Philippine E-Journals

Negros Island and the Wave Riders: A Maritime History

Earl Jude Paul L. Cleope

Discipline: History

 

Abstract:

This paper spins off from an earlier study on the maritime raiding phenomenon that occurred in the Visayan Seas. It will examine this phenomenon that occurred on Negros Island in the context of the popular concept of slave-raiding perpetrated by what the Spanish colonizers labeled as “Moro raids.” The study will focus on Negros island. The paper is part of a modest attempt to offer a new framework for the writing of a “total” national history, one that underscores the role of the sea as a factor in the historical development of the Visayas in the context of national history. Following the trend in historiography inspired by Fernand Braudel, the discussion in this paper will be anchored on the maritime perspective as the analytical framework for the reconstruction of the history of Negros, in particular, and the Visayas, in general. It is hoped that this project will prove to be an interesting subject in the schema of studying the various aspects of Visayan history with a view of evolving a synthesis towards developing a national history of the Philippines.