Spanish Colony 1565 - 1898

Ferdinand Magellan set out from Spain in 1519 on the first voyage to circumnavigate the globe
with five ships and a complement of 264 crew. Three years later in 1522, only the one ship, the Victoria,
returned to Spain with 18 men.

The Philippines were the death of Magellan. The expedition sighted the island of Samar on
March 16, 1521. Magellan was welcomed by two Rajas, Kolambu and Siagu. He named the islands the
Archipelago of San Lazaro, erected a cross and claimed the lands for Spain. The friendly Rajas took
Magellan to Cebu to meet Raja Humabon. Humabon and 800 Cebuanos were baptized as Christians.
Magellan agreed to help Raja Humabon put down Lapu-Lapu, a rebellious datu on the nearby island of
Mactan. In a battle between Spanish soldiers and Lapu-Lapu's warriors, Magellan was killed on April 27,
1521.

Disputes over women caused relations between Raja Humabon and the remaining Spaniards to
deteriorate. The Cebuanos killed 27 Spaniards in a skirmish and the Spaniards, deciding to resume their
explorations, departed Cebu.

For all its losses, the voyage was a huge financial success. The Victoria's 26 ton cargo of cloves
sold for 41,000 ducats. This returned the 20,000 ducats the venture had cost plus a 105 percent profit.
Four more expeditions followed between 1525 and 1542. The commander of the fourth expedition, Ruy
Lopez de Villalobos, named the islands after Philip, heir to the Spanish throne (r. Philip II 1556-1598).

The Philippines was not formally organized as a Spanish colony until 1565 when Philip II
appointed Miguel Lopez de Legazpi the first Governor-General. Legazpi selected Manila for the capital of
the colony in 1571 because of its fine natural harbour and the rich lands surrounding the city that could
supply it with produce.

The Spanish did not develop the trade potential of the Philippine's agricultural or mineral
resources. The colony was administered from Mexico and its commerce centered on the galleon trade
between Canton and Acapulco in which Manila functioned secondarily as an entrepot. Smaller Chinese
junks brought silk and porcelain from Canton to Manila where the cargoes were re-loaded on galleons
bound for Acapulco and the Spanish colonies in the Americas. The Chinese goods were paid for in
Mexican silver.

Spanish rule had two lasting effects on Philippine society; the near universal conversion of the
population to Roman Catholicism and the creation of a landed elite. Although under the direct order of
Philip II that the conversion of the Philippines to Christianity was not to be accomplished by force, the
monastic orders of the Augustinians, Dominicans, Franciscans, Recollects and Jesuits set to their
missionary duties with purpose. Unable to extirpate the indigenous pagan beliefs by coercion and fear,
Philippine Catholicism incorporates a deep substrate of native customs and ritual.

While the missionaries spread through the colony to found their parishes and estates in the
barangays, the officials of the civil administration preferred to stay in Manila and govern indirectly
through the traditional barangay datu or village chief. Although the traditional kinship organization of
the barangay had maintained the communal use of land, the Spanish governors brought with them their
feudal notions of land tenure with "encomienderos" and subordinate vassals. The traditional village
chiefs became a class of landed nobility wielding considerable local authority. The creation of a
priviledged landed-holding elite on whom most of the rural population was dependent as landless
tenants introduced a class division in Philippine society that has been the perennial source of social
discontent and political strife ever since.

In most villages, the priest and the local "principale" or "notable" represented between them
Spanish authority. The "friarocracy" of the religious orders and the oligarchy of the landholders were the
twin pillars of colonial society whose main interests were in keeping their positions of authority and
priviledge.

The Spanish hold on the Philippines first began to weaken in 1762 when the British briefly
captured Manila during the Seven Years' War. In support of the British invasion, the long persecuted
Chinese merchant community rose in revolt against the Spanish authority. The Treaty of Paris returned
Manila to Spain at the end of the War but with increasing diversion of the China trade to Britain and,
even more importantly, with an irretrievable loss of prestige and respect in the eyes of its Filipino
subjects.

Spain had governed the colony for two hundred years in almost complete isolation from the
outside world. The royal monopolies prohibited foreign ships from trading in the Philippines. After the
Seven Years' War, in collusion with local merchants and officials, foreign ships and merchants could ever
more easily circumvent the monopolies and enter the Philippine trade.

The colonial government had always operated at a financial loss that was sustained by subsidies
from the galleon trade with Mexico. Increased competition with foreign traders finally brought the
galleon trade with Acapulco to an end in 1815. After its recognition of Mexican independence in 1821,
Spain was forced to govern the colony directly from Madrid and to find new sources of revenue to pay
for the colonial administration.