Doctrina Christiana Part 3

Under the care of Benavides and Cobo the mission flourished, and the two fathers became increasingly proficient in the Chinese language. When the provincial Juan de Castro began making preparations for an inspection tour of his Chinese vicariate in 1590, he chose as his companion Miguel de Benavides. The account of the events leading up to this expedition is given in the already quoted letter of Salazar on the Chinese:

"Of the Dominican religious who came to these islands, four are engaged in ministering to the Sangleys. Two of these four officiate in the Church of San Gabriel, which, together with the house where the religious live, stands close to the Parian. Another church with its house is on the promontory of Baybay, near Tondo--which a river divides, separating it from Manila. Two of the four have learned the language of the Sangleys so well, and one of these two how to write also (which is the most difficult part of the language), that the Sangleys wonder at their knowledge.... After due consideration of the matter, the Dominican fathers and myself decided that it was necessary to go to China.... Thus we decided upon the departure, sending at present no more than two religious: Fray Miguel de Benavides, who was the first to learn the language of the Sangleys; and Father Juan de Castro, who came as vicar of the religious and who was made provincial here. We preferred these two, as one is well acquainted with the language, and the other is much loved and esteemed by the Sangleys on account of his venerable gray locks and blessed old age; and we know that in that land old people are much respected and revered." [108]

They sailed on May 22, 1590, but Juan de Castro before he left appointed Cobo acting superior of the province with full authority during his absence, and in the latter's place as head of the Chinese mission sent Juan de San Pedro Martyr.

There is no doubt but that at this time Benavides and Cobo were the two outstanding Chinese linguists among the Spaniards in the Philippines. To Benavides has been attributed [109] a Chinese dictionary, and Schilling [110] uses the already quoted letter of Cobo to prove that he also wrote a Doctrina in Chinese, but, granting that such works were written by him, there is no evidence that they were written in Chinese characters, and not in Chinese transliterated into roman letters. The available evidence points to the fact that Cobo was the only one who could then write in Chinese characters. Salazar in his above quoted letter had said that "one of these two [have learned] how to write also," and in the same letter he continued, "Fray Juan Cobo, the Dominican religious--who, as I have said before, knows the language of the Sangleys and their writing, and who is most esteemed by them--is sending to Your Majesty a book, one of a number brought to him from China." [111] Further witness to Cobo's amazing knowledge of Chinese writing is given by Aduarte:

"He knew three thousand Chinese characters, each different from all the rest, for the Chinese have no definite number of letters nor alphabet.... He translated a number [of Chinese books]; for like those of Seneca, though they are the work of heathens, they contain many profound sayings like ours. He taught astrology to some of them whom he found capable of learning; and to bring them by all means to their salvation also taught them some trades that are necessary among Spaniards, but which, not being used by the Chinese, they did not know--such as painting images, binding books, cutting and sewing clothes, and such things--doing all to win men to G.o.d." [112]

Finally, as a more definite proof that Cobo could have been the author of the Chinese Doctrina of 1593, we have the record [113] of a _Catecismo de la Doctrina Cristiana en Lengua China_ written by him, as well as many other works in Chinese.

In May 1590, then, the most accomplished Sinologist yet to work in the Philippines was in charge of the Dominican province. "His first act," wrote Aduarte, "was to strengthen the ministry to the Chinese by appointing to it Father Domingo de Nieva, a priest of great virtue and very able--which was tremendously important there--and one who best mastered that language, as well as that of the Indians in which he had had experience; and he worked in both of them, and wrote much to the great advantage of those who came after him." [114] It is surprising that no previous writer has emphasized the presence of Domingo de Nieva, whose proficiency in Tagalog we have already noted, at San Gabriel during the years when the printing of the Doctrinas must have been planned and executed. His works are cited by Fernandez, [115] and after giving a summary of his career, Aduarte added:

"He wrote much in the language of the Indians and other things in the language of the Chinese for whom he had printed in their language and characters a memorial upon the Christian life, with other brief tracts of prayer and meditation, in preparation for the holy sacraments, of confession and the sacred communion. He was an enemy of sloth, and so worked much in Chinese, in which he wrote a practically new grammar of the Chinese language, a vocabulary, a manual of confession and many sermons, in order that those who had to learn this language might find it less difficult." [116]

Medina [117] records these various works as Manila imprints of unknown date, and to this indefinite information about them we can add nothing positive. However, it is apparent that some time before 1606, when Nieva died on his way to Mexico, he had had books printed, and since they were in Chinese they must have been printed from wood-blocks, for at that early date it would have been impossible to have cast the number of characters necessary to print in Chinese with movable type.

