Commentaries on Miguel Lopez de Legazpi
Manila chronicles its founding in an edict issued on the 24th of June, 1571, declaring the palisade-enclosed township as a territory of the Virreinato de Nueva España. This marked Manila's Hispanic beginning, intriguingly not directly with Spain, but with the Americas, specifically Mexico, where the Viceroy or the unroyal second king represented the Spanish crown. Thus, Manila itself was a colony of a colony, brought into existence under the labors and stewardship of an aging conquistador from Gipuzkoa, a region the Spaniards called "Pais Vasco" (Basque region). This conquistador, Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, was given the old Medieval title of adelantado, or "advancer." The Basques, or "Vascos," spoke an ancient language not related to the Latin-Romance languages like the dominant "Castellano" (from which native Filipinos derived the term Kastila). Proud of their heritage, it is often questioned how Legazpi communicated with his inner circle, ...