A native of Cáceres and a relative of Álvaro de Sande, he served as attorney, criminal judge, and auditor in Mexico.

[5] He also commissioned an expedition to Borneo in 1578, where the Sultan of Jolo became a vassal of Spain through a peace treaty signed at Río Grande de Mindanao.

[2] In 1579, he sent an expedition again, headed by Captain Gabriel de Ribera to Mindanao and Jolo, to secure Moro submission to Spanish authority.

Upon his return to Luzon, Ribera met some natives from Jolo with little tribute, saying that they had nothing to give to the Spaniards since the Portuguese Estevan Rodriguez de Figueroa had recently attacked their settlements.

travel, to enter China to spread Catholicism, the Chinese being stupefied when some of them disobeyed the Manila Spanish Civil Authorities and arrived at the highly controlled Portuguese trade city of Macao, where they found that they did not carry weapons, money or goods to exchange but only some religious liturgical ware for their own use and Catholic books.