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The Native Militia in the Seventeenth-Century Spanish Philippines: A Space of Power for the Indigenous Elite
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 May 2023
Abstract
The history of the indigenous militia and its role in consolidating the native elite's place in the seventeenth-century colonial Philippines is an understudied topic. This paper addresses that gap. Using lists of media anata payments gathered from the Contaduría section of the Archivo General de Indias for the province of Laguna, this paper examines the beginnings of the native militia and the positions that the native elite occupied. Based on the corresponding media anata tax that these positions required, the author has listed the military ranks that native Filipinos assumed from 1633 to 1700. The Spanish government relied heavily on native arms to support Spain's expansionary agenda, especially in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. Moreover, foreign threats, the Spanish-Dutch wars, and the challenges posed by hostile indigenous groups in the Philippines left the Spaniards with no choice but to rely on native arms to defend their position. As the native militia developed and became a permanent feature of the seventeenth-century Philippines, it gave rise to a space for the indigenous elite to exercise their roles as soldiers, encomenderos, and conquistadores in territories which remained on the periphery of the Spanish empire in which they carved their niche.
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- Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Research Institute for History, Leiden University
References
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34 Mawson, “Philippine Indios,” 386.
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37 Ibid, 91.
38 Ibid.
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44 Marco, “Contribución de Sangre,” 63.
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54 Ignacio Lopez and Ivan Notario Lopez, The Spanish Tercios 1536–1704 (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2012), 14.
55 Güereca, Milicias indígenas, 134.
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57 Ibid.
58 The visita was a neighbourhood that was part of the pueblo but far from the centre of the pueblo. The friar missionary visited it occasionally, hence the name visita.
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65 Felix Huerta, Estado geografico, topografico, estadistico, historico-religioso de la Santa y Apostolica Provincia de S. Gregorio Magno (Manila: Imprenta de M. Sanchez y Compania, 1863), 123. Catholics believe that the Eucharist or Eucharistic bread contains the body and blood of Jesus Christ. In Catholic churches, a special place is designated for keeping the Eucharist. This place is commonly called a tabernacle.
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67 Sy, “Staff of Command.”
68 For an explanation on the position of the Philippines in the security of the Spanish empire's Pacific frontier, see Eberhard Crailsheim, “Las Filipinas, zona fronteriza. Algunas repercusiones de su función conectiva y separativa (1600–1762),” in Intercambios, actores, enfoques : pasajes de la historia latinoamericana en una perspectiva global, ed. Aarón Grageda Bustamante (Hermosillo: Universidad de Sonora, 2014), 133–52.
69 Sy, “Staff of Command.”
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71 Ibid.
72 AGI, Contaduría, 1206, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas 1604, Microfilm C-4829.
73 AGI, Contaduría, 1216, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1634, Microfilm C-4837.
74 AGI, Contaduría, 1222, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1642, Microfilm C-4843 and 4844.
75 AGI, Contaduría, 1224, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1644, Microfilm 4845; Contaduría, 1224, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1646; Contaduría, 1225B, Microfilm C-4846.
76 AGI, Contaduría,1234, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1660/1661, Microfilm C-4854. Juan Dimacolangan was maestre de campo even up to 1690: Contaduría, 1247, Cuentas 1690, Microfilm C-4864.
77 AGI, Contaduría, 1235, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1661/1662, Microfilm C-4854.
78 Ley IV, Tit. 3, Lib. 6, Recopilación de Leyes de los Reinos de las Indias Tomo Segundo (Madrid: Antonio Perez de Soto, 1774).
79 Bonifacio Salamanca, “Was the Encomienda a Land Grant?,” Historical Bulletin 7:1 (March 1963), 47.
80 de Castro, Eloisa Parco, “Southern Tagalog Society in a Time of Transition, 1571–1671,” Journal of History 56 (2010), 33Google Scholar. See also “The Conquest of Luzon,” in The Philippine Islands, 3: 153 and 155.
81 Cushner, Spain in the Philippines, 107.
82 Matthew and Oudijk, “Mesoamerican Conquistadors,” 28–57.
83 AGI, Indiferente, 1420, Carta de Don Juan Agta, indio principal de Bay, vista en el Consejo de Indias, 3 June 1601.
84 Santiago, “Filipino Indios Encomenderos.”
85 Ibid, 164.
86 AGI, Filipinas, 340, L.3, F.54R. Agradecimiento a indios que ayudaron contra los sangleyes,13 September 1608.
87 My translation. The original reads: “Yten que el tiempo de la guerra de los sangleyes cuando se alzaron los indios naturales de alrededor de Manila y de la Laguna deBay y especial de la provincia de la Pampanga pelearon muy bien con los sangleyes y con mucha fidelidad y gusto nos ayudaron y fue ocasión que si se hicieran a la parte de los enemigos eran acabadas las filipinas. Vuestra Alteza sea servido de mandar al governador que en nombre de Vuestra Alteza se lo agradezca que lo estimaran en mucho y especialmente algunos principales como es a Don Guillermo que fue maese de campo en aquella ocasión de los indios de la Pampanga, y a Don Ventura que lo fue de los indios de la Laguna de Bay y que se mande a los religiosos que tienen doctrinas a su cargo que los traten bien que suelen acotarlos por cosas leves y a las indias principales …” AGI, Filipinas, 27, N.51, Petición del procurador Rios Coronel sobre varios asuntos, July 1605.
88 The Spaniards used the term negrillos or negritos to refer to the Aeta indigenous group. This group were hunter gatherers and lived in the mountains of Luzon.
89 Huerta, Estado, 127.
90 AGI, Contaduría 1216, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1634; Santiago, “Filipino Indios Encomenderos,” 167.
91 AGI, Contaduría 1244, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1644, Microfilm C-4845.
92 AGI, Filipinas, 5, N.595, Petición de Juan Dimacolangan de exenciones, probably 3 June 1700.
93 AGI, Contaduría 1234, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1660/1661, Microfilm C-4854.
94 Malaya includes present-day Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia.
95 Zheng Chenggong was a Chinese merchant and warlord who ousted the Dutch from Taiwan and threatened to annex Manila in 1662 in his bid to consolidate power in Southeast Asia. See Hang, Xing, Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia: The Zheng Family and the Shaping of the Modern World, c. 1620–1720 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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97 In 1634, Don Juan de Mendoza paid half of the media anata of 111.5 tributes of negritos in Laguna. AGI, Contaduría, 1216, Cajas de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1634.
98 AGI, Contaduría 1237, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1665/1671, Microfilm C-4857.
99 AGI, Contaduría 1245, Caja de Filipinas, Cuentas, 1687/1688, Microfilm C-4863.
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