With Nieva was Maldonado, or San Pedro Martyr. He had been one of the first a.s.sociates of Benavides in the first Chinese mission at Baybay, but after the arrival of Cobo he had been sent by order of the first chapter to Pangasinan. When Cobo was appointed acting provincial San Pedro Martyr was again a.s.signed to the Chinese ministry. He had learned Tagalog, and after his return to the Parian "he learned more words of the Chinese language than any other member of the order, though he was not successful with the p.r.o.nunciation." [118]

On May 31, 1592, the Governor received a letter from the Emperor of j.a.pan demanding that an amba.s.sador be sent to offer him the fealty of the Philippines. Juan Cobo, as the best speaker of Chinese, was chosen to represent the Spaniards, and he left Manila on July 29, 1592. After successfully convincing the j.a.panese Emperor of the amity of the Spaniards, he left to come back to Manila, but his ship was wrecked in November on the coast of Formosa, and there Cobo was killed by hostile natives. Meanwhile Benavides had gone back to Spain with Bishop Salazar in 1591, and did not return to the Philippines until after his appointment as Bishop of Nueva Segovia in 1595.

That left as the only two remaining experts in the Chinese language, Domingo de Nieva and Juan de San Pedro Martyr, both of whom were at San Gabriel in 1592. _Moreover, both of them knew Chinese and Tagalog._ A text in Tagalog was available, based on the Talavera-Plasencia-Oliver model, which had circulated freely, and this, we believe, was further edited--hence the "corrected by the religious of the orders"--by these two Dominicans. In their editorial work they may have been helped by Juan de la Cruz, who, we have noted, was sent to Bataan in 1588, there learned Tagalog, and "succeeded so perfectly with it that Father Fr. Francisco San Joseph, who was afterwards the best linguist there, profited by the papers and labors of P. Fr. Juan de la Cruz." [119]

Juan de Oliver, the pioneer Franciscan Tagalist was still living and available for consultation, and the polylingual Jesuit, Francisco Almerique, also was in Manila at the time. A Chinese text had been written by Juan Cobo, and both Nieva and San Pedro Martyr were capable of preparing this for publication, again possibly aided by Almerique, and also Diego Munoz, if as an Augustinian he had been willing to cooperate with the Dominicans. Nothing remained to be done but have the blocks cut and the impressions pulled.

THE PRINTING OF THE BOOKS

The stage was set for the production of the Doctrinas. That there were Chinese xylographic models upon which the books could be based is evidenced by the account of Mendoza of the considerable number of Chinese books brought to Manila by Martin de Rada as early as 1575. A more likely model was a bilingual text in Spanish and Chinese which Cobo describes in his letter of July 13, 1589, where speaking of the Jesuits in China he says:

"Moreover the Father of the Company who was in China wrote and printed in Chinese letters a whole book of the unity of G.o.d, the creation of the world, and the commandments explained; and in this book has gotten as far as the incarnation of the Son of G.o.d. Concerning this I am not speaking of things heard, for I have it, and am thus certain of it, as of all the things that happened. How far I have progressed with the Chinese letters I shall say later. This book was printed in China in 1584. It circulates freely in China whence we have our copy, and because of the writing, contrary to what others have misleadingly said about the Chinese, they have done him no ill: from which it may be inferred that the lion is not so wild as they paint him." [120]

There is no direct evidence to support our belief that it was during the brief period after Castro returned, probably late in 1590, and relieved Cobo of his executive responsibilities, and June 1592 when he left for j.a.pan, that Cobo began intensive plans for the production of bilingual texts. His recorded interest in such books, his influence with the Chinese, his energy and his own linguistic apt.i.tude would naturally have stimulated him to undertake the task. Whether he actually began work on the blocks from which the books were printed, or merely suggested the feasibility of the idea, we do not know, but we feel sure that Juan Cobo was the father of the production of books in the Philippines.

