Not sure if this has been posted...
"Old maps dating back to Spanish colonial times may hold the key to the claim of the Philippines to Scarborough Shoal.
Known as “Bajo Scarburo,” the shoal now called Panatag by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), has been part of the known world since 1734, when European cartographers began to map the world in an age of conquest.
In fact, Bajo Scarburo appeared on a map of the “Archipelago Filipino” as a constituent part of Sambalez (Zambales province) in a topographic map of the country “drawn under the direction of Ildefonso de Aragon on April 15, 1820.”
Senator Edgardo J. Angara, who has a collection of ancient maps of the country, told the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Sunday that the maps would easily disprove the territorial claim of China to the shoal and its surrounding waters, which, he said, had no historical or legal grounds under the United Nations Convention on the Laws of the Sea (Unclos).
“It’s clear that Scarborough Shoal is part of our cartography during the Spanish colonial times,” he said. “We have maps (reproduced) from the original, which was made in 1734. During that time, Scarborough is already part of the Philippines.”
The DFA has asked Beijing to resolve the dispute through arbitration in the United Nations-backed International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea, but China swiftly rejected this."
http://globalnation.inquirer.net/343...-old-maps-show
Originally Posted by Iani
