via Bicol Mail, 01 August 2022: A roundup on the most recent season of the Bicol Archaeological Project which just concluded.
The Archdiocese of Caceres is in its 5th year of collaborating with the Bicol Archaeological Project, an interdisciplinary archaeological and heritage research program launched in 2016 to understand indigenous responses to Spanish colonialism during the early modern period in Bicol. Caceres Archbishop Rolando Tria Tirona, OCD, has given the permission to do research in any Caceres church premises as a way of collaboration to deepen the sense of history of the Bicolanos, enrich our faith and encourage culture of research in anthropology.
The BAP explores a variety of questions about local responses to colonialism, as well as the effects of the colonization process on the environment. We seek to answer these big questions through archaeological excavation and use of state-of-the-art technologies like LiDAR and chemical analysis to provided high-resolution fragments of Bicol history.
Using these means the BAP investigations started at the churches in Quipayo, Camaligan, and Bombon. The project focused on these oldest churches because of their continuous use as gathering places of importance from before Spanish colonization through to the present day. This tells that one can look at how life may have changed through time.
Source: Caceres on 5th Year of collaborating in Bicol Archaeology Project
