The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 18 of 55 / 1617-1620 / Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century

by Unknown

Joan de Ribera,
rector of the college of the Society of Jesus at Manila.

[Endorsed: “Madrid, November 20, 621. To the Council for examination.”]

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[1] These islands were discovered in 1568 by Alvaro de Mendaña; but for various reasons nothing was done to make them available as a conquest, and their location became so doubtful that many geographers disbelieved their existence, and even removed them from the maps. These islands were not rediscovered until late in the eighteenth century. See the Hakluyt Society’s publication of the narratives of Mendaña and others, Discovery of the Solomon Islands (London, 1901), with editorial comments by Lord Amherst of Hackney and Basil Thomson.

Documents of 1619–1620

• [Philippine ships and shipbuilding]. Sebastian de Pineda; [1619].
• [Royal decree regarding religious expelled from their orders]. Felipe III; February 19, 1619.
• [Proposal to destroy Macao]. Diego Aduarte, O.P.; [1619].
• [Relation of events in the Filipinas Islands, 1618–19]. [Unsigned]; July 12, 1619.
• [Letter to Felipe III]. Pedro de Arce; July 30, 1619.
• [Letter to Felipe III]. Alonso Fajardo de Tenza; August 10, 1619.
• [Grant to seminary of Santa Potenciana]. Juan Oñez, and others; 1617–19.
• [Reforms needed in Filipinas (to be concluded)]. Hernando de los Rios Coronel; 1619–1620.

Sources: All these documents save one are obtained from MSS. in the Archivo general de Indias, Sevilla; the fourth is taken from a MS. in the Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid.

Translations: All these documents save one are translated by James A. Robertson; the fourth, by Herbert E. Bolton, Ethel Z. Rather, and Mattie A. Austin, of the University of Texas.