Bacolod

Bacolod, officially called the City of Bacolod, is a highly urbanized city located in the Negros Island Region of the Philippines. As of the 2024 census, its population stands at 624,787, making it the most populous city in the Negros Island Region and the second most populous in the entire Visayas, behind only Cebu City. Although it is geographically situated within and grouped under Negros Occidental by the Philippine Statistics Authority, the city operates as an administratively independent entity. It serves as the capital of Negros Occidental and is one of two regional centers of the Negros Island Region, alongside Dumaguete, forming the core of the Bacolod metropolitan area.

The city is widely recognized for the MassKara Festival, which takes place during the third week of October, and for its nickname, "The City of Smiles." It is also famous for local delicacies including piaya, cansi, napoleones, and chicken inasal.

The name Bacolod comes from the Old Hiligaynon word *bakólod* (spelled *bacólod* in older orthography), meaning "hill," "turtle," "mound," "rise," "hillock," "down," or any small eminence or elevation. This name was chosen because the resettlement was founded on a stony, hilly area, now the barangay of Granada. It was officially called Ciudad de Bacólod when the Municipality of Bacolod was converted into a city in 1938.

Historical church records describe Bacolod’s early beginnings as a small riverside settlement called Magsungay, meaning "horn-shaped." When the neighboring settlement of Bago was elevated to a town in 1575, it had several religious dependencies, including the village of Magsungay. Early missionaries placed the village under the protection of Saint Sebastian around the middle of the 18th century. A corregidor named Luis Fernando de Luna donated a relic of the saint to the growing mission, and the village became known as San Sebastián de Magsung̃ay.

Bacolod was not established as a town until 1755 or 1756, after the coastal settlement of San Sebastián de Magsung̃ay was attacked by Moro forces under Datu Bantílan of Sulu on July 14, 1755. The villagers then moved inland to a hilly area called Bacólod, now the barangay of Granada. Bernardino de los Santos became the first gobernadorcillo. The town was constituted as a parish in 1788 under the secular clergy, but it did not have a resident priest until 1802, as it was served by priests from Bago and later Binalbagan. By 1790, Moro pirate raids on Bacolod had ceased.

On February 11, 1802, Fr. Eusebio Laurencio became acting parish priest. In September 1806, Fr. León Pedro was appointed interim parish priest and became the first regular parish priest the following year. In September 1817, Fray Julián Gonzaga from Barcelona was appointed parish priest. He encouraged people to settle near the sea again and promoted migration to Bacolod, as well as the opening of lands for agriculture and industry. By 1818, a census by Fr. Felipe Bravo OSA recorded 1,876 tributes, amounting to 9,888 inhabitants, including 37 Spanish-Filipino tributes representing the same number of Spanish-Filipino families in the province.

In 1846, at the request of Romualdo Jimeno, bishop of Cebu and Negros, Governor-General Narciso Clavería y Zaldúa sent a team of Recollect missionaries led by priest Fernando Cuenca to Negros. A decree on June 20, 1848, ordered the political and religious restructuring of Negros. The following year, Negros Island Gobernadorcillo Manuel Valdevieso y Morquecho moved the provincial capital from Himamaylan to Bacolod, and the Augustinian Recollects were asked to take over the spiritual administration of Negros, which they did that same year. However, the transfer of Bacolod to the Recollects did not occur until 1871. Fray Mauricio Ferrero became the first Augustinian Recollect parish priest of Bacolod, succeeding the secular priest Fr. Mariano Ávila. In 1863, a compulsory primary public school system was established.

In 1889, when the province of Negros was politically divided into Occidental Negros and Oriental Negros, Bacolod became the capital of Occidental Negros.

The success of the uprising in Bacolod and its surroundings was due to the low morale of the local Spanish detachment, which had been defeated in Panay and Luzon, and to psychological warfare waged by Generals Aniceto Lacson and Juan Araneta. In 1897, a battle was fought at the Matab-ang River. A year later, on November 5, 1898, Negrense revolutionaries, armed with knives, bolos, spears, and rifle-like nipa palm stems, along with pieces of sawali or amakan mounted on carts, captured the convent (now the Palacio Episcopal), where Colonel Isidro de Castro y Cisneros, well-armed cazadores, and platoons of Guardias Civiles surrendered.

On November 7, 1898, most of the revolutionary army gathered to establish a provisional junta and confirm the elections of Aniceto Lacson as president, Juan Araneta as war-delegate, and other officials. For a brief period, the provisional government was established.