Of Two-Tailed Lizards: Spells, Folk-Knowledge, and Navigating Manila, 1620–1650

Abstract

Abstract Although seventeenth-century Manila has been anointed the birthplace of global trade and its diversity is well-established, how individuals navigated that milieu is only recently coming to light. To elucidate how various persons experienced Manila, this article assembles and analyzes nearly one hundred denunciations of sorcery (hechicería) made to the Philippine branch of the Inquisition between ca. 1620 and 1650. The hexes and spells sold in this period promised material and physical benefits. Individuals purchased or learned about spells primarily from Indigenous Philippine peoples, but also from Manila’s Moluccan, Indian, and Japanese residents who either imitated Philippine hexes or marketed their own, distinct spells. This exchange took place outside Manila’s city walls, in the sprawling city of Extramuros, where frequent interactions between diverse peoples facilitated exchange and even contributed to the emergence of novel, hybridized hexes mixing Catholic invocations and Philippine rituals. Cumulatively, what these denunciations of a minor crime capture is the everyday interactions between diverse peoples that defined Manila. In the process, they establish how residents experienced and navigated the world’s first global city.