Into the Frontier
Studies on Spanish
Colonial Philippines
ii
Into the Frontier
Studies on Spanish
Colonial Philippines
In Memoriam
Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo
Edited by
Marya Svetlana T. Camacho
2011
iii
UNIVERSITY OF ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
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© 2011 by Marya Svetlana T. Camacho
University of Asia and the Pacific
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No copies can be made in part or in whole
without prior written permission from the publisher
Recommended entry:
Camacho, Marya Svetlana T.
Into the Frontier:
Studies on Spanish Colonial Philippines
In Memoriam
Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo
Edited by Marya Svetlana T. Camacho
Pasig City: University of Asia and the Pacific, © 2011
I. Philippine, Spanish history (English). I. Title
ISBN 978-971-011-415-3
Printed in the Philippines by CentralBooks
927 Phoenix Building, Quezon Avenue
Quezon City 1100
iv
CONTENTS
List of Illustrations
Source Abbreviations
Preface
vii
ix
xi
Ma. Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo: Forging Filipinismo in
Andalusia and Spain
Antonio García-Abásolo
1
Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo and the Science of History
Jose S. Arcilla, S.J.
7
Architecture and Economic History
Delving into a Forgotten Past: Díaz-Trechuelo’s
Arquitectura española en Filipinas and the Restoration of the
Walled City of Intramuros
Jose Victor Z. Torres
17
A Market in Intramuros: Basco’s Impossible Dream
Celestina P. Boncan
37
Ciriaco González Carvajal’s Development Programs:
Promoting Prosperity through Work in EighteenthCentury Philippines
Marya Svetlana T. Camacho
59
Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo and Economic Studies on the
Eighteenth Century: A Select Bibliography
Ferdinand C. Llanes
83
v
Society and Culture
The Drafts of the Handbook for Confessors of the
Synod of Manila of 1582
Paul A. Dumol
Filipinos on the Mexican Pacific Coast during the
Spanish Colonial Period (1570-1630)
Antonio García-Abásolo
117
Jurisdictional Conflicts Regarding the Ecclesiastical
Prison of Manila during Governor Arandía’s Term
(1757-1758)
Marta María Manchado López
147
Spaces, Material Culture, and Changing Roles:
The Misericordia of Manila (1594-1869)
Juan O. Mesquida
187
Encontrar el alma filipina en España: The Search for
Philippine Art in Spain
Regalado Trota Jose
221
Portuguese Expansion in the Far East: Continuities and
Discontinuities with the Spanish Experience
Miguel Luque Talaván
237
The Historiographical Work of Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo
(1921-2008)
Inmaculada Alva Rodríguez
273
Selected Bibliography
Contributors
Index
vi
97
299
319
323
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Illustrations of the archeological site of Bastion de San
Diego
31-32
Topographia de la Ciudad de Manila, capital de las Islas Filipinas,
fundada en la isla de Luzon, Nuevo Reyno de Castilla by Antonio
Fernández de Roxas. Manila, ca. 1730
42
Vignettes showing Chinese individuals, other foreigners,
and cafres. From the map of the Philippine Islands by Pedro
Murillo Velarde, engraved by Nicolas de la Cruz Bagay and
Francisco Suarez, 1730
45
Rural scenes depicted in vignettes from map of the
Philippine Islands by Pedro Murillo Velarde, engraved by
Nicolas de la Cruz Bagay and Francisco Suarez, 1730
67
Talavera ceramic-style tile featuring a Chinese servant
124
Map showing the areas in New Spain where Filipinos
preferred to settle, bounded by the ports of Acapulco and
Navidad
130
Vignettes showing foreign traders and the different racial
groups in Spanish Philippine colonial society. From the
map of the Philippine Islands by
184-85
vii
Pedro Murillo Velarde, engraved by Nicolas de la Cruz
Bagay and Francisco Suarez (1730)
Sketches of Colegio de Santa Isabel based on the
Topographia de la Ciudad by Antonio Fernández de Roxas.
Manila (ca. 1730)
201
Vignette showing the plan of the walled city of Manila.
