Tagalogs Voicing their Faith in 1600s Vernacular Documents (3): The Settlement of Doña Juana Manahin’s Will towards the Foundation of a Capellanía, 1697

Abstract

Sickly and dying, Doña Juana Manahin dictated her last will and testament on 23 July 1691. From this document1, we learn that she was born in Puerto de Cavite, of the legitimate marriage of Don Juan Catorla and Doña María Cytain. (Typically in the 17th-century, Doña Juana did not carry her father’s family name. Her surname, based on the Tagalog word for inheritance, mana, would mean “will inherit.”) She was married to sargento mayor Don Bernavé Aliguid, now deceased. Her husband was a native of Banban, doctrina or mission station of the town of Bulacan, capital of the eponymous province (Fig.