INTRODUCTION TO PHILIPPINE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY

History is also sometimes regarded as a branch of social science, although many historians
often consider the subject to share closer links to the humanities.

On the other hand, geographically, the Philippines is a country in Southeast Asia in the western
Pacific Ocean. It is an archipelago made up of 7,106 islands located in relation to many of
Southeast Asia's main water bodies: the South China Sea, Philippine Sea, Sulu Sea, Celebes Sea,
and Luzon Strait.

In this subject, we are going to study Philippine history. Studying Philippine History is important
because you have to understand and know the things that happened in the past for you to
appreciate the future and present situation of the country. Further, helps in understanding the
origin of the society thus knowing our origin.

As far as I am concern, the culture of the Philippines is a combination of cultures of the East and
West. Filipino identity was created primarily as a result of pre-hispanic cultures, colonial
influences and foreign traders intermixing and gradually evolving together. Then came the
Americans, the Japanese and even the British but only to a short span of time.

According to Wikipedia, the history of the Philippines is known to have begun at least 709,000
years ago as suggested by the discovery of Pleistocene stone tools and butchered animal
remains associated with hominin activity. Homo luzonensis, a species of archaic humans, was
present on the island of Luzon at least 67,000 years ago.

Accordingly, the Philippines was named after King Philip II (1527-1598) of Spain. The country
was discovered by the Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 (while in Spanish
service). Later tension arose between Portugal and Spain and in 1542 Spain re-claimed the
islands for themselves, naming them after its then king.