From the map of the Philippine Islands by Pedro Murillo
Velarde, engraved by Nicolas de la Cruz Bagay and
Francisco Suarez (1730)
206
Title page of Manifiesto y resumen historico de la fundacion de la
venerable Hermandad de la Santa Misericordia de la Ciudad de
Manila (1728)
210
Blessed Virgin Mary. Ivory plaque, 17th c.
Cathedral. 229
Oviedo
227
Santo Cristo. Ivory, ca. mid-1600s. Monasterio de San
Esteban, Salamanca
230
View of Manila. From Antoine François Prévost, Histoire
générale des voyages (1756)
269
viii
SOURCE ABBREVIATIONS
AAM
Archdiocesan Archives of Manila (Manila)
AGI
Archivo General de Indias (Seville)
AHM
Archivo Histórico Militar (Madrid)
AHN
Archivo Histórico Nacional (Madrid)
ARSI
Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu (Rome)
DRAE
Diccionario de la Real Academia Española (21st
edition, 1992)
PNA
Philippine National Archives (Manila)
ix
x
PREFACE
Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo’s passing away in 2008 seemed at that time
to go largely unnoticed among Filipino historians and scholars
specializing in Hispanic Philippines. But the following year, when the
idea of holding a conference in her honor was made known to some,
invariably they welcomed it. Clearly underlying this ready response
was the recognition of her contribution to historiography on Spanish
colonial Philippines. This is true despite the situation that even
among Filipino academics knowledge of historiographical work about
the Philippines published in Spanish academia continues to be
limited. Recent Spanish historiography has built on earlier works
which lodged the Philippines in the history of Latin America. We
cannot deny the fact that filipinismo in Spain grew in the bosom of
americanismo. In this disciplinal enterprise Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo has
been accorded the undisputed role of pioneer.
In the middle of the last century Díaz-Trechuelo rescued the
Philippines from oblivion in Spanish academe. As Antonio GarcíaAbásolo points out in the first chapter, this condition of the
archipelago as a semi-forgotten entity corresponded to its
geographical position as a frontier region in the former Spanish
empire. Díaz-Trechuelo became a pioneer twice over: by venturing
into the geographical frontier that was the Philippines she pushed the
boundaries of historical memory in Spain.
Her numerous publications on the history of Spanish
America and the Philippines brought her international recognition.
Together with the mark she made through her published works, there
remains the personal imprint she left on individuals. Those who
knew Doña Lourdes as professor, mentor, and friend greatly value
xi
their dealings with her whether long- or short-term. They attest to
her uncompromising commitment to standards of scholarship and
zeal to train younger historians in research, flowing from a sense of
responsibility to serve others through her work. Her faith as a
Christian imbued her personality as teacher and historian. Some of us
who have contributed chapters to this book have had the fortune to
meet and be guided by her. We are one in feeling indebted to her and
her works.
The chapters in this book were first presented as papers in a
conference in her honor, held in March 2009, close to her death
anniversary: “Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo, In Memoriam: A Conference
on Spanish Colonial Philippines.” It was organized by the
Department of History of the University of Asia and the Pacific,
where it took place, with the cooperation of the University of
Córdoba in Spain, and the generous support of the Spanish Ministry
of Foreign Affairs through its grants program, and of the Ortigas
Foundation. It was a felicitous collaboration with a Spanish university
which has maintained Díaz-Trechuelo’s legacy of filipinismo,
focusing on the history of Spanish colonial Philippines. The
conference thus became an occasion to privilege this connection with
the honoree.
It was also an uncommon opportunity to gather some
Filipino and Spanish historians. As papers were presented, one got
the sense that a constructive dialogue was taking place. Today more
Spanish historians are accessing the works of their Filipino
counterparts. Similarly, Filipinos would gain by making a reciprocal
effort to familiarize themselves with Spanish publications on the
Philippines. The perspectives of Spanish historiography have
broadened to include analyses of the colonial processes in a regional
and international context, and the Filipino response to those
processes, particularly in terms of local transformation and the
development of national consciousness. Overall, the increasing
contact between Filipino and Spanish historians is indicative of an
xii
openness that can expand historical understanding in a mutual way.
