New Treasures from the Lost Galleon, San Felipe 1573-1576

Located on Star of India until November 2010

Your ship is at the mercy of an angry sea...

The blue and white Chinese crockery you will trade for silver has broken loose in the cargo hold...

Most of the crew is sick and controlling the ship is impossible...

Three hundred years later, you are walking along a Baja beach and a bit of blue catches your eye in the wet, washed sand...

Recovered Ming porcelain fragments from the lost Spanish Galleon, San Felipe, offer a rare glimpse into the earliest meetings between dazzled Spaniards and optimistic Chinese merchants in Manila.  They also contain exceptional artwork intentionally created to cross geographic and cultural boundaries.

San Felipe's cargo was a "sampler" of various goods intended to test Spanish markets for future trade.  It contained luxury wares designed for wealthy Japanese, overseas Chinese, Southeast Asian kings, Filipino leaders, and Indonesian rajas - and utilitarian rice bowls typically sent to Southeast-Asian native peoples.  Later cargos were tailored for European tastes.  This one never reached its destination.

More than three centuries after the San Felipe was lost, her wreck site was identified and excavated by a joint Mexican and American archaeological team in a series of expeditions sponsored, in part, by the Maritime Museum of San Diego.  Porcelain fragments from the wreck are exhibited courtesy of the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia (INAH).   Intact porcelains, not from the wreck, are shown for comparison and are on loan to the Maritime Museum by guest curator Edward Von der Porten and his wife, Saryl.