing Fray Juan de Grijalva, O.S.A., Cr~nica de la Orden de N.P. S. Agustin en las Provincias de la Nueva España (Mexico, 1624), fol. 151. Cf. Sande, "Carta a Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 420.
63. Ibid.
64. Alburquerque, "Carta del P. Agustin de Alburquerque comunicando el suceso del corsario Limahón," in HPAF, XIV : 243.
65. See HPAF, XIV : 244n., citing Lavezares' testimony published in Ciudad de Dios, XXXV: 433434.
66. Ibid. See also "Copia de una carta que escrive la ciudad de Manila," in HPAF, XIV : 371.
67. Ibid.
68. HPAF, I: 167168. See also Juan de Medina, O.S.A., Historia de la orden de N. gran P. S. Agustfn de esta Islas Filipinas, desde que se descubrieron y poblaron por los espanoles (1630), in Biblioteca Historica Filipina (Manila: TipoLitografica de Chofre y Comp., 1893), IV: 94.
69. "Copia de una carta que escrive la ciudad de Manila," in HPAF, XIV: 369.
70. For more details, see Alburquerque, "Carta del P. Agustin de Alburquerque comunicando el suceso del corsario Limahon," in HPAF, XIV : 235236. See also "Copia de una carta que escrive la ciudad de Manila," in HPAF, XIV : 369. Cf. Oficiales Reales, "Carta a Felipe II de los Oficiales de Filipinas, Guido de Lavezares, Andres de Cauchela, Andrés de Mirandaola y Salvador de Aldave, dándole cuenta de la venida de Limahón, viaje a China de los agustinos Martin de Rada y Jerónimo Marin, de las minas de oro, y cuentas que les ha tomado el Gobernador Dr. Francisco de Sande," dated Manila, June 6, 1576, in HPAF, XIV : 383, 402403.
71. See Sande, "Carta a Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 397.
72. Fray Juan Gonzales de Mendoza, O.S.A., "History of the Great Kingdom of China" (1585), in BRPl, VI: 103.
73. Sande, "Carta a Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 435.
74. See Jose Montero y Vidal, Historia general de Filipinas desde el descubrimiento de dichas Islas hasta nuestros dias, 3 vols. (Manila: M. Tello, 18871895), 1: 136137.
75. See "Expeditions to Borneo, Jolo, and Mindanao," in BRPI, IV: 148152.
76. For the full text, see Francisco de Sande, "Carta del Doctor Francisco de Sande, Gobernador de Filipinas, al Rey de Borneo, pidiéndo venga de paz y amistad con el Rey de España, que tiene establecido ya sus dominio sobre las Islas Filipinas," dated Borneo, April 1578, in HPAF, XIV : 506508. An English translation of this same letter also appears in BRPl, IV: 152155.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
77. The Augustinians' objections to the Borneo expedition are in the letter of Fray Alonso de Castro, O.S.A., dated Calompit, June 12, 1578, in Fray Gregorio de Santiago Vela, O.S.A., "Fragmentos de correspondencia de los primeros misioneros agustinos de Filipinas," AHHA, XVIII (1922), 146.
78. Sir Hugh Low, "Selesilah (Book of Descent) of the Rajas of Brunei," The Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, V (1880), 10.
79. Rada, "Carta del P. Martin de Rada, O.S.A., al P. Alonso de la Veracruz," dated April 25, 1578, in HPAF, XIV: 505. See also "Relación de la isla de burney y jornada que allá hizo el doctor francisco de sande, gobernador y capitán general de las yslas philipinas, precisamente (?) este aiio de setenta y ocho," dated Manila, July 29, 1578, in HPAF, XIV: 522.
80. "Relación de la isla de burney," in HPAF, XIV : 523.
81. For the text of the Portuguese king's letter, see BRPI, IV: 173174. 82. "Relación de la isla de burney," in HPAF, XIV : 523.
83. D. E. Brown, "Four Brief Notes on the History of Brunei," The Brunei Museum Journal, II (1971), 173.
84. "Relación de isla de burney," in HPAF, XIV : 520. 85. Ibid., 521.
