Paete, officially the Municipality of Paete (), is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

in the

province A province is an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

of Laguna,

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 24,945 people. Along the shores of picturesque

Laguna de Bay Laguna de Bay ( Spanish for "Lagoon/Lake of Bay"; , ), also known as Laguna Lake and alternatively spelled "Laguna de Bae", is the largest lake in the Philippines. It is located southeast of Metro Manila, between the provinces of Laguna to t ...

. It was founded in 1580 by Spanish friars

Juan de Plasencia Miguel Juan de Plasencia () was a Spanish friar of the Franciscan Order. He was among the first group of Franciscan missionaries who arrived in the Philippines on 2 July 1578. He spent most of his missionary life in the Philippines, where he ...

and Diego de Oropesa of the Franciscan Order. It is believed that the earliest inhabitants were of Malay lineage, coming all the way from

Borneo Borneo () is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world, with an area of , and population of 23,053,723 (2020 national censuses). Situated at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, it is one of the Greater Sunda ...

in their swift and sturdy boats called "Balangay".

Etymology

The name of Paete is derived from the Tagalog word ''paet'', which means

chisel A chisel is a hand tool with a characteristic Wedge, wedge-shaped cutting edge on the end of its blade. A chisel is useful for carving or cutting a hard material such as woodworking, wood, lapidary, stone, or metalworking, metal. Using a chi ...

. The proper pronunciation of the town's name is ''Pī-té'', long ''i'', short guttural ''ê'', sound at the end. The town was referred to as "Piety" by the American Maryknoll Missioners when they came to the town in the late 1950s.

History

Precolonial era

The Spanish friars had a tradition of naming towns they built in honor of saints. Paete was an exception. Legend has it that there was once a young Franciscan priest who was tasked by his superior to visit their newly founded settlements alongside Laguna de Bay. The priest knew little about the terrain so he asked a native the name of the place. The latter misinterpreted the young friar, thinking that the former wanted to know the name of the tool he was using. He answered, ''Paét'' (

), thus, the name Paete. Sargento Mayor Juan de Salcedo was the first Spaniard to set foot in Paete. He was on his way to explore the gold-rich region of Paracale in Bicol. His men first encountered some resistance from the settlers of what is now

Cainta Cainta, officially the Municipality of Cainta (, ), is a municipality in the Provinces of the Philippines, province of Rizal (province), Rizal, Philippines. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 376,933 people. It is one of the ...

Rizal Rizal most commonly refers to: * Rizal (province), a province of the Philippines * José Rizal, Filipino national hero whom the province is named after Rizal may also refer to: People * Akmal Rizal Ahmad Rakhli, Malaysian footballer * Atep Ri ...

Province, but defeated the lightly armed natives. Then he ventured to the lakeside barangays of Laguna de Bay on his way to Bicol.

Spanish colonial era

Around 1580, Paete was established as a pueblo by the Friars. Juan de Plasencia and Diego Oropesa. Due to a death of the prior of Paete at that time, Paete was annexed to the Convent of Lumban. Then in 1600, Paete became a barrio of Pangil. In 1602, Paete became independent town having its own convent and was christened Pueblo de San Lorenzo in honor of the town's first patron saint. The pueblo consisted not only of Paete, but included the neighboring towns of Pakil, San Antonio, Longos and Kalayaan. In 1671, Fray Francisco Soller reenacted the Via Crucis to resuscitate the people's waning faith. He carried a cross from the town proper up to Mt. Ping-as in Pakil. In 1676, when Pakil became a separate pueblo, the townspeople of Paete wanted crosses of their own, so they built and located them in ''sitio'' Santa Ana, and named the site ''Tatlong'' ''Krus'' (Three Crosses). Paete regained its full township status only in 1850.

American colonial era

In 1899, American forces launched the Laguna campaign to subjugate the whole province and squelch insurrection. On the last leg of the campaign on April 12, an American battalion of 200 men invaded Paete but met strong resistance from an inexperienced force of less than 50 men. The town was subdued but it proved to be a costly battle for the Americans.

