In celebration of the Heritage Month of May, the author began compiling Albay Heritage Series which consisted of 40 parts which he uploaded daily on his Facebook page. With his generous permission, we are posting this series from now through October.
PART 5: THE FOUNDING OF ALBAY
Even prior to the coming of the Spanish colonizers in 1567, Albay, much like the rest of the archipelago, had a thriving civilization and rich culture.
As early as July 1569, Luis Enriquez de Guzman, a member of the Spanish expedition headed by Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, led the first group of Spanish explorers in the province when they sailed north from the Visayas and set foot in the southeastern side of the region, in a town called Gibalong, then travelling by land until they reached the town of Camalig, Albay. Since then, a number of exploratory sorties were conducted by Spanish colonizers and adventurers in the Bicol Peninsula to either establish settlements or to search for gold. In 1572, the adventurer and grandson of Legazpi, named Juan de Salcedo penetrated the Bicol Peninsula from the north and made it as far south as Libon, Albay seeking gold. He established there the very first settlement in the region called Santiago de Libon.
On April 3, 1574, a number of villages, including one called “Baybayo” which should be taken to mean baybayon or “walkway in the seashore,” became encomiendas or “entrusted villages” assigned by Spanish Governor General Guido de Lavezares to Juan Guerra. This important data is inscribed in the famed Archivo General de Indias in Seville, Spain, and provides the indisputable proof of Albay’s entrance into the Spanish imperial chart.
Baybayo would later be called ‘Baybay’ which in time evolved into “Albay.” On May 14, 1834, Jose Maria Peñaranda, a military engineer, became Governor of Albay, serving the province as governor from 1834 to 1843. An outstanding leader, Peñaranda is credited as the leading developer of Albay largely because of his many contributions to the development of the province.
While beginning 2004 Albay Day was celebrated on May 14th of every year to commemorate Governor Jose Maria Peñaranda’s installation as governor of Albay, the date was later moved to April 3 by virtue of Proclamation No. 2010-01 issued by then Governor Joey Salceda when the preeminent Bikol historian, Dr. Danilo Madrid Gerona, revealed in his book titled “Albay, Winding Down the Historic Abaca Trail” that the later date, i.e. April 3, is more appropriate since it marked the day when Spanish Governor-General Guido de Lavezares assigned to Juan Guerra certain villages which were eventually constituted as the first encomienda villages in Albay. In the words of Dr. Gerona, “As encomienda villages, they paved the way for the rise of municipalities which served as the structural base upon which the Spanish colonial regime in the province took root.”
PART 6: SANTIAGO DE LIBONG; THE FIRST SPANISH GARRISON IN THE REGION
The first group of Spanish colonizers was led by Ferdinand Magellan, and it arrived in the Visayas on March 16, 1521. Magellan was slain in Mactan by the men of a local chieftain named Lapulapu, and Juan Sebastian Elcano continued the voyage, arriving back in Spain on September 6, 1522, thereby completing the first circumnavigation of the globe. The second group was led by Roy Lopez de Villalobos, and they arrived in the Visayas on February 2, 1543. The third group led by the Adelantado Miguel Lopez de Legazpi arrived on February 13, 1565, and used Cebu as its initial seat of power. In Cebu he learned of a big island up north and sent expeditionary groups on small boats to explore the island in the north. That year a place called Ybalon appeared in a 1565 Hispanic charts by Capitan Juan de la Isla.
In the latter part of 1569, one of these expeditionary groups on a small boat led by Don Luis de Guzman and Fray Alonso Jimenez chanced on the island of Burias, went further north and entered the mouth of a river and landed on a place called Gibalon. There Fray Jimenez celebrated the first mass on the island. Unknown to them, Gibalong was already part of the large island of Luzon. The group continued its journey inland until they saw a settlement with many “camarin” and called it Camarines. According to some chroniclers, the place would later be called Camalig. A few years later Ybalon and Camalig would serve as the jumping point for the colonization of the entire island, which would be called Luzon.
