Melchor Oyanguren de Santa Inés (1688–1747) was a Basque Franciscan missionary and linguist who served in Asia and North America. He wrote grammars of Japanese (1738) and Tagalog (1742). Oyanguren was born in 1688 in Salinas de Léniz (Leintz Gatzaga) in the province of Guipúzcoa (Gipuzkoa), Spain. As a young man, he joined the . He went to the Philippines in 1717 intending to go on to Japan, but the Japanese policy of Sakoku severely restricted entry to foreigners and he was unable. He went to Cochinchina and Cambodia instead. Poor health brought about his return to Spain. In 1721 he left for Mexico, but pastoral duties brought him to the Philippines again in 1723 or 1725. Between 1726 and 1736 he was the teacher (doctrinero) and minister of the village of Los Baños de Aguas Santas. In 173