World War II and Japanese occupation

In 1942, Japanese troops occupied Paete, local recognized guerrillas and ongoing troops under the Philippine Commonwealth Army units were sieges and conflicts in Paete was fought against the Imperial Japanese military and local collaborators from 1942 to 1944 until retreat by local guerrillas from the Japanese hands. In 1945, combined Filipino and American soldiers, as well as recognized guerrillas liberated Paete and defeat by the Japanese and ended in World War II.

Geography

Paete is located at the north-eastern part of Laguna. From Manila, Paete can be reached passing through

Rizal Province Rizal, officially the Province of Rizal (), is a province in the Philippines located in the Calabarzon region in Luzon. Its capital is the city of Antipolo. It is about east of Manila. The province is named after José Rizal, one of the main na ...

via Manila East Road or via

South Luzon Expressway The South Luzon Expressway (SLEX), signed as E2 of the Philippine expressway network and R-3 of the Metro Manila arterial road network, is a controlled-access highway that connects Metro Manila to the provinces in the Calabarzon, Mimaropa a ...

. It is from Santa Cruz, from

Manila Manila, officially the City of Manila, is the Capital of the Philippines, capital and second-most populous city of the Philippines after Quezon City, with a population of 1,846,513 people in 2020. Located on the eastern shore of Manila Bay on ...

, and from

Lucena Lucena (, American Spanish: , European Spanish: ), officially known as the City of Lucena (), is a highly urbanized city situated in the Calabarzon region (Region IV-A) of the Philippines. The city is the largest urban center and capital of ...

Barangays

Paete is politically subdivided into 9

barangay The barangay (; abbreviated as Brgy. or Bgy.), historically referred to as ''barrio'', is the smallest Administrative divisions of the Philippines, administrative division in the Philippines. Named after the Precolonial barangay, precolonial po ...

s, as indicated in the matrix below. Each barangay consists of

purok A ''purok'' () is an informal division within a barangay in the Philippines. While not officially considered a local government unit (LGU), a ''purok'' often serves as a unit for delivering services and administration within a barangay. ''Pur ...

s and some have

sitios A ''sitio'' (Spanish language, Spanish for "site") in the Philippines is a territorial enclave that forms part of a barangay. Typically rural, a ''sitios location is usually far from the center of the barangay itself and could be its own bar ...

Climate

Demographics

In the 2020 census, the population of Paete was 24,945 people, with a density of .

Religion

The only Catholic Church in the town is the Saint James the Apostle Parish Church which was first built in 1646. Paete is also a pilgrimage site. One of the primary products of the town's woodcarving industry are carving of ''pu-on'' or images of saints. The town's patron saint is St. James the Apostle, also known as St. James the Great. Residents celebrate his feastday every 25 July. The 1st Patron Saint of Paete is St. Lawrence, the deacon. St. Anthony the Abbot is a secondary patron of the town and his feast is celebrated by the townsfolk every January 17. The patron has a stone chapel locally known as ''Ermita'' as a shrine dedicated to him. There is a town legend related to the saint where a town native sneaked in the chapel during a

conflagration A conflagration is a large fire in the built environment that spreads via structure to structure ignition due to radiant or convective heat, or ember transmission. Conflagrations often damage human life, animal life, health, and/or property. A c ...

and took a statue the St. Anthony to bathe it in the river. Following this, it began to rain and the fire was extinguished, an event considered as a miracle by the townsfolk.

Economy

The town has had a long reputation for its craftsmen highly skilled in

wood carving Wood carving (or woodcarving) is a form of woodworking by means of a cutting tool (knife) in one hand or a chisel by two hands or with one hand on a chisel and one hand on a mallet, resulting in a wooden figure or figurine, or in the sculpture, ...

and its embellishment. In 1887,

José Rizal José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (, ; June 19, 1861 – December 30, 1896) was a Filipino nationalist, writer and polymath active at the end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is popularly considered a na ...

described Paete as a town where "carpenter shops" were issuing images "even those more rudely carved" (chapter VI, ''

Noli Me Tangere ''Noli me tangere'' ('touch me not') is the Latin version of a phrase spoken, according to John 20:17, by Jesus to Mary Magdalene when she recognized him after His resurrection. The original Koine Greek phrase is (). The biblical scene has b ...

