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The Boxer Codex is a late sixteenth century Spanish manuscript that was produced in the Philippines. The document contains seventy-five colored illustrations of the peoples of China, the Philippines, Java, the Moluccas, the Ladrones, and Siam. About 270 pages of Spanish text describe these places, their inhabitants and customs. An additional eighty-eight smaller drawings show mythological deities and demons, and both real and mythological birds and animals copied from popular Chinese texts and books in circulation at the time.

The eminent historian, Charles Ralph Boxer, purchased the manuscript in 1947 from the collection of Lord Ilchester in London. Boxer recognized the importance of what he called the "Manila Manuscript" and published a paper in 1950 with a detailed description of the codex. He made the manuscript freely available to other researchers for study and it became known as the "Boxer Codex" in recognition of its owner. Eventually Boxer sold the codex to Indiana University where it is held by the Lilly Library

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The pictures are just fabulous

Boxer Codex


A Lady from the Cagayan Valley (Possibly Ibanag)


Native common women wearing simple clothes and headscarves (likely Muslims from Maynila in the 1500s)


Aeta or "Negrito" hunters


Tagalog royalty in red (the distinctive color of his class) with his wife.

There are several more to see in Wikipedias entry about the manuscript

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Once an archaeologist, always an archaeologist

Posts: 2683 | From: Sweden | Registered: Mar 2020  |  IP: Logged | 

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In 1947, colonial Iberian maritime scholar Professor Charles R. Boxer acquired a late sixteenth-century manuscript written by an anonymous scribe who had compiled several eyewitness accounts of both Spanish and Portuguese expeditions to Asia and the Pacific. Through detailed descriptions and lavish illustrations, this manuscript depicted the customs, costumes, and ways of life of the various peoples of East and Southeast Asia, particularly the Philippine Islands. In the decades since the book came to light, an international constellation of scholars the world over has expanded our understanding of this valuable document and given us the clearest depiction of the lives of newly colonized Filipinos and the politics of early modern Asia. As such, the Boxer Codex is indispensable in understanding both Iberian and Asian encounters at a pivotal time in world history.

Now this invaluable work is made accessible to a new generation of Filipinos and scholars with this bilingual edition, written in modern Spanish and English. It also marks the beginning of the commemoration of 500 years of Philippine-Spanish encounters from 1521 to 2021. An extensive introduction situates this work in a global context and presents the intertwined histories of academician Charles Boxer and Philippine National Artist Carlos Quirino, whose friendship ignited global interest and passionate study of the codex.

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Isaac Donoso (ed) 2021: Boxer Codex: A Modern Spanish Transcription and English Translation of 16th-Century Exploration Accounts of East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific

The Boxer Codex



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Once an archaeologist, always an archaeologist

Posts: 2683 | From: Sweden | Registered: Mar 2020  |  IP: Logged |