BN1E
READINGS IN PHILIPPINE HISTORY
1. Author’s Background
2. Historical Background of the Document
3. Content Analysis: Understanding the
Historical Information
A. Identify and describe the customs and
traditions mentioned in the document
that have:
1. Socio-cultural significance
2. Political Significance
First Voyage Around the World
Antonio Pigafetta was a Venetian scholar and
explorer. He joined the expedition to the Spice
Islands led by explorer Ferdinand Magellan under
the flag of King Charles I of Spain and, after
Magellan's death in the Philippines, the
subsequent voyage around the world. During the
expedition, he served as Magellan's assistant and
kept an accurate journal which later assisted him
in translating the Cebuano language. It is the first
recorded document concerning the language.
Pigafetta was one of the 18 men who returned to
Spain in 1522, under the command of Juan
Sebastián Elcano, out of the approximately 240
who set out three years earlier. These men
completed the first circumnavigation of the
world. Pigafetta's surviving journal is the source
for much of what is known about Magellan and
Elcano's voyage.
At least one warship of the Italian Navy, a
destroyer of the Navigatori class, was named
after him in 1931.
On 10 August 1519, five ships departed from
Seville for what was to become the first
circumnavigation of the globe. Linked by fame to
the name of its captain, Magellan, much of the
expedition is known through the travelogue of
one of the few crew members who returned to
Spain, Antonio Pigafetta. A narrative and
cartographic record of the journey (including 23
hand-drawn watercolour charts) from Patagonia
to Indonesia, from the Philippines to the Cape of
Good Hope, Pigafetta's The First Voyage around
the World is a classic of discovery and exploration
literature.
A.Social Cultural
-They replied that they worshiped nothing, but
that they raised their clasped hands and their
face to the
sky; and that they called their god " Abba."Here
they explained who their god was.
-Pigafetta describes the how the natives were
dressed and how they lived their lives.
 3. Economic Significance B.Customs of Zubu
-”The interpreter told them that
that was our custom when entering into such
places, as a sign of peace and friendship, and that
we had
discharged all our mortars to honor the king of
the village. “ These were their customs as said by
the King of Zubu.

2. Political
A.Settlement
-The king of
Mazaua, who was the most influential after that
king and the seignior of a number of islands,
went
ashore to speak to the king of the great courtesy
of our captain-general.

3.Economic
A.Barter
-”One of those people brought us about a
porringer full of rice and also eight or ten figs
[i.e., bananas]
fastened together to barter them for a knife
which at the most was worth three catrini. “
-”Finally the captain tried to give him a doppione
worth two ducat, but he would take nothing but
a knife;” Both statements mentioned how they
traded their goods.

B. Identify and describe the mention: A. Dates

a. Dates March 25, Holy Monday - they were on the point
b. Places of weighing anchor, they went to the side of the
c. Personalities ship to fish, and putting my feet upon a yard
leading down into the storeroom, they slipped,
for it was rainy, and consequently they fell into
the sea, so that no one saw me.
March twenty-eight, Thursday morning - as they
had seen a fire on an island the night before they
anchored near it. They saw a small boat which
the natives call boloto with eight men in it,
approaching the flagship.

4. Contextual Analysis:
What are the factors that could have influenced
Antonio Pigafetta in the writing of the document?
Explain.
5. What is the relevance / contribution
of the document in Philippine
History?
6. What are the author’s main
arguments?
B. Places:
A.Ceylon, Zubu, and Calaghann - Three ports on
where to get the best food.But that Zubu was the
largest and the one with most
trade.
B.Mazaua -It lies in a latitude of nine and two
15thirds degrees toward the Arctic Pole, and in a
longitude of one hundred and sixty-two degrees
from the line of demarcation.
C.Ceylon, Bohol, Canighan, Baybai, and
Gatighan- they laid their course toward the
northwest, passing among these five islands.
C. Personalities
A.King of Zubu
B.King Mazaua
C.Abba- the god of the natives
D.King of Spagnia
E.King of Portogalo
Pigafetta tells how, being in Barcelona in 1519, he
heard about Magellan's expedition, and being
wishful to learn about the world, he asked for
and obtained the permission to join the voyage.
Magellan wanted to prove that the world was
round and through his exploration he DID PROVE
that the Earth is round..
The relevance of his own venture, fundamentally
lies in the fact that he took part to the first globe
circumnavigation, between 1519 and 1522, and
he was able to accomplish it after the murder of
Ferdinand Magellan, leaving a detailed
description of the journey in the Report of the
first trip around the world, a lost manuscript that
was rescued later, in 1797, and today is
considered one of the most important
documentary evidence relating the geographical
discoveries of the Sixteenth Century.
His own narration about the first world
circumnavigation was one of the greatest
achievements in the history of navy exploration
and discovery.In this narration can be found

7. Your own overall observation and
insights on the primary source?
descriptions of peoples, countries, goods and
even the languages that were spoken, of which
the seafarer was trying to assemble some brief
glossaries.
On September 8, 1522, the crew of the Victoria
cast anchor in the waters off of Seville, Spain,
having just completed the first sail 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 on the way 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 trip across the
Marianas archipelago, and some three hundred
leagues further west, the Philippines.