Rizal’s annotation on De Morga’s Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas

Rizal noted that morga has a definite bias and would often distort facts or even rely on intervention to fit
his defense of the Spanish conquest

Chapter 1 – Magellan and legazpi’s seminal expeditions

Charpter 2-7 – chronological report on govt administration under governor general

Chapter 8 – Philippine islands, the natives, antiquity, custom and govt.

Rizal’s annotation:

Philippines was not deserted and was actually habitable.

Spaniards, like any other nation, treat food to which they are not accustomed or is unknown to them
with disgust. This fish that Morga mentions is bagoong (salted & fermented fish).

Morga’s sucesos:

Philippines was deserted and inhabitable

Beef and fish they know it best when it has started to rot and stink

Rizal’s 3 Propositions

1. The people of the Philippines have a culture on their own, before the coming of the Spaniards

2. Filipinos were decimated, demoralized, exploited, and ruined by the Spanish colonization

3. The present state of the Philippines was not necessarily superior to its past

Rizal’s Objectives

1. To awaken the consciousness of the Filipinos regarding their glorious ways of the past

2. To correct what has been distorted about the Philippines due to Spanish conquest

3. To prove that Filipinos are civilized even before the coming of the Spaniards
What lead jose rizal to morga’s work

•Rizal was an earnest seeker of truth and this marked him as historian

• He had a burning desire to know exactly the condition of the Philippines when the Spaniards came
ashore to the islands

• His theory was that the country was economically self-sufficient and prosperous. Entertained the idea
that it had a lively and vigorous community

• He believed the conquest of the Spaniards contributed in part to the decline of the Philippine’s rich
traditions and culture

The

third consideration

for the choice of Morga wasRizal’s opinion that

this secular account was moreobjective, more trustworthy, than those writtenby the religious
missionaries which were liberallysprinkled with tales of miracles and apparitions.

The

fourth consideration

in Rizal's choice of the Morgawas that

it appeared more sympathetic

, at least in parts,to the indios, in contrast to the friar accounts, many of whichwere biased or downright
racist in tone and interpretation

The people of the Philippines

had a culture on theirown, before the coming of the Spaniards

•
Rizal’s annotation:

The people of the pre-Hispanic Philippines is advanced, has high literacy rate, self-sufficient and has
smooth foreign relations.

• Filipinos were decimated, demoralized, exploited and ruined by the Spanish colonization.

• The present state of the Philippines was not necessarily superior to its past.

In his annotation, he included the colonial history of the Philippines, being in prolonged periods of
suffering that many people have been subjected to.

•” The Philippines was depopulated, impoverished and retorted, astounded by metaphor, with
nocondence in their past, still without faith in her present and without faltering hope in the future”.

Indigenous people
morgan's statement implies that natives
of Luzon had that violent tendency
while Doctor Rizal's statement shows that
violence
among those natives was because of the
entry of inhumane and unjust friars
Panday pira ay isang native ng Pampanga inatasan ni governor de vera para magproduce ng artilleries
if you will search what does
arterially means
and relate the result to this context
artillery or artilleries mean large guns

while he supported the claim of Morga

as compared to artilleries or large guns

so in morga’s, there is a system of

from what we compared and contrasted dr

Artillery

Writing

Shipbuilding

Chapter four:

Second is the view that the pre-Hispanic Filipinos had an advanced knowledge of metallurgy, the
evidence being the fine cannons made by an indio named Panday Pira. Third was the existence of a pre-
Hispanic shipbuilding industry. All these, it is said, were systematically ruined by the Spanish. Filipino
historians today have to reconsider the assertions made by Rizal a century ago in the light of current
archaeological and anthropological research. In Morga’s fourth chapter, for example, on the term of
Governor Santiago de Vera, there is a reference to a foundry run by an indio from Pampanga named
Panday Pira: [de Vera] built the stone fortress of Our Lady of the Way, inside the city of Manila on the
land side, and for its defense, he had set up a foundry for the making of artillery under the hands of an
old indio called Pandapira, a native of the province of Pampanga. He and his sons served in this line of
work until their deaths many years later (Rizal 1890, 23).14 The word "panday" in Java and Borneo
means "metalworker" or "ironsmith." How Panday Pira became a "cannon-maker" can only be traced to
Rizal. Although Morga made only a passing reference to this indio artillery-maker, Rizal elaborated in his
annotation, stressing that That is, an indio who already knew how to find cannons even before the
arrival of the Spaniards, hence the epithet 'old.' In this difficult branch of metallurgy, as in others, the
present-day Filipinos or the new indios are very much behind the old indios (italics mine; 23)?5

Dun po sa chapter four ng book ni Morga, sinulat niya po dito na si Governor de vera ay nagpatayo ng
isang foundry or yung factory kung saan ginagawa yung mga metalworks na pinapatakbo ni Panday
Pira na isang indio na taga-Pampanga. Siya raw yung nagbubuild ng mga artilleries or yung weapons
specifically yung cannons. Actually, dito sa book ni Morga, Pandapira yung inistate niyang pangalan
dito.

