Prepared by Jeroen Hellingman and the Distributed Proofreaders Team
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898
explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands andtheir peoples, their history and records of the catholic missions,as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing thepolitical, economic, commercial and religious conditions of thoseislands from their earliest relations with European nations to theclose of the nineteenth century
Edited and annotated by Emma Helen Blair and James Alexander Robertsonwith historical introduction and additional notes by Edward GaylordBourne.
Editorial Announcement
The Editors desire to announce to their readers an importantmodification in the scope and contents of this work. As originallyplanned and hitherto announced, the series was intended to furnishthe original sources, printed and documentary, for the historyof the Philippine Islands only to the beginning of the nineteenthcentury. To most of our readers, the reasons for this are obvious:the fact that the classic period of Philippine history is thus bounded;the comparative rarity and inaccessibility of most material therein tothe general public; the vast extent of the field covered by Philippinehistory, and the necessary limitations of space imposed upon theselection of material for this work; the closing of foreign archivesto all investigators after an early date in the nineteenth century;and the greater difficulty, in that later period, of securing a properhistorical perspective. But so many and urgent requests have come tous, from subscribers and reviewers, for such extension of this seriesas shall cover the entire period of Spanish domination, that we havedecided to modify the former plan in the manner here briefly indicated.
It is our purpose not to exceed the number of volumes alreadyannounced, fifty-five. We are able to do this because in our originalplan, to avoid a subsequent increase in the number of volumes,a certain amount of space was purposely left for possible futurechanges as a result of later investigations to be made in foreignarchives, or on account of the necessary excision of extraneous orirrelevant matter from the printed works which are to be presentedin this series. The new title will be "The Philippine Islands:1493-1898." The early and especially important history of theislands will be covered as fully as before. For the history ofthe nineteenth century, we will present various important decrees,reports, and other official documents; and provide a clear, careful,and impartial synopsis of some of the best historical matter extant,down to the close of the Spanish régime. Throughout the series willbe used, as has been done from the beginning, all the best materialavailable—historical, descriptive, and statistical—for referenceand annotation. With the copious and carefully-prepared bibliographyof Philippine historical literature, and the full analytical index,which will close the series; the broad and representative character ofthe material selected throughout; and the impartial and non-sectarianattitude maintained, the Editors trust that this change will stillfurther enable scholars, historical writers, and general readersalike to study, with reliable and satisfactory material, the historyof the Philippine Islands from their first discovery by Europeans tothe close of the Spanish régime, and incidentally the history of theentire Orient.
Contents of Volume VI
Preface … 13
Documents of 158