The God Culture Philippines Biblical History Library

THE SMOKING QUILL | MAY 1, 2025

From Seville With Gold — Barbosa, Magellan, and the Suppressed Identification of Ophir. 1915 French Journal Reveals the Untold History

Case Summary:

This Smoking Quill exposé reveals a monumental confirmation buried in a 1907 French academic journal. The article verifies that Odoardo Barbosa and Ferdinand Magellan identified the Lequios Islands as the Biblical lands of Ophir and Tarshish, not speculatively, but in a formal manuscript preserved in the Archives of the Indies in Seville. This record, suppressed in later editions, was part of a Spanish government submission prior to Magellan’s expedition to the Moluccas.

Primary Evidence:

1. French Source (1907) – Bulletin de la Société Royale Belge de Géographie, pp. 439–461

“Odardo Barbosa… resolutely identified [Lequios] with Ophir and Tarshish… in a document we found in the Archives of the Indies in Seville.”

1. Magellan's Submission

“It is permissible… to conclude that the navigator [Magellan] presented to the King the revised version of the report by his friend Barbosa… accompanying it with formal astronomical determinations.”

1. Suppression in Print

2. The Seville manuscript used “Ophir and Tarshish.”

3. The Lisbon printed edition replaced them with “Lequios.”

4. The 1907 journal concludes this was a clear editorial shift obscuring the original biblical identification.

Supporting Evidence:

• Cabot Map (1544): Labels the “Canal of the Lequios” in Philippine waters.

• Santa Cruz Map (1539): Places “Carrigara” and Cebu together between 7–12°N latitude. Places Lequios Canal in West Philippine Sea

• Document #98 (Spanish Archive): Equates Lequios and Ophir directly, and as a destination more important than China.

• Pigafetta’s Journal: Notes traders from the northwest (i.e., Luzon) during his time in Cebu.

• Galvao (1555): Places the Lequios specifically as Lucones (Luzon). Defines Pinto's shipwreck on Luzon as well. 

• Castenhada (1883): Defined the Lequios Isles as Southeast of China, never Ryukyu nor Japan. 

Conclusion:

The identification of the Lequios Islands as Ophir and Tarshish was official Spanish policy, documented by Magellan, recorded by Barbosa, and submitted to the Crown. The editorial erasure that followed was not an academic oversight—it was cartographic and historical suppression.

This exposé restores the truth, not by conjecture, but by returning to the primary source in Seville that declared the Philippines the Land of Gold—Ophir.

Yah Bless.

The God Culture Team

Note: Though Nowell provided priceless data in finding this French Journal, he failed to understand it, and failed to overcome Colonial bias. We will cover this in a coming blog soon.