Part 8

[78] Juan de la Concepcion, _Historia general de Philipinas_, Manila, 1788-92, II, pp. 45-6. Schilling, p. 203n, maintains that the early writers were mistaken in believing that the Synod was held in 1581. On October 16, 1581 the Bishop called a meeting of ten priests at the Convent of Tondo to discuss the execution of the decree about slaves, Torres, II, pp. cxliv-v. No laymen were present and no other topic was discussed. The decisions of this meeting were sent in a letter from Salazar to the King, dated from Tondo, October 17, 1581, translated in B. & R., XXXIV, pp. 325-31, from the original MS. in the A. of I. (68-1-42), Torres, II, no. 2686, p. 95. The following year a real Synod was held, this time including lay government officials as well as priests, at which was discussed a variety of subjects. Robert Streit, _Bibliotheca Missionum_, Aachen, 1928, IV, pp. 327-31, cites a MS. account of it by the Jesuit father Sanchez who was present; and Valentín Marín, _Ensayo de una Síntesis de los trabajos realizados por las Corporaciones Religiosas Españoles de Filipinas_, Manila, 1901, I, pp. 192 et seqq., cites another MS., then in the Archives of the Archiepiscopal Palace of Manila, _Memoria de una junta que se hizo a manera de concilio el año de 1582, para dar asiento a las cosas tocantes al aumento de la fe, y justificacíon de las conquistas hechas y que adelante se hicieron por los espanoles_, from which he quotes extensively. With reference to the Synod see further Lorenzo Pérez, _Origen de las Misiones Franciscanas en el extremo oriente_, in Archivo Ibero-Americano, 1915, III, pp. 386-400.

[79] Santa Inés, p. 212. Again similar accounts are to be found in San Antonio, I, pp. 563-6, in far more detail and phrased in even more laudatory terms, and the fullest early biography of Plasencia is given by San Antonio, II, pp. 512-79. Modern surveys appear in Marín, _op. cit._, II, pp. 573-82, and Lorenzo Pérez, _op. cit._, pp. 378 et seqq.

[80] Chirino, _Primera parte_, quoted by Retana, col. 24, implied that Quiñones and Plasencia wrote at about the same time: "The first who wrote in these languages were, in Visayan, P. Fr. Martin de Rada, and in Tagalog, Fr. Juan de Quiñones, both of the Order of St. Augustine, and at the same time Fr. Juan de Oliver and Fr. Juan de Plasencia of the Order of St. Francis, of whom the latter began first, but the former [wrote] many more things and very useful ones." However, San Antonio, I, p. 532, wrote perhaps with bias in favor of his own order, "Although the Augustinian fathers had come earlier and did not lack priests fluent in the idiom, the language had not yet been reduced to a grammar, so that it could be learned by common grammatical rules, nor was there a general vocabulary of speech; except that each one had his own notes, to make himself understood, and everything was unsystematized."

[81] _Entrada de la seraphica Religion de nuestro P. S. Francisco en las Islas Philipinas_, MS. of 1649, first published in Retana, _Archivo_, I, no. III, translated in B. & R., XXXV, p. 311.

[82] Medina, p. 15, quoting from Martínez whom we are unable to trace.

[83] Huerta, pp. 492-3. Oliver died in 1599. San Antonio, II, p. 531, says that Plasencia was the first to write a catechism (called in Tagalog "Tocsohan"), and Oliver was the first to translate the explanation of the Doctrina. Oliver's works are noted by León Pinelo, _op. cit._, 1737-38, II, col. 730, and Barrantes, _op. cit._, p. 187.

[84] Sebastian de Totanes, _Arte de la Lengua Tagala_, Manila, 1850, p. v, (first edition printed in 1745) says of Oliver that "up to the present day our province reveres him as the first master of this idiom."

[85] See note 42.

[86] Huerta, p. 517. Nothing is known of Diego de la Asuncion except that he wrote five works in Tagalog including an _Arte_ and _Diccionario_. Huerta was unable to find any record of him in the mission lists, the capitularies or the death records, but that he was in the Philippines before 1649 we can be sure of from the notice of him in the manuscript of that date.

[87] Huerta, p. 495. Montes y Escamilla came to the islands in 1583 and remained there until his death in 1610. Five works in Tagalog are attributed to him, an _Arte_, _Diccionario_, _Confesionario_, _Devocional tagalog_, and a _Guia de Pecadores_. The _Devocional_ is listed by Medina, no. 16, p. 12.

