Theft of the cross of the Sto. Niño, 1625
In April 1625, Pedro de Arce, bishop of Cebu, began an investigation into the theft of a gold cross from the venerated Sto. Niño de Cebu. More than its metal and monetary value, the cross was historical; it was believed to have been found together with the image in 1565. This is but one of the many fascinating stories that lie in the archives. “Dead men tell no tales” is outdated, a phrase from the time before forensic investigation. It does not apply to historians, either. I go to the archive and read tales left by dead men on crumbling manuscripts. So many films, plays, novels, and short stories can be made from archival material. That is, if creatives explore the archive.
My last column on the finding of the Sto. Niño de Cebu in 1565 comes from materials in the Lilly Library, Indiana University at Bloomington. The documents originated from the Augustinian library in Intramuros, looted during the British Occupation (1762 to 1764). From Manila, the documents were brought to London and eventually sold at auction in the early 19th century. They passed hands, ended up in the United States, and are now made available online (transcribed and translated from the original Spanish) in the 1762 Archive website, a joint project of Christina Lee (Princeton University) and Cristina Juan (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London). In the same bundle of documents lies the story of the 1625 investigation into the theft of the cross of the Sto. Niño de Cebu.
In 1620, Juan de Tujo, prior of the Augustinian monastery in Cebu, turned over an inventory of the jewels of the Sto. Niño to Antonio Ximenez. Both friars signed the inventory, but Ximenez did not cross-check, either from trust or laziness. Ximenez left for Panay in a hurry and left the inventory with Juan Ruiz.
When Juan de Montemayor, the new prior, arrived in Cebu, he asked Ruiz to show him the treasury, commenting on the image, “the child has jewels.” Ruiz replied, “lots of them.” They physically counted the jewels in the treasury with the inventory signed and prepared by Ximenez and Tujo. A necklace weighing one tael and a cross was missing. As there was more than one cross, almost all made from gold and enamel, he was unsure if the missing one was the same one found with the image in 1565. To add to the confusion, there was something about “a string of pearls and gold.” The Niño did not wear all his jewels; some of these were kept in the treasury after the fiesta. Some jewels remained on the image when it was returned to a tabernacle in the church, where it was exposed to the faithful for veneration.
In a sworn statement, Ruiz, from the convent of Cabcar [Carcar], said that the cross, which was found with the image in 1565, was made of gold and black enamel. This was placed in a chest under the care of Ximenez, whose signature was on the inventory. Ruiz heard that Tomas Sareman, a slave or servant in the convent, stole the cross and necklace. These were later found in the possession of a Chinese who said Tomas pawned them to him. Under torture, Tomas later confessed that he stole the cross and necklace while the Augustinian community was at a meeting. Ruiz admitted that he could have been careless with the custody of the keys that led to the theft, but he said the keys were not entrusted to “Tomas the Black Man.”
When interrogated by Bishop Arce on the theft of the jewels, the suspect, Tomas, was not as forthright as the Discayas were under Senate scrutiny. The Discayas were placed under contempt of the Senate and detained, but poor Tomas was ordered bound on a rack with nine cords, where a confession was stretched or extracted from him. A certain Fray Martin de Jesus entrusted him with the tabernacle key to prepare for Mass. He stole the cross and necklace from the neck of the Niño and pawned them to a certain Isabel, an “india.” To complicate matters, Jacinto, the slave of Fr. Montemayor, the prior, stole the cross from him. When he saw the cross with Isabel, “who was living in sin with Jacinto,” he took it back. However, three weeks later, he pawned the cross with Isabel for six reales. Other witnesses were called in. A certain Manuel saw the cross with Isabel, who got it from Jacinto. Isabel was summoned from Bantayan and tortured on the rack, too, but she denied stealing the cross.
The documents published on the 1762 website are introduced with a perceptive essay by my former student Nicholas “Hobbee” Sy, who places the story in the context of life in the 17th-century Philippines. He noted the privileging of the Spanish narratives compared with those of the natives. He added that the silences in the narratives of the slaves Tomas and Jacinto, as well as Isabel, could be read as acts of agency of the colonized, ignored by history.
I presume relevant historical documents from the Basilica of the Sto. Niño were transferred to San Agustin Intramuros, or even to the mother house, the Colegio de Agustinos Filipinos in Valladolid, Spain. A quick visit to the library proved me wrong, I have to return someday for further research.
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Comments are welcome at ambeth.ocampo@inquirer.net
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