REY CARLOS IV

During the Spanish period, the central point of the Philippines was the Plaza Mayor de Manila in Intramuros. The plaza was surrounded by the four most powerful institutions of the colony. On the northern end was the Ayuntamiento which housed the city council; on the southern end was the Palacio del Gobernador General. The eastern end had the Real Audiencia or the colony’s judiciary, and on the west sat the most powerful officials of them all in the Manila Cathedral.

But in the middle of this most important Plaza stands the statue of a Spanish person most Filipinos do not recognize. It is not of King Felipe II whom the country is named after. It is not of Magellan nor Legazpi nor Urdaneta nor any other Spaniard that actually set foot in the Philippines. So to whom did we bestow the honor of having a statue erected in our most historic plaza?

Rey Carlos IV.

And the reason is simple—among all the Spanish people that affected the history of the country, the most important person was the king that brought to us the smallpox vaccine. And it says so right on the plaque on the statue (and also on the tourist marker in the plaza).

The statue is just another reminder that the country has been through worse plagues than this and yet we have survived. There are enough memorials all over for us to remember our history. But unfortunately we do not do enough memorializing to learn the lessons from our past.