This book hopes to be a step forward on this eminently positive path.
The first part gathers research that is more directly connected
to major themes in Díaz-Trechuelo’s filipinismo, namely, the city of
Manila and eighteenth- century colonial Philippines. The chapter by
Jose Victor Z. Torres is a clear example of the complementary use of
archeological, archival and bibliographical methods, in this case
applied to recover the history of Fort Nuestra Señora de Guía in the
walled city of Manila. To corroborate material data, archeologist
Isabel Picornell was introduced to Arquitectura española en Filipinas.
This was an instance of the verified usefulness of this work which,
with its natural limitations vis-à-vis more recent studies, continues to
be a classic reference on Spanish colonial architecture in the
Philippines.
Thanks to the series of articles published in Philippine Studies
in the 1960s, Díaz-Trechuelo’s research on economic development in
eighteenth-century colonial Philippines became accessible in English.
Ferdinand C. Llanes provides perspective on the value of these and
her other related works by cross-referencing them with more recent
works on economic history of Spanish colonial Philippines by
Filipino and some foreign, mostly American, scholars. Characterized
by the intensification of Bourbon reforms, the critical changes in
political economic policy in the latter half of that century would mark
the developments in the next; thus the importance of understanding
this period well. As in America, it proved to be a watershed in
Philippine history, with enduring consequences in all dimensions of
colonial life. Aspects of Bourbon reformism are discussed by
Celestina P. Boncan and Marya Svetlana T. Camacho. Boncan
presents a little-known project of Governor General José Basco y
Vargas, a market within the city walls which broke the long-standing
policy of isolating the Chinese by bringing them to do business at the
very heart of the capital. At the same time he sought to galvanize the
economic activity of the other ethnic groups, especially the Spaniards.
xiii
In the context of the more encompassing economic reforms of that
period, the attempt to establish a market in the colonial capital was
accompanied by efforts in urban development, a promising area of
study awaiting further inquiry. Ciriaco González Carvajal came to the
Philippines as a judge of the Audiencia of Manila and later on
concurrently held other posts. Camacho attempts to introduce him to
Filipinos from a perspective more relevant to them: his proposals for
change challenging the existing economic and social structures. True
to his “enlightened” outlook—at the same time paternalistic as was
expected of a man of his times—on the economic life and local
society, he saw the productive potential of indios on the one hand,
and on the other, turned a critical eye on Spaniards.
The second part explores various aspects of society and
culture in Spanish Philippines. Drawing from mostly archival sources,
the authors penetrate facets of personal and institutional lives in that
world. Paul A. Dumol and Antonio García-Abásolo’s entry points
into indigenous society are two vastly different kinds of texts. Dumol
reconstructs the process that plausibly shaped the handbook for
confessors of the Synod of Manila of 1582. Examples of the marginal
comments in the handbook offer important insights into native
society in the earliest years of Spanish colonization, with its inherent
problems that the Synod faced unflinchingly using the standards set
by the natural law and the Gospel. García-Abásolo outlines the lives
of two Filipinos in the Viceroyalty of New Spain. Using the
documentation relative to the demise of one of them, he examines
the extent to which they were assimilated into local society. Against
the backdrop of Filipino and Asian (especially Chinese) presence in
viceregal Mexico, these two transplanted individuals present an
instance of how elements of that presence could have been
introduced in the first half-century of Spanish colonization in the
Philippines. Of further interest in this case is that it provides an
example of the intersection of indigenous peoples with different
geographical and ethnic origins in a colonial Hispanic environment.
xiv
On the other hand, the studies of Marta Ma Manchado López
and Juan O. Mesquida focus on sociopolitical and economic
networks in eighteenth-century Manila. Both devote attention to the
participation of persons representing institutions and belonging to
different ethnicities, which emphasizes as well as particularizes the
Philippine colonial context. Manchado draws on the voluminous
documentation about a public incident involving Spanish civil and
ecclesiastical authorities. Beneath the defense of their respective
jurisdictions lay the dynamic of personal interests, alliances, and
enmities. While the protagonists in this episode were Spaniards, some
Tagalogs were given voice as witnesses of the event, and served to
reflect its public transcendence. While continuing with the subject of
the Spanish urban elite, Mesquida takes the angle of space and
material culture of a specific private institution, the Hermandad de la
Misericordia. The evolving purposes and practices of the
brotherhood were shaped at the pace of socioeconomic
developments, and under the influence of accompanying changes in
the values of its members and the social group they belonged to. This
approach to institutional history is rich but infrequently used.
