book issued there appeared in 1610." [45]


Pardo de Tavera was the first to call attention to Alter, and through
him to Hervas, and in all probability the orientalists at the London
Congress had seen the Doctrina cited by one of these or Adelung. But he
rejects that evidence in no uncertain terms. Mitigating somewhat his
assurance, he speaks following the above-quoted passage of printing
in China, and differentiates between xylographic and typographic
printing, and since he was obviously thinking in terms of printing
on a press with movable type his conclusions are not too extreme.

In 1896 appeared José Toribio Medina's _La Imprenta en Manila_, which
was up to then the best, most complete and most scholarly work on early
Philippine printing, and is today with its subsequent additions and
corrections the standard bibliography of the subject. There Medina
cited most of the authorities we have already quoted, the letter of
Dasmariñas, Fernández' _Historia eclesiastica_, Aduarte, Adelung,
Beristain and Pardo de Tavera. Then, basing his conclusions strongly
on the Dasmariñas letter and the note of Adelung, he listed [46]
as number one in his bibliography the Doctrina of 1593 in Spanish
and Tagalog, and as number two the Doctrina in Spanish and Chinese
of the same year. This is a verdict which has stood the test of
time, and one that is just now confirmed by the discovery of the
book itself. Two points, however, in his survey should be noted. In
his discussion of the printing and the authorship Medina does not
emphasize the Dominican origin of the book, although he does say that
"it does not appear bold to us to suppose that the imprint of these
Doctrinas ought to be the Hospital of San Gabriel in this village
[Binondo]," [47] and faithfully copies Adelung's imprint notice, "in