Manila Galleon Research Articles

When the barbarians came by sea: hunting and alienism in entangled Sino-Japanese visual cultures, 1550–1750

This article places a hunting screen, now in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, in the longue durée of intricate intra-Asian visual entanglements to elaborate on a ‘pathos formula’ that migrated across vast stretches of time and space. It proposes that a wide array of Chinese and Japanese paintings, screens, and porcelain objects produced between 1550 and 1750 followed established formulas of picturing foreign tropes that stereotypically viewed the non-Han and non-Japanese peoples as ‘barbarians.’ Historically, the northern nomadic peoples were depicted as powerful yet savage horse riders skilled in hunting and equestrian sports. To illuminate the afterlives of this shared East Asian visual legacy, key discussions include imitations of Southern Song paintings on hunting and the tragic fate of Wenji (a Chinese woman who returned to the Han empire after being captive for twelve years in the steppe), the Japanese Tartar screens, the gold-painted hunt screens produced in Macau for the galleon trade, and the carved lacquer screens manufactured along China’s southeast coast. Behind the pan-East Asian resurgence of this ‘pathos formula’, as this article suggests, three territorial and geopolitical shifts emerged as stimuli: Japan’s pursuit of overseas conquest, the rise of the Jurchens (and later, the Manchus), and the arrival of the maritime centuries in which the Europeans were predominantly engaged. The article concludes that the Amsterdam hunting screen was much more than a faithful representation of any specific event or collective, and followed a stereotypical view of the ‘Red-haired Barbarians’ (Dutch traders) who approached China by sea as nomads.

The Conflict Between the Manila Galleon Trade and the Mercantilism Policy of Spain

The purpose of this article is to delve into the rise and development of the Manila galleon trade between the 16th and 19th centuries and to focus on the deeper reasons for the limitations of Spanish control over this important trade route. The Manila galleon trade not only connected Manila in the Philippines with Acapulco, Mexico but also established economic ties between China and Spanish America, which used Manila as a transit point. In the entire trade, Spain, as a nominal trade monopolist, appears to be unable to effectively control this trade. Research suggests that this is mainly attributed to Spain's directional errors in implementing mercantilist policies in its colonies, which contradicted the principles of free trade that had developed in Manila's sailing trade during the first thirty years. Under the guidance of mercantilism, Spain excessively pursued gold and silver wealth while neglecting the overall development of the colonial economy, resulting in a serious mismatch between domestic and colonial production and actual demand. This policy orientation not only limited the growth potential of colonial economies but also weakened Spain's competitive position in global trade.

AN EARLY CONSUMER REVOLUTION IN HISPANIC AMERICA? CONSUMPTION OF ASIAN GOODS BY THE COMMONERS IN 18TH-CENTURY MEXICO

ABSTRACTWas there an early consumer revolution in Hispanic America? This article presents varied evidence supporting an affirmative answer to this question, especially regarding the case of New Spain. The inauguration of the Manilla Galleon trade route across the Pacific Ocean in 1565 was decisive in this respect. It made it possible that Asian goods (more or less finished silk and cotton textiles, porcelain, lacquerware, ivory religious images, furniture and spices, mainly) experienced an early diffusion throughout New Spain after arriving in Acapulco. This innovation in consumption patterns was adopted first by the elites, not much later, by the intermediate classes and, rather soon than not, by the commoners. Primary (i.e. Avalúos of the galleons' cargo) and secondary sources permit quantitatively exploring the possibilities of consumption of Asian goods by unprivileged segments of New Spain's population. We find that a non-negligible number of those goods were accessible to Mexico City labourers. Thus, it may be inferred that upper segments of society accessed it earlier and more easily. Therefore, New Spain should be included in any global narrative of the changes in consumption during the Early Modern Era.

Newborn Hearing Screening and Beyond: A Continuing Journey in the Philippines

Newborn Hearing Screening and Beyond: A Continuing Journey in the Philippines

The Remains of a Manila Galleon Compass: 16th-Century Nautical Material Culture

This article reveals the recovery of a compass balance from a Manila galleon that was wrecked in the 16th century off the coast of Baja California, Mexico, and discusses the possibility that it was made in Spain. Based on an analysis of navigation treaties, written in the context of the training of pilots by the Casa de Contratación (House of Trade), it is revealed in detail how nautical compasses were manufactured in Spain during that period. As a result of the review of the nautical literature of that century, it is concluded that the compass was the most important nautical instrument on board and that its simple design allowed any malfunction to be resolved during the journey. In addition, the authors affirm that the design of this compass was very similar to those suggested in the European navigation traditions of the 16th century, and thus, it seems quite possible that the compass rocker found in Baja California was made in the Hispanic world.

