UNDERSTANDING

PERSPECTIVES
 “The past is a
foreign country”
 What could it have been like to
travel with Ferdinand Magellan’s
fleet to circumnavigate the world?
Can we imagine it from the vantage
point of this “WALWAL”
generation?
 Taking historical perspective
means understanding the social,
cultural, intellectual, and emotional
settings that shaped people’s lives
and actions in the past.
 At any one point, different
historical actors may have acted on
the basis of conflicting beliefs and
ideologies, so understanding
diverse perspectives is also a key to
historical perspective-taking.
 Indeed, taking historical
perspective demands
comprehension of the vast
differences between us in the
present and those in the past.
Antonio Pigafetta’s
First Voyage Around
The World
Primo viaggio intorno al
mondo
HISTORICAL
CONTEXT
I. EUROPEAN CRUSADES
 Discovery of some
products not available in
their country
 Porcelain, silk, incense,
herbs, perfumes,
fabrics, carpets, spices,
and other oriental
products
  Most expensive and
in-demand
commodity
 Numerous uses such
as food preservative
 Very lucrative
commodity – many
merchants aspired to
monopolize the
market for spices
SPICES
II. Asian goods reached Europe either via Silk
Road or the Arabian-Italian trade route
  The closing of the land route of
the Spice Trade with the conquest
by the Ottoman Empire of
Constantinople (present-day Turkey
and the “gateway to the west”)
Forced European Kingdoms to look for
ways to purchase directly from the
source
 They decided to explore the oceans
to look for a way to the famed Spice
Islands
 III. PRINCE HENRY
 Put up a maritime school THE NAVIGATOR
that trained sailors who
would later discover an
eastern sea route going
to the Spice Islands and
other islands in Southeast
Asia via the Atlantic
Ocean and the Indian
Ocean
IV. THE MARRIAGE OF QUEEN (Coupled with the victory of the
ISABELLA OF CASTILE KING Catholic monarch over the Moors in the
Battle of Granada)
FERDINAND II OF ARAGON

The rise of
Spain as a
world power
 Spain started to explore their
economic options outside the Iberian
Peninsula
 They aspired to have a fair share in
the spice trade
 Financed the trans-Atlantic voyages
of Christopher Columbus
 Decades later, the Spanish
monarch also supported the
plan of Ferdinand Magellan to go
to the East by sailing westward,
a proposal that Portugal refused
to finance.
The Magellan-Elcano expedition
left the port of Sanlucar de
Barrameda in Seville on August
20, 1519 with around 270 men
of different nationalities
One of its main objectives:

To search for a new maritime

path to the Spice Islands that
would not violate Spain’s treaty
with Portugal
 On September 8, 1522, the crew of
the Victoria cast anchor in the waters off of
Seville, Spain, having just completed the
first circumnavigation of the world. On
board was Antonio Pigafetta, a young Italian
nobleman who had joined the expedition
three years before, and served as an
assistant to Ferdinand Magellan en route to
the Molucca Islands..
•Magellan was dead. The rest of the fleet
was gone: the Santiago shipwrecked,
the San Antonio overtaken,
the Concepcion burned and
the Trinidad abandoned.
•Of the 237 sailors who departed from
Seville, eighteen returned on the Victoria.
 Pigafetta had managed to survive, along
with his journal—notes that detailed the
discovery of the western route to the
Moluccas. And along the way, new land,
new peoples: on the far side of the Pacific,
the fleet had stumbled across the Marianas
archipelago, and some three hundred
leagues further west, the Philippines
 The
AUTHOR
ANTONIO PIGAFETTA
(1491 – c.1534)

Born around 1490 in the town

of Vicenza, Venice, Italy
Studied astronomy, geography,
and cartography

Worked in the ships owned by

the Knights of Rhodes
 ANTONIO PIGAFETTA
(1491 – c.1534)

