Luções

" and resembling the people of Borneo to the point that they are treated as one and the same."Citation
last = Pires
first = Tomé
author-link = Tomé Pires
title = A suma oriental de Tomé Pires e o livro de Francisco Rodriguez: Leitura e notas de Armando Cortesão [1512 - 1515]
editor=Armando Cortesao (translator)
language=Portuguese
place = Cambridge
publisher = Hakluyt Society
year = 1944 ] cite book
last=Lach
first=Donald Frederick
authorlink= Donald Lach
title= Asia in the Making of Europe
year=1994
publisher=University of Chicago Press
location=Chicago
chapter= Chapter 8: The Philippine Islands
isbn = 0226467325] cite book
last=Reid
first=Anthony
authorlink= Anthony Reid (academic)
editor=Peter Bellwood, James J. Fox, and Darrell Tryon
title=The Austronesians: Historical and comparative perspectives
year=1995
publisher=Department of Anthropology, The Australian National University
location=Canberra
chapter= Continuity and Change in the Austronesian Transition to Islam and Christianity
chapterurl=http://epress.anu.edu.au/austronesians/austronesians/mobile_devices/ch16.html ]

Because numerous ethnic groups live on the Island of Luzon, different sources have suggested different identities for the Luçoes: the Tagalogs of Maynila and Tondo; the Kapampangans; or, taking note of the Phonetic similarities of the names, the Ilocanos.

What little is known about the Lucoes is primarily from accounts Fernão Mendes Pinto (1614); Tomé Pires (whose account was discovered and published in 1944); and Antonio Pigafetta, the Italian scholar who chronicled the journey of Ferdinand Magellan and published it in 1524.

The Lucoes as Traders

Pires noted that they were "mostly heathen" and were not much esteemed in Malacca at the time he was there, although he also noted that they were strong, industrious, given to useful pursuits. Pires' investigations led him to discover that in their own country, the lucoes had "foodstuffs, wax, honey, inferior grade gold," had no king, and were governed instead by a group of elders.

They traded in Borneo and Malacca, and Southeast Asian historians note that the language of the Lucoes was one of the 80 different languages spoken in Malacca [ [http://210.0.141.99/eng/malaysia/ChineseMuslim_in_Malaysia.asp Chinese Muslims in Malaysia, History and Development] by Rosey Wang Ma] When Magellan's ship arrived in Timor, Pigafetta noted that there were Lucoes there collecting sandalwood. Citation
last = Pigafetta
first = Antonio
author-link = Antonio Pigafetta
title = First voyage round the world
language=English (Trans. J.A. Robertson, 1969)
place = Manila:
publisher = Filipiniana Book Guild
year = 1524 ]

The Lucoes as Sea Warriors

The Lucoes' activities weren't limited to trade however. They also had a reputation for being fierce warriors of the sea.

Pinto noted that there were quite a number of them in the Muslim fleets that went to battle with the Portuguese in the South China Sea during the sixteenth century. The sultan of Aceh gave one of them the of task of holding Aru (northeast Sumatra) in 1540. Pinto also says one was named head (temenggong) of the Malays remaining in Melaka after the Portuguese conquest in 1511.Citation
last = Pinto
first = Fernao Mendes
author-link = Fernao Mendes Pinto
title = The travels of Mendes Pinto.
language= English (Trans. Rebecca Catz, 1989)
place = Chicago
publisher = University of Chicago Press
year = 1578] Pigafetta notes that one of them was in command of the Brunei fleet in 1521.

However, the Lucoes did not only fight on the side of the Muslims. Pinto says they were also apparently among the navies of the Batak kings who fought the muslims in 1538. Scholars have thus suggested that they could be mercenaries valued by all sides.

After 1571

Whoever the Lucoes actually were, Anthony Reid notes that "they disappear from descriptions of the archipelago after the Spanish conquest of Manila in 1571." The island of Luzon still bears their name, but which of the many ethnic groups of that island they may actually have belonged to cannot be conclusively determined.

Sources

Additional sources

*cite book
last = Scott
first = William Henry
authorlink = William Henry Scott
coauthors =
title = Barangay: Sixteenth Century Philippine Culture and Society
publisher = Ateneo de Manila University Press
date = 1994
location = Quezon City
isbn = 971-550-135-4