In May 1571, Capitan Juan de Salcedo and Martin de Goiti conquered a city up north called Maynila, which was ruled by a Muslim chieftain Rajah Sulayman. The following year, Salcedo would learn of the report of Juan de la Isla that “Further north of Masbate lies the island of Ybalon…this island is large and has many rivers in which gold is found…”
Immediately, Juan de Salcedo and Alferez Pedro de Chavez organized a troop of 120 soldiers that travelled south, passing Majayjay and Laguna towards Bikol. They attacked the gold mines of Mambulao and Paracale, followed the meandering Bikol River and continued looting villages on its banks—for gold. They reached Lake Bato, followed another river (probably Quimba River), went upland and set up the very first Spanish garrison in Bikol called Santiago de Libong.
SANTIAGO DE LIBONG
There are conflicting reports as to when and where the Spanish garrison called Santiago de Libong was set up. There are some reports stating that the garrison was set up immediately after Capitan Juan de Salcedo attacked Paracale in 1571. Some other historians state that it was during the second expedition of Salcedo in 1573 that the garrison, and consequently the town of Libon was founded.
It was also reported that the garrison was made of bamboo and light materials and could not be relied on to safeguard the Spaniards in case of an attack by the aggrieved natives. Thus, because of their precarious condition, Alferez Pedro de Chavez who was entrusted by Salceda to defend it, abandoned the garrison and left for Manila on July 24, 1574. When Chavez was sent back to the Bicol Region in 1579, he did not return to Libon, he instead founded a city in Camarines called Nueva Caceres—in honor of the home city in Spain of Governor Francisco de Sande.
THE FIRST CATHOLIC CHURCH IN BIKOL?
When I was looking for the remains of the garrison Santiago de Libong, I went to the site of the Church of Saint James in the center of the town of Libon and inspected the remains of the old church. I only found four old buttresses at the back of the church. The area was used as a dumping ground for garbage. I also found an old water well, the rim of which was made of blocks of stone near the convent. An old man said that the well was used by the Spaniards during the colonization period. Sadly, this well could no longer be seen because the Parish covered it with a gazebo and installed images of angels made of concrete. Thus, an important cultural heritage was lost.
Then someone informed me that the garrison was not in the center of Libon but in a village called Linao, some 4 kilometers from the town and on the banks of the river Quiba. I visited Linao and was guided by a resident called Arturo Osorman—who told me a very disturbing tale. According to him, he bought a piece of land uphill a few meters away from his house and when he started to till it, he unearthed many old bricks strewn all over the place. Not knowing what to do with it, he looked for whoever was interested in buying it. He was able to find a buyer sometime in the 1970s and the bricks were excavated and loaded on seven 10-wheeler trucks! Where were the bricks brought? He said he was informed that the bricks were to be used as partitions in fishponds in Cavite! Another important cultural heritage was lost.
PART 7: CAGSAWA
Cagsawa or Kagsawa was a settlement southeast of Camalig. Its name came from KAG-which means “an owner of”; and SAWA- the local name for a large snake of the python family. Folktales told of an early settler in the area who tamed large snakes for good luck and to prey on the rats. The parish in Cagsawa was founded in 1587 as a visita of Camalig. A visita is a satellite or extension of a parish visited (thus visita) by a priest only when there is a request from the villagers or when an important event needed a priest.
The visita of Cagsawa was founded by the Franciscan head, Fray Pedro Bautista, who was later sent to Japan on May 30, 1593, to head a mission, was martyred by Emperor Hideyosi on Febuary 5, 1597, and became a saint in 1862. The first church was consecrated to St. James the Great.
The arrival of traders and entrepreneurs in the settlement caused the initial flourishing of trade and industry in Cagsawa. Unfortunately, tragedy came on February 1, 1814, when the whole settlement was destroyed by the eruption of Mayon Volcano. The Cagsawa survivors transferred to the nearby settlement of Daraga.
Today, only 3 groups of ruins mark the place of the old Pueblo de Cagsawa: The Iglesia which includes the bell tower, the church and the convento; the Casa Real where social functions were held and the Ayuntamiento which was the government house.
