Sources for Philippine Families

The sources of information used for these pages, along with a brief description, are listed below.  For further details on conducting genealogical research in the Philippines, see the narrative which follows the list of sources.

Comments on Sources for Philippine Genealogy:

The sources listed above, particularly the major sources, reflect the challenges inherent in Philippine genealogy.  Typically, genealogy in the Philippines consists of collecting family remembrances and using these to build a family tree.  This is well illustrated in the Perez book, which nicely documents the process used in collecting information from early family members and presents some of the uncertainty associated with that information.  As in the case of the Cabahug and Perez families, the production of a family tree is often associated with a family organization and a recurring family reunion.  In most cases, little or no additional research is undertaken.

There are multiple reasons for this approach.  First and foremost is the lack of alternate sources.  In the Philippines, civil registration of births, marriages and deaths only began in 1902 with establishment of civil government under the American occupation.  Church records can extend back to the early 1800's and even the 1700's is some cases.  However, both of these traditional sources are often seriously limited, since many records were destroyed during World War II.  As a result, the records in many municipalities and cities only date from the mid-1940's, with a few years of Civil Registers from the 1920's preserved in the National Archives in Manila.  When records do exist, they are typically incomplete, since births, deaths and marriages were often not reported to the Municipal Registrar.  Fortunately for this work, the Civil Register for Mandaue is intact back to 1902, although the Church records were lost during the War.

The Civil and Church records throughout the Philippines have been microfilmed by the Family History Library of the LDS Church.  This microfilming was performed in the 1990's and, as a result, copies of the Civil records are available for nearly all localities in the Philippines up to the date of filming.  Microfilms can be accessed through the local Family History Centers of the LDS Church.  In addition, many other Philippine records are available, and an increasing number of these records are now available on the Family History Library's web site.  The records pertaining to the Philippines can be accessed at this Link.

Another significant source of genealogical information are the Protocolos¹⁸, records of the Spanish Colonial Government.  These records consist largely of notorial and court records and are now held in the Archives of the National Library of the Philippines.  Unfortunately, these microfilm copies are no longer generally available. See reference 49.

The usefulness of these records is limited, however, by the nature of the transactions recorded and the difficulty of searching the collection.  Documents in the archives include governmental appointments, financial transactions (such as land records, mortgages) and inheritance records.  In general, the records are limited to the Principales; leading persons in a city or municipality, and therefore who were wealth enough that their transactions were recorded.  In addition to Spanish officials and priests, a major component of the Principales were Chinses-mestizo families, descended from early Chinese traders.  As a result, native Filipino families are greatly under-represented in these records.

A final limitation to genealogical research in the Philippines is the absence of surnames prior to 1850.  In November of 1849, Don Narciso Claveria y Zaldua, Governor of the Philippines issued a decree requiring all Residents of the Philippines to use a surname.  Prior to this time, Filipinos generally used two names, but there was no connection between a parent's name and that of their children.

The above circumstances create a situation which makes it difficult to trace family lineage beyond that recalled by family members.