So sa annotation naman po ni Dr. Rizal dito, inemphasize niya na yung indio na si “Panday Pira” ay
maalam na kung paano ginagawa yung mga kanyon bago pa dumating yung mga Spaniards sa pilipnas.
Then cinorrect niya dito yung name na sinabi ni morga na Pandapira into Panday Pira. Yung ibig
sabihin ng word na “panday” ay “metalworker” or “ironsmith”.
So sa annotation niya na to, cinounter niya yung sinabi ni morga na si panday pira ay natuto lamang
na gumawa ng artilleries or cannons nung nagbuild si governor de vera ng foundry. Si de vera po ay
isang Governor-General ng Philippines during Spanish colonization.

Then continuation sa fifth chaprter, may another reference naman na si governor Gomez Perez
Dasmariñas ay nag-establish ng isang foundry for artilleries sa manila kung saan inistate dito na
kulang daw sila ng mga expert sa paggawa ng cannons kaya kakaunti lang yung nagawa or
napproduce nila. So inannotate to ni rizal na yung foundry na pinapatakbo ni panday pira ay Nawala
na nung nagsettle yung mga Spaniards na manila. So nung namatay si panday pira, walang Spaniards
na nakakaalam kung paano niya ginagawa or binubuild yung mga cannons, even yung mga anak niya
ay hindi ganun kaskilled tulad ng father nila.

Sa book ni morga, sinabi dito na yung Spanish government ng manila ay nagrequest sa higher
authorities ng Mexico na padalhan sila ng mga cannon makers. So dito pinapakita or parang
pinaparating na yung filipinos ay di kayang iforge or gayahin yung European style ng cannons. Sinasabi
na hindi raw sila maalam kung paano gumawa ng mga malalaking kanyon.

So dinepensahan naman to ni Rizal, kung san sinabi niya na yung mga filipinos, based sa niresearch
niya, na possible na marunong gumawa yung mga indios ng small cannons or yung tinatawag na
“lantakas” na karaniwang minamanifacture ng mga muslims sa Mindanao. And hindi ito ginawa bilang
isang weapon pero bilang interior decorations lang. kaya dahil don, di nila kaya na maforge yung
malalaking cannons ng European style as weapons.

In the next chapter, the fifth, on the term of Governor General Gomez Perez Dasmariñas, there is
another reference by Morga to the foundry: "[Perez-Dasmarifias] established a foundry for artillery in
Manila where, owing to the lack of expert or master founders, few large pieces were made" (27)?6 Rizal
now takes the opportunity to point out, in a footnote, that the indigenous foundry run by Panday Pira
disappeared after the Spanish settled in Manila, conquered from the indios: 'This demonstrates that,
when the idio Panday Pira died, there were no Spaniards who know how to do what he did, nor were his
children as skilled as their father'' (27 n. 4)?7 Today Panday Pira, the cannon-founder, joins the
Pantheon of Heroes and other "great" Filipinos who are immortalid in school textbooks, despite
historical and archeological evidence to the contrary. In Retanafs edition of Morga, his long footnotes on
Panday Pira contain transcriptions of sixteenth century archival documents from Seville which refute
Rizal's assertions that cannon-making was a flourishing indigenous industry. documents from the
colonial government in Manila requesting higher authorities in Mexico to send cannon makers show
that the Filipinos were unable to forge the thick European-style cannons. A letter from governor Vera on
26 June 1587, to the Viceroy in Mexico gives an account of his artillery and requests more. I ¬ find
anyone who knows how to found cannons, because those provided am by indios who cannot make large
cannons. I quest Your Excellency to send from New Spain founders and officers to manufacture cannons
(Retana 1909, 406). Retana continues, This is to say, that the natives did not know how to found large
cannons. The twenty-six large pieces alluded to by de Vera could very well come from the Spanish ships
or those well-made by Robles, the Spanish master founder. If Panday Pira and his sons were indeed such
experts at making large cannons there woulq be no reason for de Vera's request (406).
Historical evidence provided by Retana is supported by recent archeological research. Dr. Eusebio Dizon,
Chief of the Archaeology Division of the National Museum of the Philippines, wrote his doctoral
dissertation on pre-Hispanic Philippine metal implements. His research showed that the indios were a
metal-using people, but did not possess the metallurgical knowledge attributed to them by Rizal or the
subsequent historians who drew on Rizal's work. He noted, however, that it is possible that the indios
were capable of forging the small cannons, or lantakas, which are still manufactured by the Muslims in
the Southern island of Mindanao, although they are not used for warfare but as ornaments for interior
decoration. The preHispanic indios, as far as current archaeological data is concerned, were not capable
of founding the heavy European-sty