The Cagsawa Ruins became a symbol of the resilience of the Albayanos as the survivors of the tragedy in 1814 was able to migrate in Daraga, which later became a very prosperous town. The Ruins became one of the most visited tourist sites in Albay, with a daily average of over one thousand visitors. The Cagsawa bell tower became the most photographed structure in Albay. On December 23, 2015, the National Museum declared the Cagsawa Ruins Park as a National Cultural Treasure.
PART 8: RELIGION & MYTHS
A long, long time ago, before foreign settlers and colonizers came to the land of the Bicolanos, the natives had a religion of their own. They believed in gods and they respected and worshipped them. They told stories of how their world came about and how men and animals and mountains and rivers and plants were created. These legends were handed down from one generation to another. They had stories about adventures in known and unknown worlds, and they told folktales to amuse the young ones. They chanted songs of love and of longing and wrote the words as poems—rawitdawit to the common folks. They drew lessons from their adventures and fashioned short, witty sayings called ariwaga, so that the young could easily memorize them and learn lessons and good morals from. Their perilous adventures with fierce creatures, real or imagined, gave rise to superstitions that are observed even today. They had rituals to implore the blessings of God, to enchant a loved one, to heal the sick and to drive away monsters.
These stories of the origins, legends, and superstitions of Bikol gave rise to a horde of distinct gods, heroes, fairies, beasts and monsters that inhabit the natural and the supernatural world of our ancestors. One such very curious creature is a Tambaluslos which in its heyday would swiftly capture and rape any person or animal it catches, until the gods punished it by enlarging its sexual organ to such size that nothing could accommodate it anymore.
What we know today about these beliefs, few as they are, come to us from oral stories of old people, from songs and chants that broke time barriers, and from written accounts of early chroniclers and historians. One of such accounts was written by a Franciscan friar named Fray Jose Castaño who came to Bikol in 1871 and wrote “Breve Noticia Acerca del origin, religion, creencias y supersticiones de los antiguos Indios del Bicol.” This compendium of origins, religion, legends and superstitions of the ancient natives of Bikol was included in one of the several volumes of Wenceslao Retana’s “Archivo del Bibliofilo Filipino” published in Madrid, Spain in 1895.
A friend of mine, an American researcher named Matt Victoria Furlong chanced upon a copy of this account of Fray Jose Castaño in the National Museum of Mexico and sent me a copy, which was written in old Spanish. It was kindly translated into English by a surprisingly knowledgeable young man from Tiwi, Albay named Kurt Zepeda. Through the perseverance of the very active and creative Governor Joey Sarte Salceda of Albay, we are able to reproduce this volume of a gallery of the mythological creatures which serve as the basis for the “Parade of the Giants,” one of the major events in the month-long celebration of the Magayon Festival.
The header image is a colorized photo of the Cagsawa Church ruins. The original was annotated with the date August 14, 1928, by Photo Art Legazpi.
About the author
Abdon M. Balde Jr., Poet Laureate of Albay, is a leading figure in contemporary Bikol and Filipino letters. He currently serves as consultant for Cultural Affairs of Albay’s 2nd Congressional District and has previously headed the province’s Historical‑Cultural Section as well as served as a Komisyoner of the Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino. A longtime leader in national and regional writers’ organizations, he has been active in the Writers Union of the Philippines, FILCOLS, WIKA, Kabulig Bikol, and the Albay Writers Group, and has also advised National Bookstore on literary matters. His achievements have been recognized with major honors, including the Southeast Asian Writers Award (2009), Ani ng Dangal (2010), the Outstanding Albayano Artist Award (2012), and multiple regional lifetime and literary distinctions.
A prolific author, Balde has published 26 books, four of which have won National Book Awards. His creative work spans poetry, fiction, drama, and libretto, including “Sayaw kan Tulong Bulod” and the CCP‑staged “Daragang Magayon, An Istorya ni Mayon.” He has received the NCCA Writers Prize for his work on the Bikol epic Ibalong and earlier won the Palanca Award and the Rokyaw Ibalong Most Outstanding Bikol Award. Born to farmer parents in Busac, Oas, Albay, he studied at St. Michael Academy and earned a civil engineering degree before spending 33 years in construction engineering. He later shifted fully to literature and now resides in Tiwi, Albay with his family and three dogs.