Introduction The most spectacular change during the Renaissance which shaped the course of history was the opening of the world to Eureopean shipping Propelled by "Gospel, Gold , and Glory", and supported by much-improved technology - new types of shipe, sailing charts and maps, navigational instruments, gunpowder, and superior high-powered arms - the two Iberian superpowers of Spain and Portugal pushed through their ultimate goals to discover the rest of the world West Meets East The inclusion of Asian trade to that of Europe led not only to the flow od economic products and the wealth of Asia to European societies but also to the dynamic interaction of cultures Merchants become important in the eyes of the people, and they not only became richer but also powerful in the more famous trading cities of Italy The Lusitanian--Historic Rivalry in Maritime Discoveries Portugal was the first country to use innovation in seamanship and boatbuilding with the establishment by Henry "the Navigator" of the first navigational school in the globe at Sagres Point in 1419 In 1451-1470, the Portuguese discovered and colonized all the islands of the Azores in the Atlantic which they used to stage the discovery of the Americs and the circumnavigation of the west coast of Africa In 1500s, portugal's two intrepid explorers had reached the southermost end of Africa, and later, India, thus, winning the race of the wealth and spices of the East Spain had the earlier dispatched the first truly momentous exploration in modern times Inspires by the Florentine map maker Paolo Toscanelli to discover westward sea route to India, Christopher Columbus (Cristoforo Colombo) instead made a landfall in Guanahani (earlier identified as San Salvador but in 1986 as Samana Cay) Island in October 1492, and two weeks later, on the coast of Cuba Columbus' voyage generated misapprehension and dispute between Spain and Portugal; King John (João) of Portugal protested on the ground that ot was incursion by Spain of his sphere of influence Spanish pope from Valencia issued in May 1493, the inter caetera and the Eximinae Devotionis, giving Spain the right over any lands new-discovered by Columbus equivalent to the Portuguese territories found along the western coast of Africa The perceptive portuguese, realizing the Spanish pope's bias, did not agree to the established demarcation line In 1494, the Treaty of Tordesillas was signed which partitioned the non-Christian world into spheres of influence. It was followed by the papal bull of 1493 granting the New World to spain, while Africa and India were reserved only for Portugal. The treaty shifted the demarcation line 370 leagues farther west, thus assigning Brazil to Portugal The Magellan (Magalhães) Expedition (1518-1521)

1. Under Imperial Spain
Introduction
- The most spectacular change during the Renaissance which shaped the course of
history was the opening of the world to Eureopean shipping
- Propelled by "Gospel, Gold , and Glory", and supported by much-improved technology
- new types of shipe, sailing charts and maps, navigational instruments, gunpowder, and
superior high-powered arms - the two Iberian superpowers of Spain and Portugal
pushed through their ultimate goals to discover the rest of the world
West Meets East
- The inclusion of Asian trade to that of Europe led not only to the flow od economic
products and the wealth of Asia to European societies but also to the dynamic
interaction of cultures
- Merchants become important in the eyes of the people, and they not only became
richer but also powerful in the more famous trading cities of Italy
The Lusitanian--Historic Rivalry in Maritime Discoveries
- Portugal was the first country to use innovation in seamanship and boatbuilding with
the establishment by Henry "the Navigator" of the first navigational school in the globe
at Sagres Point in 1419
- In 1451-1470, the Portuguese discovered and colonized all the islands of the Azores in
the Atlantic which they used to stage the discovery of the Americs and the
circumnavigation of the west coast of Africa
- In 1500s, portugal's two intrepid explorers had reached the southermost end of Africa,
and later, India, thus, winning the race of the wealth and spices of the East
- Spain had the earlier dispatched the first truly momentous exploration in modern times
- Inspires by the Florentine map maker Paolo Toscanelli to discover westward sea route to
India, Christopher Columbus (Cristoforo Colombo) instead made a landfall in
Guanahani (earlier identified as San Salvador but in 1986 as Samana Cay) Island in
October 1492, and two weeks later, on the coast of Cuba
- Columbus' voyage generated misapprehension and dispute between Spain and
Portugal; King John (João) of Portugal protested on the ground that ot was incursion
by Spain of his sphere of influence
- Spanish pope from Valencia issued in May 1493, the inter caetera and the Eximinae
Devotionis, giving Spain the right over any lands new-discovered by Columbus
equivalent to the Portuguese territories found along the western coast of Africa
- The perceptive portuguese, realizing the Spanish pope's bias, did not agree to the
established demarcation line
- In 1494, the Treaty of Tordesillas was signed which partitioned the non-Christian
world into spheres of influence.

