page_title: Spanish East Indies
section_title: Exploration and Settlement (1521–1643)
hierarchical_section_title: Spanish East Indies / History / Exploration and Settlement (1521–1643)
caption_attribution_description: Español: Mapa del itinerario de la expedición de Miguel López de Legazpi en la Islas Filipinas (1560s). English: Map of the 1560s Miguel López de Legazpi expedition, the route of European discovery of the Philippines, after crossing the Pacific from the Viceroyalty of New Spain (México). The Spanish navigator also established the Spanish East Indies (colonial Philippines), and the first Spanish settlement there, founding Cebu in 1565.
context_page_description: The Spanish East Indies were the overseas territories of the Spanish Empire in Asia and Oceania from 1565 to 1901 governed from Manila in the Spanish Philippines. The seat of government was in the Spanish Philippines and it encompassed the Marianas, Carolines, Palaos and Guam, as well as parts of Formosa, Sulawesi and the Moluccas. The King of Spain traditionally styled himself "King of the East and West Indies".
  The Spanish East Indies were ruled from the Captaincy General of the Philippines which included present-day Philippines, Guam and the Mariana Islands, as well as Palau, part of Micronesia and for a brief period Northern Taiwan. Cebu was the first seat of government, later transferred to Manila. From 1565 to 1821 these territories, together with the Spanish West Indies, were administered through the Viceroyalty of New Spain based in Mexico City. After Mexican independence, they were ruled directly from Madrid.
  As a result of the Spanish–American War in 1898, the Spanish Philippines and Guam were occupied by the United States while other smaller islands were sold to Germany in the German–Spanish Treaty of 1899.
context_section_description: Spanish contact began on 6 March 1521, when a Spanish expedition led by Ferdinand Magellan reached the Mariana Islands. He named Guam and the other islands "Islas de los Ladrones" (Islands of the Thieves) because the natives came aboard his galleon (the Trinidad) and pilfered many of its supplies. The expedition later continued its journey west and reached the island of Homonhon in the eastern Philippines on 16 March, with only 150 crewmen. There they were able to communicate with the local peoples because the Malayan interpreter, Enrique of Malacca, could understand their language. The expedition took them further into the archipelago to the Visayan island of Cebu, where Magellan's chaplain, Pedro Valderrama, baptised the local monarch Rajah Humabon, his chief consort, and his subjects.
  Seeking to develop trade between the East Indies and the Americas across the Pacific Ocean, Antonio de Mendoza encouraged the exploration of these Asian territories and commissioned the expedition of Ruy López de Villalobos to the Philippines in 1542–1543. Miguel López de Legazpi set out from Mexico, and established the first Spanish settlement in the Philippines in 1565, which became the town of San Miguel in present-day Cebu. That same year, another member of the expedition, Andrés de Urdaneta discovered a maritime route from the Philippines to Mexico, across the Pacific, leading to the important transpacific trade link of the Manila-Acapulco Galleons. In 1571, Manila was captured from the Sultanate of Brunei and then Manila was made the seat of the Spanish Captaincy General of the Philippines. These and other Asian territories claimed by the Spanish crown were to be governed from the Viceroyalty of New Spain in Mexico City.
  The Manila-Acapulco galleons shipped products gathered from both Asia-Pacific and the Americas, such as silk, spices, silver, gold and other Asian-Pacific islander products to Mexico. Products brought from Asia-Pacific were sent to Veracruz and shipped to Spain and, via trading, to the rest of Europe, while Spanish-Mexican navigators brought with them Hispanic and indigenous Mexican customs, religion, languages, foods, and cultural traditions to the Philippines, Guam, and the Mariana Islands.
  In 1606, the Spaniards established trade links with the Maluku Islands, which continued until 1663. Contacts with Japan were also established and Sebastián Vizcaíno was sent as ambassador in 1611, until Japan closed its trading post in 1630. In northeastern Taiwan, the Spaniards built Fort Santo Domingo near Keelung in 1626 and a mission in Tamsui in 1628, which they occupied until they lost in the Second Battle of San Salvador. Several Pacific islands were visited by Spanish ships in the 16th century, including New Guinea (Yñigo Ortiz de Retez in 1545), the Solomon Islands (Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa in 1568), and the Marquesas Islands (Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira in 1595), but they made no effort to trade with or colonize them.
  In 1668, Blessed Diego Luis de San Vitores established the first mission on Guam, where he and Saint Pedro Calungsod were later martyred.
  In 1762 British troops briefly captured the city of Manila during the Seven Years' War. However, they were unable to establish control over areas outside Manila—through the efforts of the Spanish lieutenant governor, Simón de Anda y Salazar, the remainder of the islands remained loyal to Spain. The British promised support for an uprising led by Diego Silang and his wife Gabriela but the British force never materialized. Under the peace settlement Manila was exchanged, along with British-occupied Havana, for Florida and Menorca. Manila was ceded back to Spanish authorities in April 1764.
caption: Routes of early Spanish expeditions in the Philippines.
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