There is no need here to go into the history of printing in China; the method used there and its antiquity have been fully described by others. [121] That there were Chinese in Manila who understood this age-old process would seem obvious from the reports of skilled craftsmen whose presence was noted by all the writers of the period. We have already quoted a reference to Juan Cobo's teaching them European trades, and Salazar in his already cited letter speaks of them further:

"They are so skillful and clever, that, as soon as they see any object made by a Spanish workman, they reproduce it with exactness. What arouses my wonder most is, that when I arrived no Sangley knew how to paint anything; but now they have so perfected themselves in this art that they have produced marvelous works with both the brush and the chisel.... What has pleased all of us here has been the arrival of a bookbinder from Mexico. He brought books with him, set up a bindery, and hired a Sangley who had offered his services to him. The Sangley secretly, and without his master noticing it, watched how the latter bound books, and lo, in less than [lacuna in MS.] he left the house, saying that he wished to serve him no longer, and set up a similar shop." [122]

To turn over a ma.n.u.script copy of a book to a Chinaman who had already some familiarity with the production of books in China, or who with a given text could carve the blocks according to tradition, was then not a matter of great difficulty. There were Chinese books which showed what the result would be; there were Spanish books, definitely some from Mexico, which provided samples of European characters and format.

Who cut the blocks--that is exactly what Chinaman--we do not know, nor do we know who handled the presswork, but it is logical to a.s.sume that the whole process took place under the supervision of the fathers of San Gabriel, Juan Cobo if work had begun before 1592, and certainly Nieva and San Pedro Martyr. One further aide may have been the lay brother, Pedro Rodriguez, who had been sent to San Gabriel with Nieva, and who was a handyman or skilled mechanic, for Aduarte credits him with rebuilding and restoring the hospital.

In speaking of the book printed for Blancas de San Jose, Aduarte said that the printing had been done by "a Chinaman, a good Christian,"

[123] but in this particular account he does not give the Chinaman's name. Yet, where he describes the founding of a second church of San Gabriel in Binondo, sometime after March 28, 1594 [124] and before June 15, 1596 when it was admitted to the chapter, he tells in some detail of printing done by Juan de Vera. [125]

"There have been in this town [Binondo, then called Minondoc]

many Chinese of very exemplary lives. Juan de Vera was not only a very devout man, and one much given to prayer, but a man who caused all his household to be the same. He always heard ma.s.s, and was very regular in his attendance at church. He adorned the church most handsomely with hangings and paintings, because he understood this art. He also, thinking only of the great results to be attained by means of holy and devout books, gave himself to the great labor necessary to establish printing in this country, where there was no journeyman who could show him the way, or give him an account of the manner of printing in Europe, which is very different from the manner of printing followed in his own country of China. The Lord aided his pious intentions, and he gave to this undertaking not only continued and excessive labor, but all the forces of his mind, which were great. In spite of the difficulties, he attained that which he desired, and was the first printer in these islands; and this not from avarice--for he gained much more in his business as a merchant, and readily gave up his profit--but merely to do service to the Lord and this good to the souls of the natives." [126]

It is interesting to note that this narrative, which is in substance similar to that about the books of Blancas de San Jose, nowhere mentions the name of the priest in connection with Vera. It is probable that Juan de Vera was, as Retana believed, the first typographer, and it may be that he also printed the Doctrinas of 1593. It is impossible to say with certainty, but it is not too fanciful to suppose that Juan de Vera tried xylographic printing under the supervision of Nieva and San Pedro Martyr, and after some experimenting achieved typography in the time of Blancas de San Jose.