2. Under Imperial Spain
- It was followed by the papal bull of 1493 granting the New World to spain, while Africa
and India were reserved only for Portugal.
- The treaty shifted the demarcation line 370 leagues farther west, thus assigning Brazil to
Portugal
The Magellan (Magalhães) Expedition (1518-1521)
- Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese serving the Spanish Royalty, saw action for his
country in the East, first in India with Alfonso de Almeida in 1505, and with
distinction, in the fall of Malacca in 1511
- His original suggestion of reaching the Maluku (spice islands) by sailing westward was
rejected by his King
- After 7 years of service in the East, he turned to his home country and then fought in
the North American campaign against the Moors
- It was Ruy Falieeo, a brilliant cosmographer, who egged him to serve Spain as he was
then bot in the good graces of the Lisbon court
- In 1518, Falieeo convinced Charles V that he could find a shorter way to the Maluku by
sailing westward via the Americas
- As part of a reconnaissance voyage in 1511-1512, Magellan had visited the Spice Islands.
He received royal instruction to sail directly to the Maluku and to bring back a cargo od
priceless spices, thus began the greatest of all epics of human discovery sailing from
Sanlucar, Spain, in 1519 on board five very antiquated shops with a crew of 235 men
- He sailed around the southern tip of South America, across the vast Pacific Ocean after
98 days or sailing northwestward
- Magellan reached the Philippines on March 17,1521
- In Mactan, he was defeated and killed in battle in April 1521 as a consequence of his
intervention in a dispute between Lapulapu and Zula, chieftains of Mactan
- Only the smallest ship victoria completed the voyage back to Spain in 1522, arriving in
Seville, led by Juan Sebastian del Cano
- Mere 18 europeans and 4 malays survived, this leaving 170 of the original expedition
lost on the way
- It was through this tip that the Europeans first learned of the existence of the
Philippines. It also proved that the earth was round; established the vastness of Pacific
Ocean; proved that the East Indies could be reached by crossing Pacific and finally,
showed that the Americas was teally a land mass entirely separate from Asia
Maluku and the Philippines
- Three spanish expeditions followed Magellan's, this time sailing from Mexico, which
had become a Spanish colony– the Saavedra (1527-29), the Villalobos (1541-46), and
the most successful of all, the Legazpi expedition (1564)

3. Under Imperial Spain
- As a sequel to Magellan voyage, a large fleet of seven ships, with a crew of 450 under the
joint command of Garcia Jofre de Loaisa and Juan Sebastian del Cano, left La Coruña,
Spain, in July 1525, to claim Maluku for the Spanish crown
- By October 1526, the expedition reached Mindanao where they bartered rice, fruits,
chicken, and coconut wine with the Filipinos. Both commanders met death in the
Pacific and the ill-fated expedition, led by Hernando de la Torre, waited for necessary
assistance from Spain
- From Zihuatanejo, thebfirst voyage to the Pacific fitted from the Americas sailed on the
eve of All Saints Day in 1527 under the command of Alonso de Saavedra Cerón, with
the squadeon of three ships and a crew of 115 men
- Among his instructions included the discovery of the Mexican-Maluku route via the
Pacific Ocean and the release or search for, if any, survivors of the Magellan, Loaisa, and
Cabot (1526) expeditions
- Saadvera reached what is probably now known as Lanuza Bay, overlooking Tundug
(Surigao del Sur) by February 1528, following Magellan's sea route
- The spaniards reported that maluarbuco in the northeastern mindanao was rich in gold,
chickens, wild pigs, and coconuts; the women were described as mean
fair-complexioned
Treaty of Zaragoza (1529)
- King Charles V ceeded his alledged rights to Maluku to John III of Portugal for 350,000
ducats, not knowing that yhey rightfully belonged to the Portuguese area of
responsibility as provided for in the Treaty of Tordesillas, truly an evidence of the lack
of proper geographical knowledge on both parties
- A line of demarcation was drawn from pole to pole, this time at 297½ leages east of the
Maluku, which was agreed upon as the western limit of Spain's colonial ownership
- In the view of the treaty, the Spanish goal in the "West" was limited only to the
Philippines. Thus, for quite some time, the Hispano-Lusitanian rivalry for hegemony in
Southeast Asia would stop
Villalobos Expedition (1542-1546)
- six shipe and some 370 men, under the command od Ruy de Villalobos, departed from
Juan Gallego (Navidad), Mexico, in November 1542
- They reached the eastern coast of Mindano 1543
- In Sarangani, Villalobos essayed to set up a colony and even ordered his men tonplow
the land to plant corn- the first time on the Philippine soil
- Villalobos surrendered to the Portuguese at Amboina in the Maluku, where he
succumbed to a malignant fever

