Is Fort Santiago ‘original’?

Seventy-five years ago today, Fort Santiago in Intramuros was declared a national shrine by virtue of Republic Act No. 597. I dug up the law and was surprised to learn that Fort Santiago was supposed to be known as the “Shrine of Freedom.” Today, Fort Santiago is a tourist attraction focused on Spanish colonial military architecture. People go there to take pictures for Instagram or wacky videos for TikTok, oblivious to the shrine’s dark and bloody history. Fort Santiago was declared a shrine in memory of the many heroes, patriots, and innocent civilians who were imprisoned, tortured, or died within its walls during the Spanish and Japanese occupations.

RA 597 also declared Intramuros and what was left of its walls after the 1945 Battle for Manila as historic monuments. Walls were to be reconstructed, and by law, “Buildings constructed within the area … shall conform strictly (emphasis mine) to the Spanish type of architecture of the proper period.” Anyone who visits Intramuros today will see that most of the buildings erected after the passage of the law in 1951 have little or no Spanish colonial elements. That said, Fort Santiago and Intramuros today have strayed very far from the intent of the law. We do not lack for laws in the Philippines; we actually have too many that are unevenly enforced or followed.

History is never clean nor straightforward like the historical markers that dot our landscape. Fort Santiago and Intramuros may be historical, but the meanings people attach to them differ. Intramuros is contested territory. Fort Santiago has many stories.

I remember grade school field trips when we were dispatched to Fort Santiago, while our teachers went off to lunch. Nobody told me what the place was all about; I had to discover it for myself. While most of my classmates were busy watching couples make out in the bushes, I entered the Rizal Shrine, and by his prison cell, met my first “Rizalista.” He showed me photos of Rizal, with Jesus Christ and God the Father. He described the end of the world as a time when seven suns, all blood red, would rise to herald the return of Rizal.

The post-Edsa part of Fort Santiago, close to the Pasig River, was closed off for excavation. This was not an archaeological project but the vain hunt for Yamashita’s fabled treasure. The harebrained project was led by the national security adviser, who believed in “duende” and other creatures of lower mythology. In the late 1980s, the anthropologist E. Arsenio Manuel proposed an archaeological excavation to find the remains of Rajah Soliman’s palisades covered by Spanish fortifications. When I asked, “What if we don’t find Soliman’s city? Would we have destroyed Intramuros for nothing?” Manuel replied, “So what? Fort Santiago is an intrusion into our history and culture; it deserves to be obliterated physically, banished from our memory and collective consciousness.” I could only shake my head and exclaim, “Why can’t we leave the ruins alone?”

The 1951 law states that Fort Santiago “shall be reconstructed as closely as possible along the lines of the original structure, and its surrounding shall be reserved for a national Plaza of the Unknown Hero, which shall include the ayuntamiento (recently rebuilt) and the site occupied by the former Palace of the Spanish Governors-General” (on which rose a modern multistory building that housed the office of former first lady Imelda Marcos, who was then minister of human settlements and, concurrently, Metro Manila governor).

Lawmakers in 1951 did not consider that the “original” Fort Santiago was a historical fiction. There are as many versions of Fort Santiago over time as there are “original” buko pie in Laguna. For example, the gate to Intramuros was built in the late 16th century. It was destroyed during one of the many destructive earthquakes in the late 19th century and rebuilt in a different design. Fort Santiago today has a reconstructed gate with a relief of a politically incorrect St. James, formerly known as “Santiago Matamoros” (James the Moor/Muslim Killer). We know what the Fort gate looked like from prewar photographs, and its wartime destruction from an iconic photograph of an American tank tearing its way in through the narrow gate.

See Also

Talk of the Town: Deaths, lies, and statistics

If Fort Santiago is a reconstruction, the same can be said for history. It started as Soliman’s wooden palisades; before the Spanish contact, it became a Spanish fort made of stone until 1898, was used as US Army barracks in the early 20th century, became a notorious Japanese prison in World War II, and is finally a tourist spot today. Rebuilding the Fort to its “original” state is messy. Which version of Fort Santiago and Intramuros do we want it to be? Our choice is limited by the documentation: maps, plans, and photographs. Our choice is determined by what we consider “beautiful” and “original.” Fort Santiago, like history, is contested territory. It has many, sometimes conflicting, versions. Telling its story is complicated. Finding what is closest to the truth is the challenge for historians and curators.

—————-

Comments are welcome at ambeth.ocampo@inquirer.net