Japanese Books from Luzon

The Spanish Dominican, Juan Rueda de los Ángeles, (?-1624) learned Japanese and wrote four books on the Rosary. These Japanese books are written in Latin characters. They were published in the Philippines by the Tagalog printer Thomas Pinpin. Father Rueda is not mentioned in the list of foreigners associated with Japan by E. Papinot in his Historical and Geographical Dictionary of Japan (1910). On the other hand, Aduarte mentions him in his Historia (1640). This modest booklet is a mere presentation of these rare books, and its sole purpose is to draw scholars' attention to their existence.