[88] Pablo Rojo, _Fr. Juan de Plasencia_, _Escritor_, Appendix 3 of Santa Inés, II, p. 590. An early reference by Fernández, _Historia Eclesiastica_, p. 300, speaking of the Franciscan missionary successes among the natives, says, "They learned the Doctrina Christiana which the priests translated into Tagalog."

[89] Rojo, in Santa Inés, II, pp. 590-1, says that the Doctrina then being used among the Tagalogs was the same as that written by Plasencia except for modernization in accordance with the changes which had taken place in the language since his time.

[90] Medina, no. 15, p. 11.

[91] Chirino, p. 14.

[92] Colin, II, p. 325.

[93] Chirino, p. 27.

[94] Chirino, chaps. XV-XVII, pp. 34-41.

[95] On May 13, 1579, Philip II wrote to the Governor of the Philippines, "Fray Domingo de Salazar, of the Dominican order, and bishop of the said islands, has reported to us that he is going to reside in these islands; and that he will take with him religious of his order to found monasteries, and to take charge of the conversion and instruction of the natives," B. & R., IV, p. 141, translated from the original MS. in the Archivo-Historico Nacional, _Cedulario indico_, t. 31, f. 132V, no. 135. Twelve of the twenty who set out from Europe with Salazar died before reaching Mexico, and the others were so sick that all but one remained there, so when Salazar landed at Manila in March 1581 he was accompanied by twenty Augustinians, eight Franciscans, and only one Dominican, Christoval de Salvatierra.

[96] For these and other general facts I have used Aduarte and Remesal where they are supported by the other historians, Juan de la Concepcion, San Antonio, San Agustin, Juan de Medina and Santa Inés. It should be noted that Remesal acknowledged as his source for much of the material on the Philippines the unpublished MS. history of the Franciscan, Francisco de Montilla. The fifteen Dominicans were Juan de Castro, Alonso Ximenez, Miguel de Benavides, Pedro Bolaños, Bernardo Navarro, Diego de Soria, Juan de Castro the younger, Marcos Soria de San Antonio, Juan de San Pedro Martyr (or Maldonado), Juan Ormaza de Santo Tomás, Pedro de Soto, Juan de la Cruz, Gregorio de Ochoa, Domingo de Nieva, and Pedro Rodriguez.

[97] By a bull of October 20, 1582 Pope Gregory XIII confirmed the appointment already obtained from Pablo Constable de Ferrara, General of the Dominican Order, making Juan Chrisóstomo vicar-general of the Philippine Islands and China, and giving him authority to establish a province there, B. & R., V, pp. 199--200, translated from Hernaez, _Coleccion de bulas_, Brussels, 1879, I, p. 527, where it is printed from the original MS. in the Vatican, Bular. Dom., t. 15, p. 412.

[98] In 1580 the Dominicans of Mexico had begun plans for the establishment of a province in the Orient, and sent Juan Chrisóstomo to Europe to obtain the necessary permission from lay and ecclesiastical authorities. The Jesuit Alonso Sanchez, who had been sent to Spain to explain the situation in the Philippines, was at court, and told the King and Council of the Indies--quite subverting his mission--that there was no need for more priests and particularly no need for a new order there. Chrisóstomo was discouraged, but the scheme was revivified by Juan de Castro who finally secured a letter from Philip II on September 20, 1585 endorsing the plan. Twenty-two volunteers sailed from Spain on July 17, 1586. In Mexico the Dominicans again found Sanchez propagandizing against the mission and also encountered the efforts of the Viceroy to persuade the friars to remain there. Notwithstanding, twenty friars subscribed to a set of ordinances at the Convent of Santo Domingo in Mexico on December 17, 1586. Of the twenty, fifteen went to the Philippines, three went directly to China, and Juan Chrisóstomo, who was ill and weak, and Juan Cobo, who had business there, stayed behind in Mexico.

[99] Aduarte, I, p. 9.

[100] Aduarte, I, p. 70.

[101] Juan Cobo had stayed behind in Mexico on business, and during his stay had been so moved by the scandals of the government there that he preached publicly against them, as a result of which he was banished by the Viceroy. He brought with him from Mexico a fellow-reformer and exile, Luis Gandullo, and four other recruits for the Philippine mission.

