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<a href="https://cdn.kahimyang.com/resources/nicolas-bagay-philippine-racial-groups.webp" rel="lightbox">
<img loading="lazy" src="https://cdn.kahimyang.com/resources/philippine-racial-groups-t.webp" alt="Different racial groups in the Philippines Map of Pedro Murillo Velarde,
engravings by Nicolas de la Cruz Bagay and Francisco Suarez, 1730s" />
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(Different racial groups in the Philippines Map of Pedro Murillo Velarde,
engravings by Nicolas de la Cruz Bagay and Francisco Suarez, 1730s)
</div>
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Bagay first drew attention in 1734 when he engraved Pedro Murillo Velarde’s Mapa de Filipinas, the first detailed map of the Philippines. His name appeared in 1744 in a reduced size of the same map in an engraved copper. He must have gained further prominence as an engraver as his name was mentioned in the Cartas y Cartografica de las Islas dedicada al rey Nuestro Senor por Mariscal de Campo Don Fernando Valdez Tamon Cavailla by Pedro Murillo Velarde.



In 1744, more work came under his expert hands. Among these were the La Navegacion Especulativa y Practica by Gonzalo Cabrera y Bueno; a dedicate engraving of Saint Joseph in 1735 that was attached by Don Jose Cortes de Arrendo y Oriosolo to his work, El Nuevo Predicador de la rey de gracia de San Andres Apostol, a sermon delivered on November 30, 1734 in commemoration of the Spanish victory over <a href="https://kahimyang.com/kauswagan/articles/1319/the-story-of-li-ma-hong-and-his-failed-attempt-to-conquer-manila-in-1574" class="news_link">Li-ma-Hong, the Chinese pirate who invaded Manila in 1574</a>. The Recollects who established their convent in Sampaloc in 1692 published the Mapa General de las Almas que Administran los Padres Agustinos Calzados en Estas Filipinas which continued to be printed until 1836. During the intervening years, Nicolas Bagay directed its printing work.



As a printer he was known far and wide. The friars relied upon and respected his printing expertise: 

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He supervised the printing of the illustration of the martyr San Pedro de Varona in Don Pedro Nunez de Villaviciencio’s Academia devota poetico sagrado vida panygerica del gloriosissimo San Pedro de Varona; 
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The portrait of San Francisco Javier; 
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Padre Murillo Velarde's Catecismo de Padre Murillo, printed in Madrid in 1752; 
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Santo Cristo de Tesoro, venerated in the Real Casa de Misericordia; 
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La Perla del Oriente, derretida en llanto, y llanto elevado a perla fria de lealtad en las sentidad exppesiones del dolor Amante con que la Muy Noble y Muy Leal Ciudad de Manila celebro las Reales Exequitas a la inmortal memoria de su querido Catolico Monarca Don Felipe V printed in 1758, being a sermon commemorating the immortality of Philip V; 
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The portrait of Ferdinand V on horseback found in the Conclusiones Matematicas of Don Fernando Araya in 1758; a picture on the front page of the work of Don Francisco Lagtaria, printed in 1759; 
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He worked with Luis and Francisco Suarez for the illustration and Manga Panalanging Pagtatgobilin sa Caloloua nang Taong Naghihingalo (Prayers for Commanding the Soul of the Dying) and Gaspar Aquino de Belen's Mahal na Pasyon ni Jesus Christong Panginoon Natin na Tola (Holy Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ in Verse); 
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The seal of the Marques of Obando in gold and attached to the treatise of Don Jose Sausa y Magalhanes entitled Matematicas de Astronomia in which he defended the academy of Mathematics in the Jesuit College of Manila, printed in 1762; 
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Fernando VI on horseback with two globes symbolic of his sovereignty over the eastern and westren hemisphere in Relacion de las expresivas demonstraciones on the occasion of the sovereign's elevation to the throne of Spain.
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</ul>

Nicolas de la Cruz Bagay engraver of the first detailed Philippine map