4. Under Imperial Spain
- The greatest contribution of Villalobos expedition was the naming of Tandaya or
Kandayw (Leyte) in 1544 as Las Phelipinas in honor of then crown-prince Philip II, by
Bernando de la Torre (Capitan Calabaza), commander of the ship, San Juan de Letran
Legazpi-Urdaneta Expedition (1564)
- 22 years since Villalobod set sail from the same port of Juan Gallego, four vessels of
about 350 men sailed for the Philippines in 1564
- By February 1565, Legazpi reached Cebu and contracted blood compacts with Si
Katunaw and Si Gala at Bohol
- In April of the same year, Villa de San Miguel, later changed to Ciudad del Santissimo
Nombre de Jesus after the discovered Santo Niño of Cebu, become "the first Spanish
town established in the Archipelago" and the pioneer permanent settlement in the
Philippines
- Legazpi was specifically instructed to bring back to Mexico samples of
Philippine-grown spices; to discover the return route to Mexico; and to abide by the
1529 Zaragoza treaty not to proceed to Maluku
- Fr. Andres de Urdanete, Legazpi's chief pilot, whose expertise of the seasonal winds he
had acquired while with the Loaisa expedition, discovered the "Urdaneta Passage" on his
return to Navidad via the Pacific
- This unique sea lane was subsequently used by the Manila-Acapulco galleons until the
nineteenth century
The Making of the Spanish "Indio"
- It was easy for Miguel Lopez de Legazpi who was granted by King Philip II, the peerless
and single title of "Adelantado de Filipinas" to accomplish an almost "bloodless"
conquest of the Philippines considering its physical and human geography
- Filipino society split into numerous disunified barangay units, it was impossible to put
up an effective armed resistance against the well-equipped and preparee conquistadores
- Not only did the Sword help in the pacification of the indios, but above all, the Cross,
represented by the different regular missions that came from 1565 to 1606, also helped
to mold the natives in the Hispanic image
- "En cada fraile tenía el rey en Filipinas un capitan general y un ejército entero" ("In each
friar in the Philippines they had a captain and a whole army"), as one Mexican viceroy
put it
- With the permanent colonization by Legazpi,the indios lost the freedom they earlier
enjoyed

