Antonio Margil de Jesús
August 18, 1657–August 6, 1726
Spanish Texas was more than a provincial frontier. It was part of a larger Atlantic world, and Franciscan missionary Antonio Margil de Jesús embodies its breadth. Father Margil sailed from Spain to evangelize from Costa Rica to East Texas, his achievements resonating through Mexico City, Madrid, Paris, and Rome.
Born in Valencia, Spain, in 1657, Margil joined the Franciscan order as a teenager and in 1683 ventured to Mexico to spread the Catholic faith among the New World’s native peoples. He sought the most challenging assignments, traveling barefoot over rough terrain through the Yucatan, Guatemala, and Costa Rica.
In the early 1700s, Margil returned to central Mexico to direct missionary colleges in Queretaro and Zacatecas. He then headed north to Texas, where French incursions had renewed Spanish imperial interest. In 1716, Margil joined an expedition to establish missions among the Caddos and other native groups in East Texas. Of the expedition’s six mission settlements, Margil founded those at Nacogdoches and Los Adaes.
In 1719, after the French attacked the East Texas missions, the Spaniards retreated to San Antonio. There, Margil founded Mission San José, called the "Queen" of the missions and the best-preserved Texas mission complex today.
Margil died in Mexico City in 1726, advocating for the troubled East Texas missions to the end. The Vatican continues to consider Margil as a candidate for sainthood.
For More about Antonio Margil de Jesús
South of Saint Augustine in East Texas, the Mission Dolores State Historic Site marks the location of one of the missions that traces its history back to Fray Margil’s service. No physical structures remain, but archaeological digs have revealed much about life among the region’s Spanish missionaries and native peoples. Another East Texas site relevant to Margil’s life is Los Ojos de Padre Margil, a pair of now-dormant natural springs that folklore claims Margil discovered in the summer of 1718 during a particularly harsh drought. A historical marker now graces the pilgrimage site.
Often called the "Queen" of the city’s missions, Mission San José is the largest, best-preserved, and most well-known of San Antonio’s mission complexes. After extensive restoration in the 1930s by the Works Progress Administration, the mission Margil founded gives visitors a sense of life in Spanish colonial Texas. Among its key attractions is the church’s famed Rose Window, considered one of the finest examples of Baroque design in North America.
Leading historian of Spanish Texas, Frank de la Teja, spoke to the subject of "Understanding Spanish Texas through the Life of Fray Margil" in the Texas Historical Association’s Texas Talks video series. There, he makes the case that Fray Margil’s biography can help us understand the global context and intellectual and theological underpinnings of colonial Spanish Texas.
Selected Bibliography
Abernethy, F. E. "Locating the Eyes of Father Margil." East Texas Historical Journal 42, no.1 (2004): 3–9.
Castañeda, Carlos Eduardo. Our Catholic Heritage in Texas, Volume II: The Winning of Texas, 1693–1731. Austin: Von Boeckmann-Jones Company, 1976 [1936].
Chipman, Donald E. and Harriet Denise Joseph. Notable Men and Women of Spanish Texas. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1999.
Chipman, Donald E. Spanish Texas, 1519–1821. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1992.
Forrestal, Peter. "The Venerable Padre Fray Antonio Margil de Jesús." In Wilderness Mission: Preliminary Studies of the Texas Catholic Historical Society II, edited by Jesús F. de la Teja. Austin: Texas Catholic Historical Society, 1999.
Galan, Francis X. Los Adaes: The First Capital of Spanish Texas. College Station: Texas A&M University, 2020.
Habig, Marion A. San Antonio's Mission San Jose. San. Antonio: The Naylor Company, 1968.
Oberste, William H. The Restless Friar: Venerable Fray Antonio Margil de Jesus, Missionary to the Americas, Apostle of Texas. Austin: Von Boeckmann-Jones Company, 1970.
Smith, F. Todd. The Caddo Indians: Tribes at the Convergence of Empires, 1542–1854. College Station: Texas A&M University, 1995.
Weber, David. The Spanish Frontier in North America. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992.
Weddle, Robert S. San Juan Bautista: Gateway to Spanish Texas. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1968.
Spanish Translation
Download the Spanish translation of this Texas Originals script.
P. Fray Antonio Margil de Jesús, Oil on Canvas, 1726, Museo Regional de Michoacán, Nicolás León Calderón, D. R. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico. Accessed via the INAH Media Library.
Mission San José in San Antonio. Photo by Justine Hanrahan, courtesy of the National Park Service.