86. Francisco Colin, S.J., Labor evangelica, I: 163n.
87. Fray Martín de Rada to Fray Alonso de la Veracruz, O.S.A., dated Manila, June 7, 1577, as cited by Santiago Vela, O.S.A., "Fragmentos de correspondencia," in AHHA, XVIII: 158159.
88. Martin Enriquez, "Carta del Virrey de Nueva España, D. Martin Enriquez, a Felipe II sobre varios asuntos de gobierno. Da ... noticias llegadas de las Indias de Poniente por cartas de su governador, D. Francisco de Sande, de Guido Lavezarii, que fue el primero que dió orden para la entrada de la china; y otras muchas sosas," dated Mexico, October 31, 1576, in HPAF, XIV : 447.
89. The Jesuit historian, Father Pablo Pastells, S.J., in a footnote to Colin's Labor evangelica, II: 315n., says: "Ya en 1575 [the correct date is 1576] habia naufragado en las costas de Catanduanes la nao Espiritu Santo en que pereció el P. Herrera, con todos los que en ellas iban, a excepción de Geronimo Albez y otro español que se le arrimó, los cuales por hablar la lengua de los naturales fueron hechos esclavos, hasta que los libertb Pedro de Chaves, cuando fué alla para castigar a los naturales por los asesinatos cometidos en las personas de los naufragos."
This seems to be a correction to an earlier footnote by Pastells in the same work (see 1: 25), where he says that the only survivor was Geronimo Albez, "vezino antiguo de las Islas Bisayas, porque sabía hablar en su lengua."
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
For a contemporaneous account of the fate of the shipwrecked men, written a fortnight after the incident, see "1576. Testimonio de la información y diligencias hechas en la costa de la isla de Catanduanes, una de las filipinas, sobre la muerte y paradero de una embarcación española, que habia dado al trabes en aquellas inmediaciónes, cuya tripulación fue en parte ahogada y en parte muerta por los yndios," dated Isla de Catanduanes, May 7, 1576, in HPAF, XIV: 359362.
This source identifies the assailants as the inhabitants of the river settlements of Laut and Siut in Catanduanes. When a local man named Siango was subsequently interrogated by the Spanish lieutenant Juan Arce de Sardonil, the former admitted that the people of Siut had told him that they were keeping two captives. Another respondent named Sialon said that one of the persons spared was a mere youth. (See ibid., 362, 364.) A later Augustinian historian opined that this youth was probably the "Filipino servant of Padre Herrera, who had gone with him to Spain, and whom Philip II had allowed to return to the islands," quite incorrectly adding, "and this could have been the only one among the passengers who managed to reach the shore." See Santiago Vela, "Fragmentos de correspondencia," in AHHA, VIII (1917), 214n.
90. See "Copia de una carta que escrive la qiudad de Manila," in HPAF, XIV : 376.
91. See HPAF, XIV : 509n., citing Archivo de la Provincia Agustiniana del Smo. Nombre de Jesús de Filipinas (Madrid), Libro de Gobierno de la Provincia, I, fol. 31rv.
92. Fray Juan de Alba, O.S.A., "Carta del P. Juan de Alba, y otros, al
P. Alonso de la Veracruz," dated Manila, June 8, 1577, in HPAF, XIV: 466.
93. Sande, "Carta a Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 435.
94. Letter of Sande to the viceroy of Mexico, dated Manila, June 7, 1577, in AGI (Seville), Audiencia de Filipinas, 6; as cited by HPAF, XIV: 435n.
95. See HPAF, 1: 286.
96. As cited in Santiago Vela, "Fragmentos de correspondencia," AHHA, XVIII (1922), 156.
97. Rada, "Copia de una carta quel Padre fray martfn de Rada, in HPAF, XIV: 113.
98. Echevarria, "Origenes de las misiones de Agustinos Recoletos," 127.
99. Legazpi, "Copia de carta que el general miguel lópez de legazpi scrive al virrey de la nueva españa," in HPAF, XIV: 129.