Conquering the Pacific: An Unknown Mariner and the Final Great Voyage of the Age of Discovery

Conquering the Pacific: An Unknown Mariner and the Final Great Voyage of the Age of Discovery

The Art of Barniz de Pasto and Its Appropriation of Other Cultures

This study analyzes the techniques and decorative motifs of several works made using barniz de Pasto, highlighting their characteristics in order to establish comparisons with artistic phenomena of Asia and Europe. A possible link can be observed between barniz de Pasto and the Namban and Pictorial style Japanese export lacquer works of the 17th and 18th centuries. A search for similarity is justified by the documentary and material evidence of Japanese works created in these styles being transported from Japan to the Viceroyalty of New Spain by Manila galleons via the trade route between Acapulco and Callao. Additionally, traces of the Spanish culture have been recognized in barniz de Pasto. For example, printed images that circulated in the Viceroyalty of Peru have been observed on a coffer. This appropriation, also observed in the mural painting of a Central Andean church, and the presence of the image of Amaru, a Quechua deity, on the same coffer, marks the Central Andes as one of the possible places where the practice of barniz de Pasto could have been established. All of this points to Central and South America’s great ability to appropriate foreign cultures and fuse them with their own during the viceregal period, as manifested in the art of barniz de Pasto.

Review: Cabotajes Novohispanos: Espacios y contactos marítimos en torno a la Nueva España, by Guadalupe Pinzón Ríos

Review: <i>Cabotajes Novohispanos: Espacios y contactos marítimos en torno a la Nueva España</i>, by Guadalupe Pinzón Ríos

The Collapse of Mercantilism: Anglo-Hispanic Trans-Pacific Ventures in Asia at the End of the Spanish Empire (1815–30)

Early modern connections between the Pacific shores of the Spanish Empire have been assessed in previous studies and yet, studies on the subsequent developments during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries are scant. This particularly applies to the consequences of the commercial developments at the end of the Manila Galleon and the collapse of the Spanish Empire in America. Through the analysis of the professional networks of Francisco Xavier de Ezpeleta, and Juan Nepomuceno Machado, which stretched from Asia to Mexico at the time, this paper proposes some preliminary conclusions about trans-Pacific links. It focuses on the study of networks and connections, and builds upon archival sources — mostly from the Jardine Matheson Archive, in Cambridge. In the transition from the eighteenth to the nineteenth centuries, actors who made up Hispanic trading networks in what remained of the crumbling Spanish Empire, reorganised to benefit from opportunities as mercantilist limitations came to an end. In so doing, by the 1820s, Hispanic traders allied with the forebears of the British firm of Jardine, Matheson &amp; Co., and controlled the resulting networks. This paper points to Hispanic trans-Pacific connections during the development of European private trade between East Asia and the Mexican Pacific. Ties between British and Hispanic merchants are key for the analysis of the opium trade and Western imperialism in East Asia, and the development of British commercial hegemony in Latin America in the nineteenth century.

