Place:Marinduque, MIMAROPA, Philippines

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source: Family History Library Catalog

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Marinduque is an island province in the Philippines located in Southwestern Tagalog Region or Mimaropa, formerly designated as Region IV-B. Its capital is the municipality of Boac. Marinduque lies between Tayabas Bay to the north and Sibuyan Sea to the south. It is west of the Bondoc Peninsula of Quezon province; east of Mindoro Island; and north of the island province of Romblon. Some parts of the Verde Island Passage, the center of the center of world's marine biodiversity and a protected marine area, are also within Marinduque's provincial waters.

The province of Marinduque was ranked number 1 by the Philippine National Police and Philippine Security Forces as the 2013 Most Peaceful Province of the country due to its low crime rate statistics alternately ranking with the province of Batanes yearly. Furthermore, for almost 200 years, the province is home to one of the oldest religious festivals of the country, the Moriones celebrated annually every Holy Week.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

The most accepted theory of the etymology of the province's name is a Hispanized corruption of either malindig or malindug, which means "stand tall" or "elegant", in reference to a potentially active volcano in the southern section of the island, the Mount Malindig. Domingo Navarette ('Tratados...', 1676) wrote "The island which the natives call Minolo is named Mindoro by the Spaniards, and that of Malindic we call Marinduque." (trans. by Blair and Robertson).

During the Spanish and early American occupations, Marinduque was part of Balayan Province (now Batangas) in the 16th century, Mindoro from the 17th to 19th century, and had a brief period as an independent province from the time the Americans arrived in 1901 to 1902.

In 1571, Governor-General Miguel López de Legaspi assigned the then-encomienda of Marinduque to a certain Fr. Pedro de Herrera, the first Augustinian priest who introduced Christianity to the natives of the island.

During the Philippine–American War, Marinduque was the first island to have American concentration camps. Marinduque is the site of the Battle of Pulang Lupa, where 250 Filipino soldiers under Colonel Maximo Abad, defeated a smaller force of 54 American Infantrymen. It is one of the few battles during the pacification of the Philippines where the tenacity and bravery of the Filipinos prevailed over the well-armed Americans. Col. Abad after capturing the Americans later surrendered on April 15, 1901, upon orders from Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo and due to the capture of Gov. Martin Lardizabal and two other officials of the revolutionary who were held hostage by the Americans in Fort Santiago.

On June 23, 1902, by virtue of Act No. 423, the US-Philippine Commission annexed the islands of Mindoro (now two separate provinces) and Lubang (now part of Occidental Mindoro) to the province. Four months later, on November 10, Marinduque was annexed to the province of Tayabas (now Quezon) by virtue of an Act No. 499.

On February 21, 1920, Act No. 2280 was passed by the Philippine Congress, reestablishing Marinduque as a separate province.

In 1942, during the Second World War, the Japanese Imperial forces landed in Marinduque.

In 1945, combined American and Filipino troops liberated the province from the Japanese forces. Two government agencies were stationed in the province during the American period, the Philippine Commonwealth Army and the Philippine Constabulary. The general headquarters of the PCA was active from 1935 to 1942 and again from 1945 to 1946 while the PC was active from 1945 to 1946.

Archaeological finds

Archaeology in the Philippines began in Marinduque. Prior to 1900, only one important archaeological investigation had been carried out in the country: the Antoine-Alfred Marche’s exploration of Marinduque from April to July 1881. According to anthropologist Henry Otley Beyer, while many other accidental discoveries and finds have been recorded from time to time and a few burial caves and sites had been casually explored by European and local scientists, no systematic work had been done anywhere else prior to these explorations. After Marche, the next important archaeological work was undertaken by Dr. Carl Gunthe in the Visayas Island Group in 1922.

An abundant yield of Chinese urns, vases, gold ornaments, skulls, and other ornaments of pre-colonial origin was what Marche finds represented. He brought back to France the Marinduque artifacts he uncovered in 40 crates. Part of it now is said to be housed at the Musée de l'Homme in France. The finds also included a wooden image of the Marinduque anito called "Pastores" by the natives.

One of these artifacts also found its way into the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. (Catalogue No. A127996-0, Department of Anthropology, NMNH, Smithsonian Institution). These fragile jarlets traveled from China to the pre-colonial Philippines. Buried in a cave in Marinduque for centuries, excavated in the late 19th century, brought to Paris and eventually one ended up at the Smithsonian Institution museum.

Part of Marinduque's history lies at the Marinduque Museum in Poblacion at Boac and in museums abroad. It will take some time to analyze these artifacts to piece together its pre-colonial past.

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