100. Sande, "Carta a Felipe II," in HPAF, XIV: 435.
101. Fray Agustin de Alburquerque, O.S.A., "Cartacircular del Provincial Fr. Agustin de Alburquerque a todos los religiosos de la Provincia de agustinos de las Islas Filipinas," dated Lubao, August 20, 1578, in HPAF, XIV : 526527.
102. Ibid. Evidence for the existence of Rada's Cebuano vocabulary is given by Fray Juan de Medina, O.S.A., who wrote in 1630 that in 1612, while he was a conventual in Cebu, he
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
had seen this vocabulario. (See Medina, Historia de la orden de N. gran P.S. Agustin, 54.) The Jesuit, Father Pedro Chirino, writing in 1604, also speaks of this uocabulario and claims to have seen and studied it while he was in Cebu. See Pedro Chirino, S.J., Relación de las islas Filipinas y de los que en ellas an trabajado los padres de la Compania de Jesus (Rome, 1604). New Edition (Manila: Esteban Balbas, 1890), 8.
103. Huerta, Estado geografico, 443, 492.
104. HPAF, XIV: 528n., citing "Primera parte de la Historia de la Provincia de Philipinas de Compania de Jesús," reproduced in Martinez Vigil, "La escritura," Revista de Filipinas, II (1876), 33.
105. Fray Eusebio Gomez Platero, O.F.M., Catdlogo biogrdfico de los religiosos franciscanos de la provincia de San Gregorio Magno de Filipinas, desde 1577 en que llegan los primeros a Manila hasta los de nuestros dias (Manila: Imprenta del Real Colegio de Santo Tomas, 1880),.33.
106. Fray Diego de Aduarte, O.P. Historia de la Provincia del Santrsimo Rosario de la Orden de Predicadores en Filipinas, Japón y China (1640). First published in Zaragoza, 1693. New ed. Manuel Ferrero, O.P., 2 vols. (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, 19621963), 1: 117.
107. See King Philip III to Archbishop Miguel de Benavidez, O.P., dated 1603, in BRPI, XXI: 51. See also the king's letter to the Royal Audiencia in Madrid, dated November 14, 1603, in BRPI, XXI: 52n.
108. "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV: 167.
109. "Relación del orden que la gente española, que por mandado de su magestad salió de la nueva españa para las islas Philipinas, á tenido y tiene en pacificar la tierra y sustentarse en ella," dated [September 17, 1574], inHPAF, XIV: 231.
110. Fray Juan Gonzales de Mendoza, O.S.A., "History of the Great Kingdom of China," in BRPI, VI: 149.
111. "Memoria de los Religiosos de las yslas del poniente," in HPAF, XIV: 167.
174. See "Anales Eclesiasticos," Philippiniana Sacra, II (1967), 193201. Cf. Pablo Fernandez, O.P., The Church in the Philippines (15211898) (Manila: National Book Store, 1979), 2829.
175. For the English translation of this bull, and for the authenticity of this date and year (1579, not 1578!), see "400th Year of the Archdiocese of Manila Bulletin," I: 2 (October, 1978), 57.
176. Fray Andres de Salazar, O.S.A., to Bishop Fray Domingo de Salazar, O.P., dated Mexico, February 12, 1583, in Fray Juan Francisco de San Antonio, O.F.M., Chronicas de la apostolica prouincia de religiosos descalzos de N.S. P. San Francisco de San Gregorio
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
Magno, 3 vols. (Sampaloc & Manila: [Impr. de la Provincia de San Gregorio Magno], 17381744), 1: 585591. Cf. ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, I: 311313.
177. See HPAF, I: 258259.
178. Don Gaspar de Ayala, fiscal of the Royal Audiencia of Manila, to King Philip II, dated Manila, July 15, 1589, as cited by HPAF, I: 288.
179. Bishop Domingo de Salazar, "Relación de las cosas de las Filipinas" [1583], in Wenceslao E. Retana, Archivo del Bibliofilo Filipino: Recopilación de documentos históricos, científicos, literarios, y estudios bibliográficos, 5 vols. (Madrid: Impr. de la viuda de M. Minuesa de los Rios, 18951905), III: 13.