Transpacific Exoticisms: Performing Asia Across the U.S. Southern Border

Transpacific Exoticisms:Performing Asia Across the U.S. Southern Border Rosanne A. Sia (bio) In 1951, Korean American soprano Florence Ahn stood center stage in an elegant gown at the Trocadero nightclub in Havana, Cuba (Figure 1). She gestured graciously toward the audience, soaking up their applause as she prepared to take her bow. Florence took her place among a group of Cuban rumba dancers costumed in polka-dot sleeves and long shiny dresses. An appreciative audience clad in firs and suits clapped from their seats at tables strewn with the remnants of drinks. The Cuban entertainment magazine Carteles wrote that Florence Ahn's arrival in Havana had been a triumph: "This Chinese girl came, saw, and conquered. She came to Cuba like a shining star."1 In the postwar period, Asian Americans traveled on nightclub circuits that took them across the southern border to perform amid the glitz and glamour of Cuban and Mexican cabaret culture. Many of them had first showcased their artistic talents and "oriental" beauty at famed Asian-themed nightclubs, such as the Forbidden City in San Francisco or the China Doll in New York City.2 They gained visibility during the early Cold War period when American policymakers, journalists, and cultural producers sought to demonstrate the promises of American racial democracy to audiences at home and abroad by promoting "desirable" images of race.3 This led to what Christina Klein has termed "Cold War Orientalism," a blossoming of American middlebrow entertainment about Asia, such as the musicals and films Flower Drum Song, South Pacific, and A Many Splendored Thing.4 As Klein has argued, this middlebrow [End Page 151] culture served the pedagogical function of teaching white Americans "correct" feelings of sympathy toward Asians and Asian Americans, but it also served to conceal war and violence across the Pacific. Along with films and musicals, American GIs brought home a taste for live Asian-themed nightclub shows. This led to the growth of lively audiences in the U.S. South at a time when the region was expanding with the postwar growth of the American military, industry, and tourism. Asian Americans took their shows on the road to entertainment hubs down south. Their travels show how the U.S. South served as what Tara McPherson has called a "hinge point between the Americas."5 Asian American entertainers boarded ferries and planes between Miami, Florida, and Havana, Cuba, or took the bus between the small border towns of McAllen, Texas, and Reynosa, Tamaulipas, before heading to Monterrey and Mexico City. In turn, they criss-crossed entertainers of Asian descent traveling in the opposite direction. Asian Cuban and Asian Mexican entertainers formed part of the stream of Caribbean and Latin American artists moving across the border to cater to the American craze for tropical rumba and dancing Mexican señoritas. They brought with them Cuban fantasies of the national symbol of the mulata, a figure that officially incorporated Blackness and whiteness, but also carried erased histories of racial mixing with the Chinese in Cuba.6 Others brought with them Mexican fantasies of Asia that had origins in the sixteenth century Manila galleon trade, intimate transpacific ties subsequently denied because of Mexico's orientation toward the transatlantic.7 This article draws on archival and oral history research to explore how four entertainers of Asian and mixed-Asian descent, Florence Ahn, Estela, Jadin Wong, and Su Muy Key, navigated the multiple racial and gendered imaginaries of the transpacific that circulated throughout the U.S. South, Mexico, and Cuba in the postwar era. They formed part of a much larger circulation of performers of Asian descent in this interconnected region. I argue that performers of Asian descent occupied culturally and racially ambiguous positions that allowed them to embody multiple transpacific fantasies in nightclub performances that experimented with cultural mixing. This included incorporating new genres global in scope, such as zarzuela, rumba, modern dance, and Mexican revista, developed through cross-cultural encounters during the entertainers' travels. In doing so, they disturbed the Black and white binary in the U.S. South as well as the erasure of the long-standing Asian presence within Latin America and the Caribbean; in some cases, they...

The Wreck of the Galleon San Francisco (1609): Anatomy of a Maritime Disaster in the Manila-Acapulco Trade Route

Abstract The Manila galleon San Francisco sank off the coast of Japan in 1609 after almost two months of sailing through storms and hurricanes that damaged the ship to the point that it was carrying more than two metres of water in its hold. This article provides an account of the final journey of San Francisco according to primary and secondary sources. It also proposes a set of theoretical dimensions for the galleon based on its tonnage, contemporary vessels of similar tonnages, hull ratios provided in late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century shipbuilding treatises and ordinances, and archaeological parallels. In addition, the authors estimate possible distances from the wreck of the galleon to the shore, using the distances provided in accounts of wreck and contemporary marine leagues, and the theoretical draft of the vessel.

Discovery of Timbers of Oregon’s Manila Galleon and New Light on the Early Beeswax Controversy

This Research Note reports on two items, one archaeological and one historical, on Oregon’s Manila galleon. The first item summarizes the find of timbers on the north Oregon coast, which initial testing indicates date from the time of the Santo Cristo de Burgos, the Manila galleon thought to have wrecked in the area in 1693-94. The second item traces the controversy that raged in the early 20th century over the masses of wax found in the Nehalem Spit area. There was heated disagreement between those who thought it was beeswax, and therefore from a shipwreck, and those who thought it was ozokerite, a mineral wax indicative of possible presence of oil. This brief drama played out in lurid newspaper ads and an oil drilling outfit operating on Nehalem Spit.

The genetic legacy of the Manila galleon trade in Mexico.

