Jose Rizal's El Filibusterismo

Today in Philippine History (Philatelic Edition):

SEPTEMBER 18, 1891

El Filibusterismo (The Reign of Greed), Jose Rizal’s sequel to Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not) was published in Ghent, Belgium. 

Rizal started writing El Filibusterismo in his hometown in Calamba, Laguna in October of 1887. 

While in London, he revised some chapters and finished the book on March 29, 1891. El Filibusterismo was dedicated to the Gomburza priests, Fathers Jose Burgos, Jacinto Zamora and Mariano Gomez. 

Both novels written in Spanish, portrayed the abuses and corruption of the Spanish authorities and sparked the 1896 Philippine Revolution.  

(Design, concept, stamps and research: Richard Allan Uy) All rights reserved

Photo credit: en.wikipedia.org

Today in Philippine History: Jose P. Rizal

JUNE 19, 1861

José Protacio Rizal (June 19, 1861 – December 30, 1896), the national hero of the Philippines and pride of the Malayan race was born in Calamba, Laguna. He was the seventh of the nine children of Francisco Mercado Rizal and Teodora Alonzo y Quintos. Rizal was a novelist, poet, journalist, ophthalmologist and a nationalist. His two books, Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo  exposed the injustices of the civil and church officials that led to his arrest, trial and execution.

Today in Philippine History: Santiago Fonacier, Obispo Maximo II

MAY 21, 1885

Santiago Fonacier (May 21, 1885 – December 8, 1977), a clergyman, journalist and legislator was born in Laoag, Ilocos Norte. A priest of the Iglesia Filipina Independiente, he founded and edited Spanish periodicals such as La Lucha and translated Jose Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo into Ilocano. Fonacier was a reporter for La Democracia and El Grito del Pueblo. An assemblyman (1912) and senator (1919), Bishop Fonacier succeeded Gregorio  Aglipay in the Aglipayan Church and became Obispo Máximo II (Second Supreme Bishop). 

Photo credit: http://www.rappler.com/thought-leaders/18797-bookmarking-rizal-a-dead-tree-hero-in-a-digital-world