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- Title:
- A Nose For Food
- Description:
- Around this time, March, Chinese traders who had arrived in Manila from December to early January would sail home happy with silver payment. Bobadilla writes, “Those Chinese merchants are so keen after gain that if one sort of merchandise has succeeded well one year, they take a great deal of it the following year.” So every Christmas season the Spanish were brought small oranges, nuts, chestnuts, raisins, plums, flour and more. A Spaniard lost his nose through a certain illness. He likely couldn’t smell his food anymore. He sent for a Chinese to make him one of wood to hide his deformity. It was so well done that the trader was well rewarded. The next year he brought a fine boatload of wooden noses. But in order to sell, writes Bobadilla, “he would have to cut off the noses of all the Spaniards in the colony.” Figuring out what new products the export market desires is a recurring dilemma even today. In a twist of events, the noses of Catholic statuary were chopped off during the Philippine Revolution that started in 1896 because they looked Spanish.
- Subjects:
- Chinese Trading
- Exhibition:
- Diego Bob 1616
- Source:
- “Head of a Man,” Diego Velazquez, c. 1616 the year Bobadilla arrived in Manila. Hermitage Museum, Russia. Wikiart public domain.
- Type:
- Image;Still Image
- Format:
- image/jpeg
Source
- Preferred Citation:
- "A Nose For Food", Philippine Food History, Felice P. Sta. Maria
- Reference Link:
- felicepstamaria.net/items/coll085.html
Rights
- Rights:
- public domain