Spanish and Portuguese Conflict in the Spice Islands: The Loaysa Expedition to the Moluccas 1525-1535

Book excerpt: Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés, (1478–1557), warden of the fortress and port of Santo Domingo of the Island of Hispaniola, also served his emperor, Charles V, as the official chronicler of the first half-century of the Spanish presence in the New World. His monumental General y Natural Historia de las Indias, consisting of three parts, with fifty books, hundreds of chapters and thousands of pages, is still a major primary source for researchers of the period 1492–1548. Part One, consisting of 19 books, was first published in 1535, then reprinted and augmented in 1547, with a third edition, including Book XX, the first book of Part II, appearing in Valladolid in 1557. Book XX, which was printed separately in Valladolid in 1557 (the year of Oviedo’s death), concerns the first three Spanish voyages to the East Indies. While it might be expected that the narrative of Magellan’s voyage would predominate in Book XX, Oviedo devoted only the first four chapters to this monumental voyage. The remaining thirty–one concern the two subsequent and little-known Spanish follow-up expeditions to the Moluccas 1525-35. The first, initially led by García Jofre de Loaysa, set out from Coruña to follow Magellan’s route through the Strait and across the Pacific. A second relief expedition under Alvaro Saavedra was sent out in search of Loaysa’s company from the Pacific coast of New Spain in 1527. In each venture only one vessel reached the Spice Islands. Oviedo’s narrative offers many details of the 10 years of hardships and conflict with the Portuguese, endured by the stoic Spanish, and of the growing unrest it provoked among their indigenous hosts. The news that Charles V had pawned his claim to the King João III of Portugal allowed a very few of the Spaniards to negotiate a passage back to Spain via Lisbon, while others remained in Portuguese settlements in the East Indies. The reports made by the returnees to the Consejo de Indias were integrated by Oviedo into his narrative, expanded and enriched by personal interviews. His chronicle includes much information about the indigenous culture, commerce, geography and of the exotic fauna and flora of the Spice Islands.