Mesquida’s work shows how it may be employed to advantage to
explore the sociocultural dimension of Spanish Manila.
Regalado Trota Jose’s incremented catalogue of Philippine art
and cultural artifacts in Spain highlights the importance of material
culture as representations of Spanish colonial Philippines. The very
presence of such objects in Spain, and the stories yet untold of their
transit from the Philippines to Spain would contribute to expanding
the appreciation of the historical dynamic between the two countries
and cultures.
Providing a macroview of the Spanish colonial enterprise in
Asia, Miguel Luque Talaván’s article situates the Philippines in a
comparative context. The short-lived Iberian Union that began in
Philip II’s reign affected the direction of western expansion in Asia,
which in reality consisted of two processes, the Portuguese and the
xv
Spanish. This brings to mind the relatively recent development of the
concept of Hispanoasia (which includes the Pacific), analogous to
Hispanoamérica. The first defines a distinct geopolitical sphere and
evokes the different fortunes that expansionist efforts had in that
part of the world.
This book closes with a chapter on Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo’s
work as historian. Inmaculada Alva Rodríguez defines her
characteristics as a researcher and writer, above all those that enabled
her to produce works that were of service to future researchers, such
as bibliographies and working outlines. Her role in promoting
filipinismo in Spain was not solely based on her publications but on
the research she encouraged and supervised among younger scholars.
Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo was a filipinista within her vocation as
americanista. While the Philippines has begun to be treated as part of
Hispanoasia, Philippine colonial history remains handicapped to the
extent that it ignores its ties with the Hispanic American world.
Lately, interest and effort to recover shared history and to recognize
shared culture between the Philippines and Latin America, especially
Mexico, has been increasing in the academic, government and
business sectors. Going in this direction, Philippine historiography
stands to benefit as it takes a comparative look within the context of
the Hispanic ambit of the early modern period. This orientation
becomes all the more promising from the point of view of the
present when the Asia-Pacific region—which does well to revisit
historical relationships within that space once dominated by Spain—
gains prominence on the world scene.
I hope that this collective work may truly honor Lourdes
Díaz-Trechuelo, and at the same time express gratitude. She
encouraged me, and many others, to pursue my vocation as historian
at the beginning of my academic career and continued to do so
through the years. I am especially grateful to Antonio GarcíaAbásolo, professor of the University of Córdoba (Spain), for his
unflagging support, from the inception of the conference in
xvi
memoriam to the completion of this publication project. It helped
immensely to have the virtual presence of someone who followed up
the progress of the book as Josemaria A. Mariano, president of the
University of Asia and the Pacific, did whenever he had the
opportunity. Erlinda R. Paez and Divine Angeli P. Endriga deserve
special thanks for the painstaking work of editing and proofreading,
and overall for reminding me that I had deadlines to meet. They and
Veronica E. Ramirez guided me through the process of publication.
We worked on the premise that in this labor of love little things were
important. Nelia Gahol had the first go at copyediting, and I learned
much from her. To my colleagues in the Department of History, in
particular Sofia B. Marco, former department chair, and Ma. Victoria
B. Ferreria, and to our administrative assistants Mary Grace B. Caedo
and Krishna B. Luna, I am grateful for their unstinting assistance
before and during the conference which started it all. May this book
serve as a reminder of our aspiration to establish colonial studies as
an area of research. And for their unconditional encouragement
whose beauty lay in its quiet naturalness, I wish to thank my parents,
who nurtured love for the humanities in me, and my friends; they all
graciously understood why I was so busy.
xvii
xviii
María Lourdes Díaz-Trechuelo y López-Spínola
(1921-2008)
xix
xx