The Sangleys were a populous group of Chinese merchants and artisans who lived in segregated areas around Intramuros, the walled urban core of Spanish Manila. Largely coming from the Fujian region of mainland China, this partly settled and partly floating community provided most of the goods needed daily in the colonial capital and other parts of the Spanish Philippines, and some of its members became crucial actors in the commercial networks that connected the South China Sea and the transpacific trade. After the arrival of the first Fujianese merchants to the riverbanks of the Pasig in the 1570s, the Chinese population of Manila and its surroundings must have largely outnumbered the Spanish colonists almost at any point in history. Their prominence in the social and economic life of the colony and their distinctive treatment vis-à-vis the native Filipino population of the area have led some historians to assert that Spanish Manila was actually a Chinese city.

The following document is a detailed description of Manila's Chinese neighborhoods and people, paying particular attention to everyday life, popular cultural practices, and the activity of the Dominican friars in charge of converting and preaching to the Chinese population of the city.