PUP GEED 10033 Page 1 of 3

Readings in Philippine History

Weekly Activity No. 4

Chronicles About the 16th Century Filipinos: The First Voyage
Around the World and the Customs of the Tagalogs.

Instructions:

1. Using a world and Philippine map, trace the route of the Magellan expedition.

2. Discuss what makes Pigafetta’s account on Magellan’s expedition essential in

understanding pre-16th century Filipinos.

3. Analyze the content of Fray de Plasencia’s account. Focusing on the relation on the
worship and beliefs of the Tagalogs, does the language or description used in the account
suggest bias of any sort? In terms of biases, what makes Morga’s Sucesos de las Islas
Filipinas different from that of Fray Plasencia?

Answer:

Figure 1: Magellan-Elcano Voyage route.

Retrieved from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magellan%27s_circumnavigation#/media/File:Mage
llan_Elcano_Circumnavigation-en.svg
 PUP GEED 10033 Page 2 of 3
Readings in Philippine History

The account of Pigafetta on the expedition of Magellan in the Philippines is a

significant primary source of information regarding the 16th century Philippines, the 16th
century Filipinos’ state, their culture, and tradition at that time. Furthermore, Pigafetta’s
account could also serve as a reference on the sequence of events that occurred from
the expedition, Magellan’s arrival in the Philippines, His death, and the return of the
westerners to Seville. Lastly, Pigafetta’s account is one of the other accounts of
historians regarding the 16th century Philippines and the Filipinos, which offers a
different perception of the History of the Philippines.

In Fray de Plasencia’s work, he narrated his accounts on the Tagalog’s customs

and beliefs. Focusing on his account of the worship and beliefs of the Tagalogs,
Plasencia has shown bias with his language and his descriptions. Whereas he has a
bias towards the beliefs of the Catholic Christian Church, that he depreciates the
paganistic belief of the Tagalogs that worship Bathala, the sun, moon, and stars, and
other patrons of their religion. They also belittle structures due to the absence of
temples, the outdated native place of adoration made of natural materials. On which,
they justify their mission to evangelize the native people. However, Morga’s Sucesos de
las Islas Filipinas provided a fairer and more neutral stance in narrating the events of
the expedition in the Philippines. On which, Morga served as an honest observer that
wrote his experiences on what happened and blocked any influences from the church
and the government, a first of his kind to defy the norms writing events of the religious
chroniclers.
 PUP GEED 10033 Page 3 of 3
Readings in Philippine History

Rubrics

Essay Rubric

Features 4 3 2 1

Expert Accomplished Capable Beginner

Quality of Piece was Piece was written in Piece had little Piece had no style
Writing written in anan interesting style style or voice or voice
extraordinaryand voice
style and voice Gives some Gives no new
Somewhat new information information and
Very informative informative and but poorly very poorly
and well- organized organized organized
organized
Grammar, Virtually no Few spelling and A number of So many spelling,
Usage & spelling, punctuation errors, spelling, punctuation and
Mechanics punctuation or minor grammatical punctuation or grammatical errors
grammatical errors grammatical that it interferes
errors errors with the meaning

Cox J. (2020) Sample Essay Rubrics Retrieved from: https://www.thoughtco.com/ on August 07,
2020