[102] These are printed in the _Ordinationes_ of 1604, see note 127, and by Remesal, pp. 677--8, who says that "these ordinances were printed in as fine characters and as correctly as if in Rome or Lyon, by Francisco de Vera, a Chinese Christian, in the town of Binondo in the year 1604 through the diligence of Fr. Miguel Martin."

[103] Sangley, a term used by the natives to designate Chinese, was derived from the Cantonese _hiang_ (or _xiang_) and _ley_ meaning a "travelling merchant." It was adopted by the Spaniards and in most instances used interchangeably with Chinese. If any distinction existed it was that a Sangley was a permanent resident of the Philippines--quite contrary to the derivation of the word--or a Chinese of partially native blood. See San Agustin, p. 253.

[104] Particularly the Memorial to the Council of the Indies sent with Sanchez, April 20, 1586, translated in B. & R., VI, pp. 167-8, from the original MS. in the A. of I. (1-1-2/24), Torres, II, no. 3289, p. 159.

[105] B. & R., VII, pp. 130-1, translated from the original MS. in the A. of I. (67-6-18), Torres, III, no. 3556, pp. 15-6. See the statement of San Agustin quoted on p. 22, which gives the irreconciled Augustinian view. Most of the contemporary witnesses, however, seem to agree with the Dominicans.

[106] B. & R., VII, pp. 220-3, translated from Retana, _Archivo_, III, pp. 47-80, and there printed from the original MS. in the A. of I. (68-1-32), Torres, III, no. 3698, p. 32.

[107] Remesal, pp. 681-2.

[108] B. & R., VII, pp. 223-5, as in note 106.

[109] Martínez-Vigil, _op. cit._, p. 246, lists as written by Benavides a _Vocabularium sinense facillimum_, and Vinaza, p. 17, cites his entry.

[110] Schilling, p. 210, says that in his letter Cobo himself recorded that "Benavides wrote the first Chinese catechism in the Philippines." He does not however differentiate between writing in Chinese characters and writing transliterated Chinese, and moreover "hizo doctrina" may only mean that he taught the doctrine, not necessarily that he wrote one.

[111] B. & R., VII, p. 238, as in note 106.

[112] Aduarte, I, p. 140.

[113] Aduarte, I, p. 140, says, before the previously quoted passage, that Cobo "put the Doctrina Christiana in the Chinese language," and Viñaza, pp. 17-23, lists seven books by him, including the famous translation of the Chinese classic, _Beng-Sim-Po-Cam_, the original MS. of which, with an introductory epistle by Benavides, dated from Madrid, December 23, 1595, is in the Biblioteca Nacional at Madrid; an _Arte de las letras chinas_; _Vocabulario chino_; _Catecismo o doctrina christiana en chino_; (cited from León Pinelo, _op. cit._, 1737-38, I, col. 142); _Tratado de astronomia en chino_; _Linguae sinica ad certam revocata methodum_ (called by Martinez-Vigil, _op. cit._, p. 263, "the first works or work on the Chinese language"); and _Sententiae plures_, excerpted from various Chinese books. See also Beristain, _op. cit._, I, p. 316, and Quétif and Echard, _op. cit._, II, pp. 306-7.

[114] Aduarte, I, p. 122.

[115] Fernandez, _Historia Eclesiastica_, p. 304, "In the Chinese language and letters, P. Fr. Domingo de Nieva, of San Pablo of Valladolid, printed a memorial of the Christian life; and P. Fray Tomas Mayor, of the province of Aragon, from the Convent and College of Orihuela, the Symbol of Faith." In his _Historia de los Insignes Milagros_, f. 217, Fernández states that both these works were printed at Bataan. Since Mayor did not arrive in the islands until 1602 his work is not pertinent to the present discussion. Mayor's book was seen but inadequately described by Jose Rodriguez, _Biblioteca Valentina_, 1747, p. 406, from a copy then in the Library of the Dominican Convent at Valencia, but now lost. Medina records it under the year 1607, no. 6, p. 6. See also León Pinelo, _op. cit._, 1737--38, II, f. 919r, and Antonio, _op. cit._, I, p. 330.

[116] Aduarte, I, p. 342.

[117] Medina, nos. 399-402, pp. 261-2.

