Fray Alonso Gimenez, OSA, was the first missionary who introduced Christianity in the Bicol Region in 1569, reacing the islands of Masbate, Ticao, Burias, and the town of Camalig in Albay where storehouses of grain abounced, hence the term Tierra de Camarines . The expedition was headed by Captain Enrique de Guzman. Following the route of the De Guzman expedition, Captail Andres Ibarra pushed farther inland to the settlements along Lake Bato and Bua (now the towns of Bato and Nabua) in 1570. In 1573, Fray Diego de Espinar, OSA, and Captain Juan Salcedo, came down from the north and went through Paracale and San Miguel Bay to Libon, Albay. Captain Pedro de Chaves founded a township along the Bicol River for Spanish nationals and named it Ciudad de Caceres, after Caceres in Spain, the birthplace of Governor-General Francisco de Sande.

Fray Pablo de Jesus and Fray Bartolome Ruiz, the first Franciscan missionaries, established the first four parishes in the regions of Naga, Quipayo, Nabua and Bula. And in 1594 Tierra de Camarines was officially and permanently assigned to the Franciscan missionaries until the end of the Spanish regime by virtue of a decree issued by Philip II.

On August 14, 1595, Pope Clement VII created the Diocese of Caceres by virtue of a papal bull. The diocese extended over the provinces of Camarines and Albay, the islands of Masbate, Ticao, Burias, Catanduances and Samar, and the province of Tayabas, Luis Maldonado, OFM, was the first appointed bishop.

The construction of the conciliar seminary was started in 1783, but it was in 1797 that the canonical erection of the Seminario Conciliar de Caceres took place under Domingo Collates, OP. In 1816 the ecclesiastical buildings (cathedral, bishop’s house and seminary) were transferred to their present site, and in 1843 the inauguration and blessing of the new Cathedral was celebrated.

With the creation of the Diocese of Lipa in 1910, Caceres became a purely Bicol diocese composed of the six provinces of Albay, Camarines Norte, Camarines Sur, Catanduanes, Masbate and Sorsogon. And on June 29, 1951, Caceres was elevated to an archdiocese by Pope Pius XII through a papal bull. Its suffragan dioceses today are Legazpi and Sorsogon. The first archbishop was Most Reverend Pedro Santos, D.D.

Resources:
- CBCP. “Archdiocese of Caceres”. Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines On-Line. 10 December 2005.

Notations:
- Considering the religious fervor of Bicolanos, Catholic Churches are important sources of information, especially in the absence of civil registration documents. It is important to study where the churches are and when they were built to assess the best source of information.
- In the case of Del Gallego whose civil records were destroyed in a fire before WWII, it has been established that the nearest town with a Catholic Church would be Nueva Caceres (or Naga). It is likely that the town folk go to the St. John the Evangelist Parish for baptism, marriages and other sacraments.

The Claveria Decree

Before 1849, Filipinos in general lacked individual surnames which distinguished them by families. They arbitrarily adopted names of saints, resulting in the existence of thousands of individuals of the same surname. This resulted in confusion in the administration of justice, government, finance, and public order. Also, as family names were not transmitted from parents to children, degrees of consanguinity were difficult to assess for the purpose of marriage.

On the 21st of November 1849, the Governor General of the Philippines, Don Narciso Claveria y Zaldua, issued a law (thereafter called the Claveria Decree) requiring Filipinos to adopt Spanish and indegenous names from the Catalogo Alfabetico de Apellidos for civil and legal purposes. This landmark law ensured the uniform usage of surnames preceeding 1849.

For purposes of genealogical research, progress beyond the 1840’s is a major challenge as our ancestors may have used different and varying surnames before then.

Resources

- Certifications from the Office of the Civil Registrar. Practical information needed in transacting with the OCR of the Philippine National Statistics Office.
- Claveria’s Decree on Filipino Surnames. Taken from the introduction of Dr. Domingo Abella in the Catalogo Alfabetico Apellidos.
- Guide to Genealogical Research in the Philippines. A introduction to tools, resources and strategies in researching one’s roots in the Philippines.
- National Statistics Office e-Census. Request for Philippine civil registry records on-line.

by Junep Ocampo
(Published in the Philippine Star, 17 August 2001)

Almost everyday, Mona Magno-Veluz surfs the World Wide Web and visits a site that is very close to her heart. She has seen this site from its very beginning and has witnessed its development and growth. And she wants her children and her children’s children to see and also use it.

The site in nothing spectacular. It doesn’t have any fancy graphics or anything moving or talking objects. But it contains information that gives a background to Mona’s life. It contains her family’s history.

The Magno-Veluz Chronicles (magnoveluz.homestead.com) attempts to trace the beginning of Mona’s family — the Magno’s — and her husband’s — the Veluz’s. It began as a mere hobby for Mona who is a self-taught genealogist and who has become her family’s unofficial historian, interviewing relatives during wakes, reunions and weddings.

“I am notorious for interviewing those I’ve never met before — complete with tape recorder and a laptop. After two years of talking to so many people — my lolo’s, lola’s, great aunts, neighbors of a deceased uncle, you name it — I realized I actually knew so much more about my family and my husband’s than any single person did,” she recalls.

It was then that she thought about putting up a website that would contain all the information she has gathered. After a month of work, she launched the site at a family reunion during Christmas 1999.

Mona, who works as director for market development and communications for Ericsson Philippines, is not alone. There is probably millions of people like her who have found the Web a convenient archive for their personal information. …

Building Your Home

… Mona says the hardest part in creating her own website was finding the right tool. At first, she experimented with those available online; but she found them slow and produced ugly results. She used FrontPage, a website creation software instead. And she found the software Family Tree Maker useful in managing the more than 500 names in her site.

Mona chose Homestead (www.homestead.com) to host her site. Although new in the game, Homestead is now considered by many as the most generous of site hosts. It is completely advertisement-free (Geocities “shares” banner ads with its sites). It allows up to 100 people to collaborate on a site, split maintenance chores or even post new documents or add pages. And it offers 16 megabytes of storage space per site, 1 MB more than Geocities.

Maintaining Ties

Many people who have created their own sites probably did them just for fun. But for Mona, it was more than that. She was driven by something noble.

Her Magno-Veluz Chronicles traces the Magno family’s beginnings in Iloilo City and the Veluz family’s origins in Del Gallego, Camarines Sur. It contains glimpses of world and Philippine history and how these had affected the lives of Mona’s ancestors. And it has a number of feature stories narrating anecdotes on the lives and loves of her predecessors.

She recalls that the initial work was tough, but it eased up along the way. “The website opened doors for more materials to come in from other family members. I even discovered long-lost family members in other countries who accidentally found my site via other genealogy sites. I got several god leads from inputs given by ‘instant’ relatives in Canada, Guam and the United States” she says.

Mona says the best moment in the creation of her website was when she found the baptismal certificate of her mother’s paternal grandfather, with details on his lineage. The document, she discovered, moved back her research to as far as 1840. “It was my biggest breakthrough yet,” she says.

But more than anything, the Magno-Veluz Chronicles serves as a link for members of the two families. Mona says the site has managed to raise awareness of the Web’s personal usefulness within her family circle. “It’s really a good communication tool. We sign up for community family sites where we post party invitations, announce illnesses or deaths, exchange photos and remind each other of birthdays and anniversaries,” she says. “It has helped up manage distance better.”

And that’s what the World Wide Web is all about — linkages. Without her saying it, Mona is probably aware that the Web has linked her not only to her kin who are alive but also to whose who have long died. And it will link her further to those who have yet to come.