''). Even now, its inhabitants (called ''Paeteños'' or Paetenians) continue with their centuries-old tradition in carving and painting. Its statues, pulpits, murals and bas relief are found in churches, palaces and museums all over the world, including the

St. Peter's Basilica The Papal Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican (), or simply St. Peter's Basilica (; ), is a church of the Italian High Renaissance located in Vatican City, an independent microstate enclaved within the city of Rome, Italy. It was initiall ...

in Rome,

St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York St. Patrick's Cathedral is a Catholic cathedral in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. It is the seat of the Archbishop of New York as well as a parish church. The cathedral occupies a city block bounded by Fifth Avenue, M ...

, the Mission Dolorosa in San Francisco, the San Cayetano Church in Mexico, the St. Joseph's shrine in Santa Cruz, California, various churches in the Philippines and the Ayala Museum in Makati,

. The official town hero is not a statesman nor a soldier but a woodcarver, the master artisan Mariano Madriñan, whose ''obra maestra'', the lifelike Mater Dolorosa, was honored by the King of Spain with a prestigious award in Amsterdam in 1882. The town was proclaimed "the Carving Capital of the Philippines" on March 15, 2005, by Philippine President Arroyo. Taka (taká),

papier maché Papier may refer to : *paper in French, Dutch, Afrikaans, Polish or German, word that can be found in the following expressions: **Papier-mâché, a construction material made of pieces of paper stuck together using a wet paste **Papier collé, a p ...

made using carved wooden sculpture used as a mold, also originated from Paete. It is also believed that the modern

yo-yo A yo-yo (also spelled yoyo) is a toy consisting of an axle connected to two disks, and a string looped around the axle, similar to a spool. It is an ancient toy with proof of existence since 440 BC. The yo-yo was also called a bandalore in th ...

, which originated in the Philippines, was invented in Paete.Pruden, Marie Cagahastian Castillo. ''About Paete'': April 1999
Many descendants of these artisans have found a niche in the culinary world.

Ice sculpture Ice sculpture is a form of sculpture that uses ice as the raw material. Sculptures from ice can be abstract or realistic and can be functional or purely decorative. Ice sculptures are generally associated with special or extravagant events becaus ...

s and fruit and vegetable carvings done by ''Paeteños'' abound on buffet tables of cruise ships and world-class hotels and restaurants. Today the town thrives mainly on the sale and export of woodcarvings and ''taka'', tourism, poultry industry, farming and fishing.

Gallery

Paete Municipal Hall, Laguna, Dec 2023.jpg, Municipal Hall Paete Town Plaza, Laguna, 2023.jpg, Town Plaza Liceo de Paete, Laguna, Dec 2023.jpg, Liceo de Paete Mural inside Paete Church, Laguna (2).jpg, A mural inside Paete Church

Footnotes

References

*Madridejos, Sancho. ''Zonification of Paete''. copyright@2003, paete.org *Madriñan, Virgil. ''Lanzones''. copyright@2003, paete.org. *Pruden, Marie Cagahastian. ''Paete on My Mind''. copyright@2003, paete.org *Quesada, Eugenio C. ''Paete.'' 1956. Manila, Philippines *Quesada, Frank Col. ''Freedom at Dawn'': 7-part series. copyright@2003, paete.org *Quesada, Frank Col. ''World War II in Paete''. copyright@2003, paete.org *Quesada, Juan, Jr. ''Paete:'' ''The Once And Future Village''. copyright@2003, paete.org

External links

Philippine Standard Geographic Code The Philippine Standard Geographic Code (PSGC) is a systematic classification and coding for geographic areas in the Philippines. It classifies areas based on the country's four levels of administrative divisions: regions, provinces, municipalities ...

* {{Authority control Municipalities of Laguna (province) Populated places on Laguna de Bay