Holy Week and Eastertide 1521

You’ll recognize the year 1521, marking the arrival in the Philippines—the name was to come several decades later—of Ferdinand Magellan and his crew.

I wrote last week about the common misconception that Magellan was the first to circumnavigate the world, with far-reaching consequences for trade, colonialism, and science with proof that the planet was indeed round.

I have Joan Orendain to thank, with her email reminding me that no less than Antonio Pigafetta said Magellan was the first. Pigafetta was an Italian adventurer who joined Magellan on that trip, not as a crew member but as an assistant to Magellan tasked to chronicle the voyage. He was not a very good writer but was an amazing observer who was meticulous in giving details about everything he saw.

Pigafetta’s chronicles have been compiled several times in several languages but the original title, in Italian, translates as “The first trip around the world.” English translations added Magellan’s name, for example, “Magellan’s voyage: a narrative of the first circumnavigation.”

The facts speak otherwise. Magellan’s crew sought a westward route from Europe to the “Spice Islands” for prized cloves and other spices, more accurately the Maluku (Moluccas) in what is Indonesia today. But Magellan was killed in the Philippines even before he could make it to the Moluccas, a long way off from a complete global circumnavigation.

A Basque crew member, Juan Sebastian Elcano, eventually took over and guided what was left of the crew, finding the Spice Islands and continuing westwards until they made it back to Spain. A more accurate way of referring to the trip should be the Magellan-Elcano expedition.

Right before Holy Week started, I compiled a list of work-related stuff I have to do over the next few days, what I call my penitensiya. The work started off preparing this column—reading Pigafetta and “Over the Edge of the World” by historian Laurence Bergreen, tapping additional sources besides Pigafetta, and written more like a novel.

A surprising discovery when I started reading: Holy Week and Eastertide (the liturgical season extending from Easter to Pentecost) this year (2024) fall on the same dates as in 1521!

Let me get to the highlights of the portion of Magellan’s expedition in the Philippines:

Magellan’s ships arrived in Samar on March 16, 1521, a Saturday. Holy Week began on March 25 and the highlight of that week was the crew meeting two rajahs, Kulambo (Calambu in Pigafetta’s accounts) and Siaiu, whose rajanates were in Mindanao, including Butuan, which was a bustling trade entrepot. Pigafetta’s account was mainly about Kulambo, who hosted Magellan and several of his crew on his balanghai, described by Pigafetta as 80 feet long.

It was a friendly first encounter, most probably because Kulambo and some of the other rajahs were used to foreign visitors because of their trading. But Magellan had a history of arrogance combined with a strange piety. He defied orders from Spain to keep away from religious activity, pushing hard to convert natives in the Philippines. Meeting new rajahs, he would have his ships fire artillery like modern 21-gun salutes, clearly meant to display military prowess and to convince local chiefs that it would be advantageous to side with Christians and their firepower. He did succeed at mass baptisms.

Kulambo convinced Magellan to go on to Cebu and meet his cousin, Rajah Humabon, who also converted. The rajahs and their families received Christian names; Humabon’s wife Juana received a statue of a woman carrying an infant, the Virgin Mary and Jesus, which 40 years later was found intact by the Spanish conquistador Miguel Lopez de Legazpi.

But trouble was brewing. Magellan’s religious zeal turned ugly as he threatened local people who resisted conversion. He burned down a village in Mactan that resisted baptism. The village was under a rajah named Lapulapu.

Now you know why we had the fateful Battle of Mactan.

There are so many other details to the saga of this first circumnavigation. After Magellan was killed, the crew continued with their voyage to Mindanao, Brunei, the Moluccas, and then a few more months back to Spain via the Indian Ocean and the southern part of Africa.

There’s much material to dig up yet, stories within stories. For example, Bergreen proposes that Magellan lost the battle of Mactan in part because his own crew betrayed him, refusing to come to his rescue. He was a very pious man but was also cruel and despotic.

The accounts about the Philippines also painted a picture of a rather unholy Holy Week, much like what we see today on our beaches. Remember the crew was sex-starved after months of crossing the vast Pacific. Magellan warned that sex with heathens was prohibited; the crew responded by performing fake baptisms on the women.