180. Ibid., 14.
181. Ibid.
182. Ibid.
183. Ibid., 5.
184. Ibid., 14.
185. Ibid., 56.
186. Ibid., 1516.
187. Ibid., 4.
188. Thus, Legazpi had exempted Lakandula's descendants from tributes and personal services (tributos, polos y servicios personales) and those of Rajah Soliman from manual services (oficios y servicios mecánicos). See "Pleito promovido contra los heredores de Lakandola," (proceedings of the Royal Council of the Indies), dated Buen Retiro, August 30, 1751, in The Christianization of the Philippines, ed. and trans. Rafael Lopez, O.S.A., and Alfonso Felix, Jr. (Manila: Historical Conservation Society and University of San Agustin, 1965), doc. xiii, 225.
Similar privileges had earlier been granted to the people of San Nicolas and Mandawe in Cebu.
189. See deposition by the notary Salvador de Aragon, dated [Manila, June 15, 1582], in BRPI, V: 190.
190. "Conspiracy Against the Spaniards: Testimony in Certain investigations made by Doctor Santiago de Vera, president of the Philippines," dated Manila, May 20, 1589, in BRPI, VII: 96. Cf. Costa, Jesuits in Philippines, 112.
191. By 1750, many of the descendants of Lakandula and Soliman already had Spanish family names, but others were still surnamed "Lacandola," "Capolong," "Macapagal," etc. One barangay captain from San Simon, Pampanga, who was specifically identified as a
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descendant of Lakandula was named Don Sebastian Puyat. See "Pleito promovido," 224249.
192. "Letter from Domingo de Salazar to Felipe II," dated Manila, June 22, 1582, in BRPI, V: 188.
193. Costa, Jesuits in Philippines, 112.
194. "Conspiracy Against the Spaniards," in BRPI, VII: 95.
195. The official accounts of this "Tondo Conspiracy" are Vera's report of May 20, 1589 and that of the Royal Audiencia of Manila, dated July 13, 1589, as quoted in ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, II: 172n.174n. The English translations of these documents are in BRPI, VII: 95f.
196. See ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, I: 51; II; 676. Cf. Antonio de Morga, Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas, por el Doctor Antonio de Morga [edition by Wenceslao E. Retana] (Madrid: Victoriano Suarez, 1909), 407.
197. Governor Santiago de Vera to King Philip II, dated Manila, June 26, 1587, in BRPI, VI: 308309.
198. S. R. Turnbull, The Samurai: A Military History (New York : Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1977), 134, 202205.
199. Governor Vera to Philip II, dated Manila, June 26, 1587, in BRPI, VI: 309. Vera added: "I have kept this conference secret, and ordered it kept so, in order that the Chinese might not hear of it, as they are a very suspicious and timorous race. I have made much of these Japanese, and am treating them with especial hospitality." See ibid., 310.
200. "Conspiracy Against the Spaniards," in BRPI, VII: 99100. 201. Ibid.
202. See Huerta, Estado geografico, 53.
203. "Conspiracy Against the Spaniards," in BRPI, VII: 98, 100. (/
204. See "Letter from Gaspar de Ayala to Felipe II," dated Manila, July 15, 1589, in BRPI, VII: 121122. Ribadeneyra, Historia de las Islas del Archipielago, y reynos de la Gran China, Tartaria, Cuchinchina, Malaca, Sian, Camboxa y lappdn, bk. 3, ch. vi, 210211. Cf, also Gomez Platero, Catalogo biografico de los religiosos franciscanos, 2728.
205. On the passing visit of Candish's Desire, see "Letter from Domingo de Salazar to Felipe II," dated Manila, June 27, 1588, in BRPI, VII: 68. Cf. "Conspiracy Against the Spaniards," in BRPI, VII: 101. Cf. also Governor Vera to Philip II, dated Manila, June 23, 1588, in ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, I: 55n., 175n.
206. Vera to Philip II, dated Manila, May 20, 1589,.in ColinPastells, Labor euangelica, I: 173n.
207. "Conspiracy Against the Spaniards," in BRPI, VII: 104105.y 208. Ibid., 106110.