Described as a
well-educated young
man possessing an
avid curiosity of the
world around him
 HOW WAS HE ABLE TO JOIN THE
EXPEDITION?
1) He joined the delegation of Msgr.
Francesco Chieregati, the Papal
Nuncio to Spain in 1519
When in Spain…
(He became acquainted with the lucrative
spice trade and heard the news of the
voyage to be undertaken by Magellan)
HOW WAS HE ABLE TO JOIN THE
EXPEDITION?
2) After getting the approval of the
Spanish sovereign, he left
Barcelona and went to Seville,
presented his credentials to
Magellan and to the Casa de la
Contratacion, the office in charge of
voyages to the New World
 He was admitted as one of the
sobresalientes (supernumeraries)
or men coming from prominent
families who will join the trip for
the love of adventure and for the
advancement of military service
From Seville, Pigafetta reported to
his Majesty King Carlos V and gave
him a handwritten account of what
happened to them during the
journey before returning to his
native Italy
 The
BOOK
 ABOUT THE PRIMARY SOURCE

 Pigafetta kept a detailed journal of

their expedition
 He was asked to write a formal
account of the Magellan expedition
 Unfortunately, he was unable to find a
financier for his publication
Pigafetta’s journal
became the basis
for his 1525
travelogue,
The First Voyage
Around the World.
 ABOUT THE PRIMARY SOURCE

 The original journal of Pigafetta did

not survive time.

 What was handed down to us are

copies of the manuscript that were
never printed in his lifetime.
 ABOUT THE PRIMARY SOURCE

Of the four known primary

sources that dealt with the
Magellan expedition, Pigafetta’s
account is the longest and most
comprehensive
 ABOUT THE PRIMARY SOURCE

Pigafetta’s account included

maps, glossaries of native
words, and geographic
information and descriptions of
the flora and fauna of the places
they visited
 SOME
EXCERPTS
(Textual Analysis)
 From the Text

 Pigafetta provided us a glimpse of the

political, economic, and social conditions of
the islands in the Visayan region.
 He described vividly the physical
appearance, social life, religious beliefs,
and cultural practices of the people they
encountered in the islands of Samar,
Leyte, and Cebu
 From the Text

 He provided us with a data about the

economic activities of the local folks and
the goods they offered for trade.
 He gave us an eyewitness account of the
death of Magellan in the Battle of Mactan
 Nota Bene: He got all this information through
the help of Enrique de Malacca, Magellan’s
slave/interpreter
relevance
 TO EUROPEAN HISTORIOGRAPHY

 Pigafetta’s chronicle preserved and

popularized the achievements of the
Magellan – Elcano expedition
 First, the Magellan expedition proved that
the earth is not flat but an oblate sphere.
They demolished the myth that there is
boiling water at the Equator.
 TO EUROPEAN HISTORIOGRAPHY

 Second, Magellan’s fleet completed the

first circumnavigation of the world.

 Third, they confirmed that the Portuguese

route is not the only way to the Spice
Islands. (One can go to the east by sailing
west.)
 TO EUROPEAN HISTORIOGRAPHY

 Fourth, they brought to the

attention of the Europeans that on
the other side of the American
continent exists a large body of
water which they named Pacific
Ocean (Mar Pacifico)
 TO PHILIPPINE HISTORIOGRAPHY

 Pigafetta’s chronicle contains important

details about the conditions of the Visayan
Islands in the 16th Century.
 Some of the prominent leaders during that
time, their economic activities, social and
cultural practices, and religious beliefs
were identified
 TO PHILIPPINE HISTORIOGRAPHY
 Local textbook writers use his book as
their sources of historical information
about the beginning of Christianity in the
Philippines.
 Account of First Mass in the Philippines
 Conversion of Rajah Humabon and his
wife
 The story of the image of the Sto. Nino
 TO PHILIPPINE HISTORIOGRAPHY
 Pigafetta has numerous accounts
about the reaction of the Filipinos
when they met the Spaniards.

 Some natives befriended the Spaniards

 Other refused to interact and trade with
the Spaniards
TO PHILIPPINE HISTORIOGRAPHY

LAPU-LAPU was the first Filipino

who led the resistance movement
against Spanish rule and successfully
thwarted the first attempt of the
Spaniards to take control of the
Philippines.
VS.