This book contains eleven papers presented at the “Seminario Asia y América Latina Colonial” of the thirtieth Congreso Internacional de Ciencias Humanas en Asia y Africa del Norte held at Mexico City, August 3-8, 1976. They are of varying value, as is inevitable on such occasions. By far the most original is a succinct and densely documented analysis of the China trade at Manila in the years 1660-79 by María Lourdes Díaz Trechuelo (pp. 134-48). It is soundly based on the testimonios de visitas by the officials of the real hacienda who inspected each incoming Chinese junk (champán), and recorded the details of its cargo and the sale-prices at Manila. Admittedly, these records take no account of merchandise that fraudulently evaded registration and valuation, which was probably very considerable. Even so, the figures are very informative. They show that during those two decades, Chinese silks did not have the preponderant share of trade value that has always been attributed to them. They constituted only 2.76 percent of imports in the first decade and 8.59 percent in the second. Cotton and other textiles accounted for 85.46 percent of the value of the total imports in the first period and 71.48 percent in the second.
Two overlapping articles deal with the activities of don Rodrigo de Vivero de Velasco and Pilot-Major Sebastián Vizcaíno in Japan, 1609-13. They add little to what has been published previously, and confirm the verdict of Japanese historian Tokutomi Soho that the Spaniards were primarily interested in using trade for the Kingdom of Heaven, whereas the Japanese were only interested in using the Kingdom of Heaven for trade. A rupture was therefore inevitable, even without the interference of the maverick Franciscan friar Luis Sotelo, martyred in 1624. Two short and rather superficial articles deal with Mexican archival and library resources for the history of the Spanish missions in the Far East.
