The books in the earliest library of the University of Santo Tomas

It has recently been confirmed that many books were brought to the Philippines from Europe in the 1564 expedition of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi. Fr. Martin de Rada, OSA, later brought books from China and he also possessed European books. It is well-known that Fr. Benavides gave his books in founding the University of Santo Tomas. The earlier UST Archivist, Fr. Jesus Gayo, analyzed the writings of Fr. Benavides, so we know to what books he referred. Building on this earlier work by Fr. Gayo, and other more recent work, we are now able to give a picture of more than fifty titles of books that were very likely in the library of the University of Santo Tomas when it began. We also know of five people whose books entered the library at that very early stage. Besides Fr. Benavides, there were Fr. Diego de Soria, OP, Archbishop Ignacio Santibanez, OFM, the government fiscal Hieronimo Salazar y Salcedo, and Hernando de los Rios Coronel, the Procurator General of the Philippines. Most of the books are on religious matters and Dominicans wrote fourteen of them. The fifty books listed are still in the Heritage Library of the University of Santo Tomas