Church Lands in

the Agrarian
History in
Tagalog Region
➢ Spanish consquistadores received land
grants.
➢ Spanish law required that land grants not
encroach on areas already occupied by
Filipinos. But this principle was disregarded
in areas where population density was
greater. By 1612 the original grants has been
consolidated 34 ranches.
➢ Spanish Landowners sold their lands to
other Spaniards, Who in turn, mortgaged or
donated their estates to the religious
orders.
 Reason
➢ The Spanish population in the Philippines was highly
transient and its impermanence was not conducive to
settle landowning.
➢ A small Spanish population, together with absence
of mining and other large-scale economic activities,
restricted the market for livestock products which
were the main stay of early estates.
➢ The attractions of the high projects to be made on
the speculative Manila galleon trade turned the
Spaniards attention almost exclusively to trans-
cosmic commerce.
➢ By 1896 four (4) religious orders owned twenty-one
(21) haciendas in the provinces surrounding Manila.
The Spanish brought with them to the Philippines
their ideas of landownership.
➢ In Latin America the sate aided the haciendados
and miners by providing them with drafts corvee
labor, known as departamientos.
➢ Departamienstos for Spanish colonist were
abolished in the New World at about the time that
land was being granted in the Philippines, so the
practice was not introduced into the Philippines.
➢ However, the state continued to draft labor for its
own need. Timber for ships and galleons had to be cut in
the mountains, and naval yards built and maintained.
➢ The Filipino peasant living in one of the provinces
near in Manila gave up a month each year to these task,
and if the call came at the wrong time he might be
unable to plat or harvest his corps.
➢ A payment known as topa could be made to officials
for replacement to found, but few were able to raise
the necessary cash.
➢ A new commission was given to Pedro Calderon y
Henriquez, a judge of the Audencia, who set out
for the province with 27 heavily cavalrymen.

• He issued a general amnesty for all

except the “principal instigators of
the revolt”.
• He promised that all religious
haciendas would be surveyed and that
free access would be granted for
pasturage and forage in the hacienda
uplands.
• He desired to avoid these distasteful task gave the
hacenderos another way of obtaining labor, and an
institution arose which might be called an indirect
repartmiento.
• He also issued another decree regarding abuses with
reservas on the estates, and in most of the towns left
the inhabitants in control of the land which they
claimed, on condition that they deposit the rent with
the treasury until he could determine legitimate
ownership.
Thank
You!!