The God Culture Philippines Biblical History Library

🪶 THE SMOKING QUILL | May 22, 2025

175 Leagues to Luzon —

Barbosa’s True Lequios Exposed

🔰 INTRODUCTION: A Note That Changes Everything

In the 16th-century accounts of Duarte Barbosa, a single note in the Spanish version of his journal may contain one of the most significant suppressed geographic truths in colonial history. The marginal annotation “175 leagues to the east” has often been overlooked, yet it aligns precisely with a Luzon-region destination when measured from either China or Malacca. This is not mere coincidence—it is a cartographic key that unlocks the mystery of Lequios. And the story doesn’t end there.

🛍 SECTION 1: Lequios in the Right Place

Barbosa's narrative describes a powerful and wealthy trading people called the "Lequeos" (also noted as Lequios or Liquii in other versions). While many colonial propagandists attempted to reframe Lequios as Ryukyu, Barbosa's own geographic context speaks differently:

• "Facing the great land of China" situates Lequios across the sea from China.

• "Come to Malaca every year" situates it along the same east-west trade corridor.

• The 175-league margin note (Spanish version) places it within sailing range of Luzon, not Okinawa.

• 📍 Note:Hainan Island, China (18°10′ to 20°10′ N), lies almost perfectly parallel with northern Luzon and the Batanes Islands. Lequios (noted at 20.45° N) sits due east, directly facing China — just as Barbosa described. This geographic alignment further confirms Luzon–Batanes as the true Lequios, not the northeast-shifted Ryukyu archipelago.

A straight-line measurement of 175 leagues (~900 km) from southern China or Malacca places us squarely in northern Luzon or the Batanes region.

🚣 SECTION 2: Ships, Routes, and People

Barbosa describes the Lequios as more prosperous than the Chinese, sailing in:

• Three to four large ships yearly to Malacca

• With merchants of white complexion

This matches well with Spanish and Portuguese references to Lucones or Lequios of Luzon—not Okinawan fishermen. The Luzon-based trade elite were renowned across Asia for their maritime presence, diplomacy, and wealth.

💰 SECTION 3: The Wealth of the Lequios

The resource list Barbosa provides is both extensive and revealing:

• Gold in bars

• Silver

• Silks and rich cloths

• Porcelains

• Very good wheat

Let’s test this:

• Ryukyu had no recorded gold in bars, limited silver, and wheat only introduced late and not praised.

• Luzon and Batanes, by contrast, were documented to export gold, host ancient mining activity, and grow Adlay wheat, a high-nutrient native cereal known for its medicinal and culinary value ("very good wheat" indeed).

🌾 Note: Batanes, often labeled Lequio Grande in maps, grows Adlay to this day.

🔎 SECTION 4: The Spanish Footnote — Correction or Cover-up?

The Spanish version includes the 175-league distance, while other editions omit it. Why?

• It's possible the Spanish knew exactly where Lequios was—having sailed there.

• Magellan himself is suspected of having replaced “Lequios” with “Ofir and Tarsis” in a separate version.

• If so, this may be a clarification of Barbosa, not a corruption.

Either way, the Spanish annotation confirms that they knew Lequios = Luzon, and 175 leagues is the linchpin.

🗺 SECTION 5: Contextual and Cartographic Support

Support from other explorers is overwhelming:

• Pigafetta used the spelling Lequii, pointing to Luzon.

• Ortelius (1589) maps Lequios as Luzon and Batanes.

• Cabot (1544) shows a Lequios Canal west of Luzon in the West Philippine Sea next to Palawan.

• Pinto placed Lequios south of Japan in a multi-island archipelago rich in gold.

Lequios was always in the Philippines. Only through Jesuit-era reframing did it migrate north to Ryukyu without logic or accuracy.

✅ CONCLUSION: The Real Lequios Was Always in Luzon

175 leagues confirms what Barbosa's descriptions already implied:

• Facing China

• Trading at Malacca

• Richer than the Chinese

• High-quality wheat

• Gold and silver bars

All evidence points to northern Luzon and Batanes. Ryukyu matches none of the criteria.

Barbosa's marginal note is a smoking quill.

It was never vague. It was never lost. It was Luzon all along.

"The truth was never buried. It was footnoted."
This single line may become iconic.