[118] Aduarte, I, pp. 255-8. San Pedro Martyr moved back and forth a good deal. The first year in the Philippines he was with Benavides at Baybay; the second year he was in Pangasinan. In 1590 he was ordered to the Chinese mission in Cobo's place by Castro before he left for China. When Castro got back and Cobo could resume his old station, San Pedro Martyr went to the vicariate of Bataan "the language of which he learned very well," and when Cobo left for Japan in 1592, San Pedro Martyr went back to San Gabriel.

[119] Aduarte, I, p. 323.

[120] Remesal, p. 683.

[121] See Hermann Hülle, _Über den alten chinesischen Typendruck und seine Entzvicklung in den Ländern des Fernen Ostens_, N.P., 1923; Thomas Francis Carter, _The Invention of Printing in China and its Spread Westward_, New York, 1925; and Cyrus H. Peake, _The origin and development of printing in China in the light of recent research_, in the Gutenberg-Jahrbuch 1935, X, pp. 9-17.

[122] B. & R., VII, pp. 226, as in note 106.

[123] Aduarte, II, pp. 15-18.

[124] Medina, p. xix, supposed that the Doctrina was printed in the Hospital of San Gabriel in Minondoc, but Aduarte, I, p. 107, says that when the village of Baybay became overcrowded, it became necessary to spread the Chinese Christian settlement to a new site directly across the river, where land was given them by Don Luis Pérez Dasmariñas, the son and successor of Gómez Pérez Dasmariñas, and there a second church of San Gabriel was built. According to an inscription on a painting of Don Luis, exhibited at the St. Louis Fair of 1904 and illustrated in B. & R., XXX, p. 228, he bought the land from Don Antonio Velada on March 28, 1594, so that San Gabriel of Minondoc could not have been the place where the 1593 volumes were printed. Marin, _op. cit._, II, p. 617, says that San Gabriel was moved several years after its foundation to Binondo at the request of the city, and was rebuilt twice. It is apparent that San Gabriel in the Parian was abandoned after the church in Binondo was built.

[125] Juan de Vera was probably a comparatively common name at this time, because upon baptism the natives and Chinese assumed any Spanish name they pleased, and since Santiago de Vera was governor from 1584 to 1590, his last name would have been very popular. Aduarte, I, p. 86, mentions an Indian chief, Don Juan de Vera, who helped the Dominicans in Pangasinan, and Retana, col. 23, quotes from a document sent by the Audiencia of the Philippines to the King, August 11, 1620, the appointments as official interpreters of one Juan de Vera on June 15, 1598, and the same or another Juan de Vera on October 9, 1613.

[126] Aduarte, I, p. 108.

[127] The title-page of this unique book is as follows: [row of type ornaments] / _Ordinationes Generales_ / prouinciæ Sanctissimi Rosarij / [type ornament] Philippinarum. [type ornament] / Factæ per admodum Reuerendum patrem fratrem / Ioanem de Castro, primum vicarium generalem e- / iusdem prouintiæ. De consilio, & vnanimi con / sensu omnium frattu, qui primit_9_ in pro / uintiam illam se contulerunt, euan / gelizandi gratia./ Sunt que semper vsque in hodiernum diem in om- / nibus eiusdem prouintiæ capitulis infalibiliter / acceptatæ, inuiolabiliter ab omnibus / fratribus obseruandæ. / Binondoc, per Ioannem de Vera china / Christianum. Cum licentia. 1604. / [row of type ornaments]. The volume, an octavo bound in maroon levant morocco by Sangorski and Sutcliffe, consists of eight leaves, as follows: title-page as above, on the verso the permission signed at Manila, June 24, 1604, by Fr. Miguel Martin de San Jacinto, prior provincial of the Dominican Province of the Philippines; the text of the ordinances in Latin on eleven pages, with the device of the Dominican order on the verso of the last page; blank.

[128] See note 102.

[129] Medina, _Adiciones y Ampliacixones_, p. [5].

[130] Retana, cols. 77-8, where he gives as his source Hilario Ocio, _Reseña biográfica de los religiosos de la provincia del Santisimo Rosario de Filipinas_, Manila, 1891, I, p. 63. Ocio did not cite Remesal as his source, but the information, including the printer's name as Francisco de Vera, is the same.

[131] Both title-pages are reproduced in Francisco Vindel, _Manual Gráphico-Descriptivo del Bibliófilo Hispano-Americano_, Madrid, 1930--34, IX, p. 22, and VII, p. 181 respectively.