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
209. See Nicolas Zafra, "The Colonization of the Philippines and the Beginnings of the Spanish City of Manila" (Manila: National Historical Commission, 1574), 58.
210. "Letter from Gaspar de Ayala to Felipe II" (July 15, 1589), in BRPI, VII: 126.
211. On Pedro Ladia's insurrection, see "Insurrections by Filipinos in the Seventeenth Century," in BRPI, XXXVIII: 9899.
The family name "Ladia" seems to have been a local variant for "Rajah," as suggested by a marginal note in an official record of the Royal Audiencia of Manila, dated October 30, 1753, which refers to los descendientes de los Regulos Lacandola Ladia, Matanda y Raja Soliman. Whether the title "Ladia"for that is what it seemsrefers to Lakandula or Matanda is immaterial; what is important is that it appears to be a variant for the regal title. See "Pleito promovido," in Lopez and Felix, Christianization, 231.
212. Thus, a British document dated ca. 1759 speaks of conveying "the Sultan" to Manila, apparently referring to the deposed Sulu sultan, Ali Muddin, as soon as the British had wrested control over the Visayas and Mindanao from the Spaniards. The context of the statement gives the impression that "the Sultan" had a claim over Manila, and such an item of information could have been obtained by the British from the people of Sulu, which in turn indicates the political hopes still entertained by the latter with regard to the restoration of the old principality of Manila. See "Plan of an Expedition for the Conquest of the Southern Philippines," dated "23 November 1762" (but this is obviously incorrect, since the British by then had taken Manila; the above date probably refers to the time when the document was received in London, hence, the document was most probably prepared about 1759, in BRPI, XXXVIII: 43.
213. See Pastell's notes in ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, I: 176n.
214. "Letter from Gaspar de Ayala to Felipe II," July 15, 1589, in BRPI, VII: 122.
215. ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, 176n. See also Ayala to Philip II (July 15, 1589), in BRPI, VII: 122.
216. Andres de Cauchela and Salvador de Aldave to King Philip II, dated [Manila], June 10, 1579, in AGI (Sevilla), Audiencia de Filipinas, 29; as cited in HPAF, XIV: 537n. Cf. Sande, "Carta a S.M. del Gobernador de Filipinas, Doctor Francisco de Sande," in HPAF, XIV : 535.
217. The Italian traveler Francesco Carletti, who visited Japan by way of the Philippines in 1597, reported that upon docking at Nagasaki, their vessel was boarded by customs officials to search the cargo and the personal effects of the crew and passengers, especially for Philippine jars. Since the Filipinos dramatically raised the prices for such jars as soon as they realized the great value the Japanese placed on these items, prices equally rose in Japan so that by the end of the sixteenth century, some were valued at the fantastic sum of what today would range from $625 to $3,400 in U.S. currency, per jarthat is, after Japanese craftsmen had embellished these items. In 1615, the powerful daimyo of Sendai, Date Masamune, reportedly bought one such jar, after it was gilded and otherwise
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Filipino Responses to Spanish Colonization and Evangelization
decorated, for the staggering sum of 130,000 scudi ($40,000 U.S. today). See "The Carletti Discourse," trans. Bishop Trollope, in The Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan, 2nd series, IX (1932), 6.
218. See "Letter from Peñalosa [Governor Gonzalo Ronquillo de Peñalosa] to Felipe II," dated July 1, 1582, in BRPI, V: 197.
219. Ibid., 196197. See also Bishop Salazar to King Philip II, dated Manila, June 18, 1582, as cited in HPAF, I: 253.
220. "Letter from Gaspar de Ayala to Felipe II" (July 15, 1589), in BRPI, VII: 135.
221. ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, I: 176n.
222. Governor Vera to King Philip II, dated Manila, July 13, 1589, in Colin Pastells, Labor evangelica, I: 174n.
223. "Letter from Gaspar de Ayala to Felipe II" (July 15, 1589), in BRPI, VIII: 123.
224. Ibid., 124.
225. ColinPastells, Labor evangelica, I: 176n.
226. See "Letter from Gomez Perez Dasmariñas to the King," dated Manila, May 31, 1592, in BRPI, VIII: 240241.
end.
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