The population of Mexico has a considerable genetic substructure due to both its pre-Columbian diversity and due to genetic admixture from post-Columbian trans-oceanic migrations. The latter primarily originated in Europe and Africa, but also, to a lesser extent, in Asia. We analyze previously understudied genetic connections between Asia and Mexico to infer the timing and source of this genetic ancestry in Mexico. We identify the predominant origin within Southeast Asia—specifically western Indonesian and non-Negrito Filipino sources—and we date its arrival in Mexico to approximately 13 generations ago (1620 CE). This points to a genetic legacy from the seventeenth century Manila galleon trade between the colonial Spanish Philippines and the Pacific port of Acapulco. Indeed, within Mexico we observe the highest level of this trans-Pacific ancestry in Acapulco, located in the state of Guerrero. This colonial Spanish trade route from East Asia to Europe was centred on Mexico and appears in historical records, but its legacy has been largely ignored. Identities and stories were suppressed due to slavery, assimilation of the immigrants as ‘Indios’ and incomplete historical records. Here we characterize this understudied Mexican ancestry.This article is part of the theme issue ‘Celebrating 50 years since Lewontin's apportionment of human diversity’.

Symbolism and Expression of Performing Panata in the Philippines: An Ethnohistorical Analysis of Nuestro Padre Jesus Nazareno of Quiapo

This paper is about Catholicism in the Philippines, highlighting the events and objects of the popular devotion to the Black Christ Nazarene of Manila, popularly known as Nuestro Padre Jesus Nazareno of Quiapo or NPJN. What are the motivations of the devotees? How have the religious practices changed over time in Quiapo? This study also calls for more scholarly attention to the historical and religious connection between the Philippines and Mexico, so that through them we can better understand how Filipinos reimagined Baroque Catholicism. In addition to commercial goods, the Manila Galleon facilitated the first transpacific people-to-people exchange along with their ideas, and the transmission and transplantation of Catholicism to the Philippines. This study is both historical and ethnographic, using sources from the archives and research materials collected in the Philippines, Mexico, and Spain. Although the devotion to NPJN is central to the arguments of this paper, the discussion takes a broader consideration of Quiapo, a district of Manila as a shared space for performing the sacred vow or PSV, popularly known as panata. This analytical step is consistent with the main argument of this study, that consideration of the PSV particular to Jesus Christ is crucial to understanding the historical and religious connections and how popular Catholicism has changed in the Philippines.

Reseña de: Commentary to Tatiana Seijas’ review of The Atlantic World and the Manila Galleons: Circulation, Market, and Consumption of Asian Goods in the Spanish Empire

El presente texto es un comentario y réplica a la reseña escrita por Tatiana Seijas en New West Indian Guide (94, 2020) asobre el libro de José L. Gasch-Tomás titulado The Atlantic World and the Manila Galleons: Circulation, Market, and Consumption of Asian Goods in the Spanish Empire (Leiden, the Netherlands: Brill, 2019. 258 pp.).

The economics of the Manila Galleon

PurposeThis paper aims to offer a unified economic interpretation of the existing evidence on the Manila Galleon. It intends to be an introduction to the Manila Galleon for economists curious about long-term patterns in global trade, but who are not experts on economic history.Design/methodology/approachThe paper jointly presents quantitative and qualitative data to analyze in a critical way the existing work on the Manila Galleon. It proposes a conceptual model from the world-systems approach to reflect on the impact of this trade route. Evidence from two case studies, New Granada and Korea, accompany the model.FindingsThe paper finds that the Manila Galleon was only possible because of the temporary coincidence of a quite singular set of international circumstances and favorable local market conditions. The paper also finds that, despite its large effects on the global integration of silver markets, the Manila Galleon was a profoundly asymmetric activity that brought minor consequences to most of the world.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper shows the importance of additional studies providing systematic quantitative evidence on the Manila Galleon. The long tradition of an archival collection developed by historians offers a huge potential to this line of research. In addition, studies in regions different from Mexico, the Philippines, Spain and China would contribute to a better understanding of the Manila Galleon’s global consequences.Practical implicationsThis paper provides a series of reflections useful to think about the future challenges of global trade. These challenges require understanding the transformations that will come from profound technological change, massive reconfigurations of the geopolitical order and transitions in the long-term cycles of commodities. Because of their rare occurrence, these are forces hardly visible in recent history, making it necessary for the existence of long-term points of reference such as the Manila Galleon.Originality/valueThis paper brings together widespread evidence on the Manila Galleon and provides a unified interpretation of it. This opens the door for audiences who are not experts on the economic history of the period to discuss the topic, allowing them to reflect on its lessons for the modern world.