5. Under Imperial Spain
Political Institutions
- The hierarchical political set-up of the Philippines during the Spanish regime may be
seen in the political institutions established by the colonial power
- From 1565 to 1821, the Philippines was a captaincy-general administered by the
Spanish king through the viceroyalty of Nueva España (Mexico)
- All spanish possessions were governed by the Real y Supremo Consejo de las Indias
(Royal and Supreme Council of the Indies) established in 1524 by Charles V
- Bureaucracy may be divided into levels of administration, from the central or national,
provincial, city, municipal, and barrio levels
- On the national level with its seat of power in Manila (intramuros), the King, through
the Consejo de las Indias, governed through his sole spokesman and representative in
the Philippines, the governor y capitan-general
- As captain-general of the colony, the gobernador-general was commander-in-chief of the
army and the navy
- He was also president of the real audiencia (supreme court), he had the power over
ecclesiastical appointments in the church and even the right to supervise mission work
- On the provincial level heading the alcadia (previously the encomienda), provincia or
hukuman (used by Bonifacio’s Katipunan, and latter called lalawigan) was the alcade
mayor (provincial governor) for the pacified provinces and districts
The Residencia (1501-1799) and the Visita (1499-c18th century)
- To check the abuse of power of royal officials, two ancient Castilian institutions, the
residencia and the visita, were transplanted into Philippine soil
- The residencia, dating back to the fifteenth century in Spain, was first resorted to in the
Indies (Spanish possessions in Amerisia including the Philippines) in 1501
- Residencia was the judicial review of a residenciado (one judged) conducted at the end
of his term of office, supervised publicly by a juez de residencia
- The visita differed in that it was conducted clandestinely by a visitador-general sent
from Spain and might occur any time within the official’s term, without any previous
notice
- Visitas may be specific or general
- Specific visita meant an investigation of a single official or a province
- General visita mean an investigation of the whole viceroyalty like Mexico or
captaincy-general like the Philippines
- First applied in the Indies in 1499, the visita had the same objectives as the residencia,
that is, to ensure faithful and efficient service on the part of government authorities

6. Under Imperial Spain
The Filipino Bureaucrats
- On the municipal level, the title governor or gobernadorcillo (later replaced by the
capitan municipal in 1894) headed the pueblo or municipio
- Any Filipino or Chinese mestizo, 25 years old, literate in oral and written
Spanish, and who had been a cabeza de barangay for four years could be a
gobernadorcillo
- This was the highest government position a Filipino could attain during the
Spanish Regime, and together with the parish priest, his role was considered
significant in a town
- Among his administrative duties was preparation of the padron (tribute list),
recruitment and distribution of men for the draft labor, communal public work
(as in the construction and repair of minor bridges) and the quinto (military
conscription), poster clerk, judge in civil suits involving PhP 44.00 or less
- He intervened in all administrative cases pertaining to his town: lands, justice,
finance, and the armed forces
- Gobernadorcillo was assisted by three supernumeraries or inspectors (tenientes
de justicia), constables (alguaciles); four tenente’s segundos; lieutenants of
districts (tenientes de barrio), and a secretary (directorcillo)
- Barrio government rested on the cabeza de barangay whose main role was a tax and
contributions collector for the gobernadorcillo
- they are exempted from taxation
- It was Philip II who conferred upon the barangay chiefs the title of cabezas de
barangay to ‘show them good treatment and entrust them,in our name, with
the government of the indians, of whom they were formerly the lords’
- Just like gobernadorcillo, he was responsible for peace and order in his own
barrio and recruited polistas for communal public works
- The manual del cabeza de barangay (1874) required literacy in Spanish, good
moral character, and property-ownership as qualifications for cabezas who
served for three year terms
- By the mid-19th century, whose who served for 25 years were exempted from
polo y servicio
The Amalgamation of Church and State
- It was in the exercise of political and economic powers if the Spanish clergy that we can
perceive very clearly the disunity between the church and state
- The distinguishing features such as church meddling in civil government and press
censorship were succintly pointed out by Filipino laborantes (reformers) as well as
revolutionarios in 19th century

7. Under Imperial Spain
- The separation of church and state become one of the outstanding innovations of the
Malolos Constitution in 1898
- The first and only open anti-friar demonstration against the intolerable church abuses
took place in Manila on march 1, 1888, led by Doroteo Cortes, aided secretly by
Marcelo H. Del Pilar and Jose Ramos Ishikawa
- The high influence of the Church on the State was exposed by Filipinos, among them
Marcelo H. Del Pilar who derisively called the situation in the Philippines la soberania
monacal (monastic supremacy) or frailocracia (friarocracy), because the Spanish friars
or monastic orders ruled supreme, even over governmental matters
- In the national level, the influence was exercised through the vast networks of parishes
- By the end of the Spanish regime, there were 967 regulars (priests who belonged to a
religious order) manning dioceses in the Philippines, whereas only 675 secular (priests
who did not belong to any religious order) administered parishes in 1896-98.
Reference:
Agoncillo, Teodoro A. (1990). Reprinted 2012. History of the Filipino People. Eighth
Edition. C&E Publishing, Inc.: Quezon City.