Since we have here dealt with a volume printed entirely from wood-blocks it does not seem necessary to discuss in detail the subsequent typographical books. However, just as this goes to press, a copy of the _Ordinationes Generales prouintiae Sanctissimi Rosarij Philippinarum_, [127] printed at Binondo by Juan de Vera in 1604, has been discovered, and also presented by Mr. Rosenwald to the Library of Congress. This is the volume described by Remesal [128]

as being printed "in as fine characters and as correctly as if in Rome or Lyon." No copy of the book had been described since his day, although Medina [129] and Retana [130] both listed it from references which probably derived from Remesal. Its discovery--almost unbelievable coming so close on the heels of that of the Doctrina--helps to close the gap between the latter and the two Bataan imprints [131] of 1610, the _Arte y Reglas de la Lengva Tagala_ and the _Librong Pagaaralan nang manga Tagalog nang uicang Castilla_.

The full story of the early typographical products of the Philippines must wait upon another occasion, for the questions posed by the scanty records and the handful of surviving books are extremely knotty. Where did the type come from? Medina suggested it was imported from Macao; Retana believed it to have been cut in the Philippines. Fernandez said that the first works of Blancas de San Jose were printed at Bataan and the two 1610 books have that place of printing, yet in 1604 the _Ordinationes_ issued from Binondo. Remesal wrote that this book was printed by Francisco de Vera, and the book itself bears the name of Juan. Indeed, the history of the early typographers and the output of their presses, as it has so far been written, presents many problems, but they are problems which we feel are outside the scope of this study.

To summarize what we have learned of the earliest printing in the Philippines: we have the possibility, but not a likely one, that an _Arte_ by Juan de Quinones was printed xylographically in 1581; we know that in the first half of the year 1593 two Doctrinas were printed xylographically--although we have no way of telling which came first--one in Tagalog from the Talavera-Plasencia-Oliver text, and one in Chinese written by Juan Cobo, both edited and printed under the supervision of Domingo de Nieva and Juan de San Pedro Martyr; we surmise that between 1593 and 1602 other works were also printed xylographically, such as the small tracts of Juan de Villanueva and some of the books of Blancas de San Jose, Nieva and others; and in 1602 was printed by Juan de Vera, in all likelihood from movable type, the book of Our Lady of the Rosary by Blancas de San Jose. The known facts are not many, and we can only hope that time and further research will discover new ones to make the history of the earliest Philippine imprints more complete and more satisfactory.

Philadelphia, January 20, 1947 EDWIN WOLF 2ND.

The most frequently cited authorities will be referred to as follows:

ADUARTE--Diego Aduarte, _Historia de la Provincia del Sancto Rosario de la Orden de Predicadores en Philippinas, Iapon, y China_, Manila, 1640.

B. & R.--Emma Helen Blair and James Alexander Robertson, _The Philippine Islands 1493-1898_, Cleveland, 1903-09.

CANO--Gaspar Cano, _Catalogo de los Religiosos de N.P.S. Agustin de la Provincia del Smo. Nombre de Jesus de Filipinas_, Manila, 1864.

CHIRINO--Pedro Chirino, _Relacion de las Islas Filipinas_, Rome, 1604.

COLiN--Francisco Colin, _Labor Evangelica, Ministerios Apostolicos de los Obreros de la Compania de Jesus, Fundacion, y Progressos de su Provincia en las Islas Filipinas_ (ed. Pablo Pastells), Barcelona, 1900-02.

HUERTA--Felix de Huerta, _Estado Geografico, Topografico, Estadistico, Historico-Religioso, de la Santa y Apostolica Provincia de S. Gregorio Magno ... de N.S.P.S. Francisco, en las Islas Filipinas_, Binondo, 1865.

MEDINA--Jose Toribio Medina, _La Imprenta en Manila desde sus Origenes hasta 1810_, Santiago de Chile, 1896.

MEDINA (Juan de)--Juan de Medina, _Historia de los Sucesos de la Orden de N. Gran P. S. Agustin de estas Islas Filipinas_, Manila, 1893.

P. & G.--Angel Perez and Cecilio Guemes, _Adiciones y Continuacion de "La Imprenta en Manila" de D.J.T. Medina_, Manila, 1904.