Recensão a] Etsuko Miyata, Portuguese Intervention in the Manila Galleon Trade. The Structure and Networks of Trade between Asia and America in the 16th and 17th Centuries as Revealed by Chinese Ceramics and Spanish Archives, Oxford, Archaeopress, 2016, 75 p., ISBN 978-1-78491-532-2

Recensão a] Etsuko Miyata, Portuguese Intervention in the Manila Galleon Trade. The Structure and Networks of Trade between Asia and America in the 16th and 17th Centuries as Revealed by Chinese Ceramics and Spanish Archives, Oxford, Archaeopress, 2016, 75 p., ISBN 978-1-78491-532-2

Chunming Wu, Roberto Junco and Miao Liu, Editors: Archaeology of Manila Galleon Seaports and Early Maritime Globalization

Chunming Wu, Roberto Junco and Miao Liu, Editors: Archaeology of Manila Galleon Seaports and Early Maritime Globalization

Isles of Passages: Transport geography perspective on Calayan and Lubang as gateways to the main Island of Luzon (Metal ages to early historical period, 500 BCE to CE 1600)

Archaeological works have tended to privilege the processes behind the rise and fall of ancient culture- centers (as defined by Wallerstein 2004 in World Systems Theory) while some have attempted to integrate more data on the changes that take place in strategic nodes or peripheries that ‘feed’ into these centers (Junker and Smith, 2017; Hendrickson et al., 2013). This paper tackles how social-historical transformations may have become an impetus in the waxing and waning of gateway/ gatekeeper locations using transport geography perspective. At the center of the case study are two strategic island nodes connecting to the main Island of Luzon- – Calayan and Lubang group. The paper attempts to demonstrate that due to social-historical factors specifically evolving trade, colonial assimilation, and technological diffusion, these key players have eventually taken a backseat in the transportation and communication network in this crucial passage to Island Southeast Asia. The crux of the argument lies on probative evidence that these islands possibly supported more inhabitants before the Spanish Contact period in the 16th c, using boat shaped burial complexes and ijang (garrison) complexes as proxy indicators. Aided by geomatics and remote sensing and geographic information systems (RS-GIS) algorithms including maximum likelihood classification, band maths as well as principal component analysis, the paper emphasizes the density of possible archaeological sites in both island locales as the proxy indicator to the pre-Contact period populations. The paper argues that the introduction of blue water maritime vessels with the opening of the Manila-Acapulco galleon trade (Wu, 2019; Dizon, 2004; Dizon, 2003; Schurz, 1985 on the Manila Galleon) contributed to the waning of the strategic importance of these island nodes with the final straw being the Spanish colonial administrations’ policy of depopulating these smaller islands and relocating them to their colonial- panoptic landscapes in Luzon. The role of the prevailing market situation as dictated by rapidly evolving scales of transactions from evanescent to more permanent markets (Canilao, 2020) may have also contributed to the emergent new status quo in these isles of passage.

The nexus of nationalism and internationalism: the journey of a “diplomat” after the galleons

After the galleons, Benito J. Legarda’s masterpiece on socioeconomic transformation after the galleon trade, has enriched our knowledge of the semi-open colonial economy in the 19th-century Philippine Islands, which witnessed the rise of nationalism at the end of that century. In this paper, I shed new light on the nature of the Ilustrados’ nationalism and their international activism by revisiting the life of the country’s “first diplomat”, Felipe Agoncillo, who battled in vain to achieve independence through a diplomatic channel. While class politics tends to be a focal point of the scholarly debate over the Ilustrados’ nationalism, this paper highlights the international dimensions of their advocacy. Agoncillo’s mission in the United States and Europe seems a reasonable option from our perspective, which has been shaped by the norm of modern diplomacy, but it was a risky adventure considering the overwhelming influence of imperialism. Why did Agoncillo conclude they had to send a mission? What kinds of negotiation strategies did they have? Combining Legarda’s global insights on the Philippines’ colonial economy with Agoncillo’s ideational and actual travel, this paper reveals how Philippine nationalism and internationalism created a nexus whose legacy exists in current Philippine diplomacy, one of whose achievements was the award of the arbitration case over the South China Sea in 2016.