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Old 24th September 2010, 09:58 PM   #26
Dimasalang
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Quote:
Originally Posted by migueldiaz

Anyway, the pics below are from Museo Naval. An intriguing thing was the presence of Japanese katanas. One theory thus was that Spain used Japanese mercenaries then. Yet perhaps another possibility is that some of the Filipinos who joined the Spanish military then were armed with imported katanas.

In San Buenaventura's 1613 and Ruiz's 1630 Spanish-Tagalog dictionaries, they used "katana" to refer to a sword in the Tagalog dialect. It's a loan word of course, as there's no native "katana" word in Tagalog.

But the presence of katanas in the Philippines then, and the usage of the term to refer to the common sword actually makes a lot of sense. And that's because the Philippines then has been trading with China, Japan, Siam (Thailand), etc., long before the Spaniards came.

The complete San Diego pics are HERE.
Lorenz, check out "Events in the Philippine Islands"(or the original Spanish version: Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas) by Dr Antonio de Morga published in 1609...they are now released in English or Tagalog as "History of the Philippine Islands Vol I and II". Im sure you know of this book, but maybe you haven't looked in to it for the Japanese connection. For those that don't know Morga, he was a high ranking colonial official, but he is best remembered as a historian...and his book documents the history of the Philippine islands from 1493 to 1603. He also led the Spanish naval battle with the Dutch in 1600(which Lorenz mentioned previously). Jose Rizal and many historians today study his work. Morga makes mention of the Japanese in the Philippines on several hundred accounts, and some being of war. In one instance Morga speaks of one Japanese mestizo and his Japanese counterparts living in a Japanese community in Manila. They are hired men and collaborated at one time with Spanish forces. In 1594 the King of Cambodia fled to Laos after being invaded by the King of Siam(Thailand). In 1596 Luis Pérez Dasmariñas(son of Gomez) set sail for Cambodia with 3 ships consisting of Filipino, Japanese, and Spanish warriors...they planned to reconquer Cambodia for the Cambodian king. This plan failed once two of the ships reached the docks and made conflict with the residing community.
Morga also mentions he received notice of a possible invasion by Japan, but explains, due to their lack of ships and navigational skills they would never succeed. These are just bits and pieces I just looked up in the book...I myself still haven't really sat down and looked through it completely or thoroughly...I think I'll do that now. Katanas and samurai swords were possibly traded for goods in and around the Philippines, but as you can see also, there were in fact documented Japanese warriors roaming around the Philippines. Interesting don't you think...these Samurai warriors as hired men during the 15-16th century settling in the Philippines.
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