While many historians focus on the rise and fall of the Spanish empire as the colonizer, few discuss the native, or Filipino, perspective as the colonized during the Manila Galleon trade. The galleons typically left Acapulco in March or April and used the trade winds to reach Guam and then the Philippines. For example, the Spanish changed the balangay, which was a light, slender and fast general-purpose vessel, into a larger and faster military vessel called the caracoa (Stead 2014:7-8). The galleon trade had a negative effect on economic development in the Philippines since virtually all Spanish capital was devoted to speculation in Chinese goods. For example, 1 oz of gold bought 11 oz of silver in Amsterdam while the same silver in China could be re-exchanged for 2 oz of gold. (February 22, 2023). Advantages: The galleons brought Mexican silver, merchandise, and useful plants to the Philippines as well as other influences from Mexico and Spain. This trade route linked America with Asia, and more particularly, the Viceroyalty of New Spain with its farthest province, the Philippine Islands. The Pacific trade moved in phase with economic activity in the Atlantic. The trade generated revenue needed by the government. The subjugated natives in the Philippines were building the Spanish empire with all that they had: their bodies, resources, food, and money.In his dissertation Andrew Peterson argues, the galleon trade was built upon the toils of indigenous laborers and natural resources of the Philippine archipelago (Peterson 2014:1). More ships were lost after crossing, and both de Loaisa and Elcano died from scurvy (De Leon-Bolinao 2014:3). Unlike Mexico, Manila was able to provide the cheap labor and the resources necessary to support the new colonial center and the shipbuilding industry of the Spanish galleons (Peterson 2014:7-8). The Murrys California Favorite RV Destinations, The Impact of the Manila Galleon Trade on the Philippines, Land Management and Land Use, Northwestern Belize. There have been more recent works from historians and archaeologists that reveal the complexities of the Manila Galleon Trade, including from Peterson in his dissertation called Making the First Global Trade Route: The Southeast Asian Foundations of the Acapulco-Manila Galleon Trade, 1519-1650, and Arturo Girldez with his book The Age of Trade (Peterson 2014; Girldez 2015). THE Manila Galleon Trade lasted for 250 years and ended in 1815 with Mexico's war of independence. The cargoes were unloaded into the Acapulco storehouses. Here Are the Advantages of International Trade 1. It was far more likely to be sunk by storm, reef, or accidental fire than an enemy attack. These topics provide more insight to the Spanish colonial period in the Philippines. In addition, the Philippines engaged in interisland trade with areas like Brunei (Min 2014:48). It took a month for the galleons to clear the Philippine archipelago and sail out into the open water of the Pacific. IT WAS . Encyclopedia.com. Now, let's dive into our list of interesting facts about the Spanish American War. The Philippines slowly transitioned into a Spanish colony. The fourth and final capture was made in 1762 by a British fleet commanded by Admiral Cornish which relieved the galleon Santsima Trinidad, whose masts had been broken in a storm, of its cargo destined for Acapulco, a haul worth over 2 million silver pesos. Advantages: The galleons brought Mexican silver, merchandise, and useful plants to the Philippines as well as other influences from Mexico and Spain. For example, much of the timber necessary to build vessels had to be imported from the Netherlands, where it was abundant but costly to purchase and transport to Mexico (Peterson 2014:209). Spanish Colonial Empire in the Age of Exploration. The journey was much easier in this direction and took about three to four months. The Spanish Crown decreed an end to the route in 1813, but one final Manila galleon, the San Fernando, sailed to Acapulco in 1815. 1998 Spains Men of the Sea: Daily Life on the Indies Fleet in the Sixteenth Century, Carla Rahn Phillips, translator. From November 27-30, 2017, the 3rd Annual Asia-Pacific Regional Conference on Underwater Cultural Heritage was held in Hong Kong (Jeffrey 2017). Manila galleon; 5 pages. The native sailor was a real sailor. Sign up for our free weekly email newsletter! In 1529, de Saavedra Ceron embarked on a second voyage back to the Moluccas, but the Portuguese captured his crew and forced their return back to Spain (De Leon-Bolinao 2014:3-4).In 1542,Ruy Lopez de Villalobos voyaged to the Pacific with the help of detailed ship logs, but he lacked the proper knowledge of wind and sea currents to navigate the oceans (De Leon-Bolinao 2014:4). The Spanish were then able to connect the Asian trade network to the markets in the Americas and Europe, leading to more trade activities and profits internationally (Orillaneda 2014:2). 2011 The Manila-Acapulco Galleons: The Treasure Ships of the Pacific. News of a thriving trans-Pacific trade network reached Spain. These letters represented the opening four words of the Hail Mary prayer: Ave Maria, gratia plena, Spanish Colonial Empire in the Age of ExplorationSimeon Netchev (CC BY-NC-SA). Thus, the Manila-Acapulco Trade, better known as the "Galleon Trade" was born. Copyright The Manila Times All Rights Reserved. Goods not sold at the Acapulco trade fairs were transported by land to Veracruz on the Atlantic coast which had been founded by Hernn Corts in 1519. The paper jointly presents quantitative and qualitative data to analyze in a critical way the existing work on the Manila Galleon. The Manila galleons carried cargo like rolls of silk, Chinese porcelain, Persian carpets, jewellery, medicines, and rolls of Indian cotton cloth. We would much rather spend this money on producing more free history content for the world. In the 1840s, there were some Filipinos who worked in the whaling industry in the Pacific coast and the Alaskan coast (Aguilar 2012:370). The galleon trade had good and bad effect to the economy of our country. WHAT ARE THE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF THE GALLEON TRADE TO THE PHILIPPINES? Previously, Spains colonial center was in Cebu, Visayas, located in central Philippines (Peterson 2014:7). While natives could be punished for the rejection of Spanish ways, physical abuse was worse when it came to labor conditions. ." Expanded trade with China was possible. The voyage to the American continent, which was the ships' first sight of land, generally took six months, although it might take four or eight depending on wind and sea conditions. William Lytle Schurz, The Manila Galleon (1939). The Manila-Acapulco galleons were an obvious temptation for foreign powers and their privateers. The Manila galleon trade made significant contributions to colonial Spanish culture. Robert R. Reed, Colonial Manila: The Context of Hispanic Urbanism and Process of Morphogenesis (1978). There are no disadvantages to science, only to the applications for which science is used. This purposeful limitation after 1593 led to the proliferation of contraband trading. Another Filipino said, Just imagine, the native sailor did not have modern instruments during the galleon times like we have now. The lack of materials and the lack of people made it a difficult and slow process to build galleons in Mexico and engage successfully in global trade (Peterson 2014:154). Another blow to the Spanish empire was the establishment of the Royal Philippine Company in 1785. Manila Bay is heavily polluted from the refuse coming from major tributaries like Pasig, Paranaque, and Tullahan Rivers, and about 20 other rivers. Join us for a panel discussion featuring scholars and experts as they dived into the historic. By the 19th century, though, they had become a part of maritime history, victims of the process of globalisation in trade they had themselves helped begin. Members of the principala class included datus, also known as the cabezas de barangay, who were the leaders of indigenous communities(Peterson 2014:25). World History Publishing is a non-profit company registered in the United Kingdom. Despite losing four ships, many men, and Magellan himself, the Spanish sent even more explorers to the Pacific region afterwards to exploit the goods there (Pigafetta 1969). The Manila Galleon Trade Route was an economically powerful system of linking Spain with the commodities of Asia via Mexico. The term Indio was used to identify natives who were subjugated workers obligated to serve the Spanish, but also was used to identify them as Christian members of Spain (Peterson 2014:22-23). Many Chinese became very wealthy through hard work. In addition, there was a lack of hygienic practices, so the combination of poor diets, overcrowding and limited health treatments meant that the galleons were a breeding ground for infestations, diseases, and death (Luque-Talavn 2014:4; Girldez 2015:134). One of its good effects was that it developed an interest in the cultures of the two countries. Over time, there was a greater demand for spices including pepper, cloves and nutmeg coming from the Moluccas, located south of the Philippines (Orillaneda 2014:2; Girldez 2015:38). Chartered Companies. Abac was strong, plentiful and able to withstand saltwater corrosion, which made it the ideal material for ropes and sailcloth (Peterson 2014:10). Please support World History Encyclopedia. Though Chinese silk was by far the most important cargo, other exotic goods, such as perfumes, porcelain, cotton fabric (from India), and precious stones, were also transshipped via the galleon. This study, by revealing the extent to which the galleon trade was built upon the toils of indigenous laborers and natural resources of the Philippine archipelago, attempts to ameliorate the standard commercially oriented narrative of the Acapulco-Manila galleon trade. Ming porcelain was already highly collectible and much sought-after by Europe's aristocracy, so much so, Chinese potters began to produce designs which were most popular in that market. See alsoNew Spain, Viceroyalty of; Silk Industry and Trade. Spain realized the advantages of the manpower and resources that the Philippines could contribute to support their empire. The one, or more rarely two, annual Manila galleons arrived at Acapulco on the Pacific coast of what is today Mexico and which was then part of the Spanish Empire in the Americas, the Spanish Main. Special interests include art, architecture, and discovering the ideas that all civilizations share. (It is estimated that as much as one-third of the silver mined in New Spain and Peru went to the Far East.) Masters thesis, Department of History, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA. Retrieved from https://www.worldhistory.org/Manila_Galleon/. He captured the Nuestra Seora de la Encarnacin Disengao and its lucrative cargo off the coast of North America. Meanwhile, the second galleon would travel to Acapulco with around 250,000 pesos worth of goods on a journey that took 90 days at sea. Because few people volunteered to embark on the dangerous voyages between Manila and Acapulco, Indios were taken to work on the galleons (Peterson 2014:8). No severe exploitation of the Philippines natural resources Manila became an Entrepot Corrections? . As a Spanish historian, Girldez utilized many primary Spanish sources such as journals and letters written by Jesuits, friars, travelers, and government officials, to share a variety of first-person accounts. While they did not leave written records about the maltreatment, they showed their disapproval of the Spanish colonization through their actions. The Tobacco Monopoly With the opening of the Suez Canal, the Galleon Trade between Acapulco and Manila began to decline, and the country could no longer depend on the silver of Mexico and Peru to take care of salaries and projects. The desire to enjoy the spoils of the Asian trade led the Spanish to send explorers to the Pacific to claim and establish territories in the region (Pigafetta 1969). The result was a massive decrease in the native population, from 20-60% in different communities (Girldez 2015:72). 183-222. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. The Manila Galleons, loaded with their rich cargos of oriental goods are still a great mystery to researchers, especially Theme presented at the 3rd Asia-Pacific Regional Conference on Underwater Cultural Heritage, Hong Kong. 7. 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