Another example may be necessary to demonstrate Rizal's exaggeration. Morga describes Filipino boats
large enough to cany "one hundred rowers on the border (vanda) and thirty soldiers on top (pelea)," on
which Rizal (1890, 267-68 n. 1) elaborates to mourn the extinction of the indigenous boat-making
industry: PHILIPPINE STUDIES The Filipinos . . . [were] celebrated and skilled in navigation, but far from
pmpssing, have become backward. Although boats are still built in the islands now, we can say that they
are almost all of'the European model. The ships that camed one hundred rowers and thirty fighting
soldiers disappeared. The country that at one time, with primitive means, built ships of around 2,000
tons, now has to resort to foreign ports like Hongkong . . . for unserviceable cruisers." On the same page,
Rizal laments the environmental costs of Spanish boat-building, by describing the pre-Hispanic Philippine
landscape as being "covered in shadows," as an abundance of trees were cut down with no thought of
conservation, so that some species became extinct (268). There is no doubt that the pre-Hispanic indios
were a seafaring people who built swift and light vessels that could traverse the length of the
archipelago or aoss into neighboring countries for trade. Recent archeological excavations in the
southern city of Butuan in. Mindanao have enlarged our understanding of pre-Hispanic Philippine boats.
Some remains are as large as Morga describes, but nothing comes close to the massive 2,000 ton boats
of which Rizal boasts. Spanish colonization is further blamed for the loss of the pre-Hispanic Philippine
syllabary, and thus the extinction of a written literature. Aside from a few signatures by indios, in their
own script, on early Spanish legal documents of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, no full
document written in the pre-Hispanic Philippine script has ever been found.

Ambeth ocampo

Dun po sa chapter four ng book ni Morga, sinulat niya po dito na si Governor de vera ay nagpatayo ng
isang foundry or yung factory kung saan ginagawa yung mga metalworks na pinapatakbo ni Panday
Pira na isang indio na taga-Pampanga. Siya raw yung nagbubuild ng mga artilleries or yung weapons
specifically yung cannons. Actually, dito sa book ni Morga, Pandapira yung inistate niyang pangalan
dito.
So sa annotation naman po ni Dr. Rizal dito, inemphasize niya na yung indio na si “Panday Pira” ay
maalam na kung paano ginagawa yung mga kanyon bago pa dumating yung mga Spaniards sa pilipnas.
Then cinorrect niya dito yung name na sinabi ni morga na Pandapira into Panday Pira. Yung ibig
sabihin ng word na “panday” ay “metalworker” or “ironsmith”.

So sa annotation niya na to, cinounter niya yung sinabi ni morga na si panday pira ay natuto lamang
na gumawa ng artilleries or cannons nung nagbuild si governor de vera ng foundry. Si de vera po ay
isang Governor-General ng Philippines during Spanish colonization.

Then continuation sa fifth chaprter, may another reference naman na si governor Gomez Perez
Dasmariñas ay nag-establish ng isang foundry for artilleries sa manila kung saan inistate dito na
kulang daw sila ng mga expert sa paggawa ng cannons kaya kakaunti lang yung nagawa or
napproduce nila. So inannotate to ni rizal na yung foundry na pinapatakbo ni panday pira ay Nawala
na nung nagsettle yung mga Spaniards na manila. So nung namatay si panday pira, walang Spaniards
na nakakaalam kung paano niya ginagawa or binubuild yung mga cannons, even yung mga anak niya
ay hindi ganun kaskilled tulad ng father nila.

Sa book ni morga, sinabi dito na yung Spanish government ng manila ay nagrequest sa higher
authorities ng Mexico na padalhan sila ng mga cannon makers. So dito pinapakita or parang
pinaparating na yung filipinos ay di kayang iforge or gayahin yung European style ng cannons. Sinasabi
na hindi raw sila maalam kung paano gumawa ng mga malalaking kanyon.

So dinepensahan naman to ni Rizal, kung san sinabi niya na yung mga filipinos, based sa niresearch
niya, na possible na marunong gumawa yung mga indios ng small cannons or yung tinatawag na
“lantakas” na karaniwang minamanifacture ng mga muslims sa Mindanao. And hindi ito ginawa bilang
isang weapon pero bilang interior decorations lang. kaya dahil don, di nila kaya na maforge yung
malalaking cannons ng European style as weapons.