Jesuit Matters

Studying books of manners published in the Spanish Philippines is fascinating because it shows how Filipinos were being changed to conform to Christian and European norms of behavior. Before De Castro, there was Jesuit Fr. Pedro de Estrada who allegedly published, as early as 1734, a book of manners that I have yet to locate. A bibliographic search led to two citations: first a work in 1735 that I couldn’t locate, and another work from 1746 that was available online from Biblioteca Nacional de Espana but didn’t seem to match the English translation, entitled “Lagda,” which is available in typescript from the San Beda College Library and was reprinted in volume 5 of Gregorio Zaide’s “Documentary Sources of Philippine History” (1990). The English translation came from the scholar Jaime C. de Veyra, and we are left with that bibliographic dead end. Nevertheless, the work, if genuine, is fascinating because it shows us 18th century Visayan behavior that Fr. Estrada felt needed correction.

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