The blood compact shrine in Barangay Bool, Tagbilaran City, commemorates the Sandugo, the friendship ritual between the Spanish commander Miguel López de Legazpi and the Boholano chieftain Datu Sikatuna. A national agency has placed the event itself at Loay.
This page sets out the history of the ritual, what the monument in Bool shows, how the Loay dispute arose and how the province remembers the event today. For the wider picture of the island, the guide to bohol tourism covers regions, transport and attractions.
The Sandugo ritual and the men behind it
Sandugo is a Visayan word meaning “one blood”, according to the encyclopaedia entry on the Sandugo, which also describes the ritual as the first treaty of friendship between the Spaniards and Filipinos. The Bohol Provincial Tourism Office dates it to March 16, 1565, when the two leaders shed blood into a cup and drank its contents in a native ritual. The same account describes Legazpi as the leader of an expedition representing the King of Spain, and Sikatuna as a native Boholano chieftain.
The meeting did not begin in friendship. The encyclopaedia account records that Legazpi sailed from Mexico with five ships and 500 men, reached the Philippines in 1565 and established a Spanish settlement. On Bohol he found a wary population. Earlier, in 1563, Portuguese fleets had arrived in Visayan waters and enslaved about 1,000 inhabitants, which explains the hostility the Spaniards met. With the help of a Malay sailor, Legazpi explained that his party was not Portuguese and had come to trade. Upon learning this, the chieftains became friendlier and welcomed the Spaniards.
The ceremony itself followed local custom. In the same source, Legazpi and Sikatuna each made a cut on the left arm with a dagger and poured their blood into a cup filled with wine, which both men drank in honour of their friendship. The scene became a staple of Philippine art and civic symbolism: the painter Juan Luna depicted the event in his painting entitled The Blood Compact, and the Sandugo appears on both the provincial flag and the seal of the government of Bohol.
The blood compact shrine in Bool
The monument most visitors know stands in Bool, a barangay of Tagbilaran City. Its centrepiece is the sculpture of the compact by Napoleon Abueva, a Tagbilaran-born sculptor. According to his encyclopaedia biography, Abueva was proclaimed National Artist for Sculpture in 1976 when he was 46, and the same entry calls his Sandugo shrine in Barangay Bool a landmark of the city.
The grounds changed in 2024. A report from Bohol Island News on the 459th anniversary on March 16, 2024 says the National Museum of the Philippines in Bohol and the Tagbilaran City government unveiled an Important Cultural Property marker for Abueva’s sculpture. The same report states that the sculpture stands in the newly launched Tagbilaran Friendship Park and Dejaresco Cultural Amphitheater in Bool. In her message that day, the city mayor called the compact a first international treaty of friendship and said it shaped how Tagbilaranons see themselves.
The Loay question: where the compact took place
The location of the compact has been debated for years. According to a report in The Freeman, the National Historical Institute approved Resolution 04 series of 2005, declaring the town of Loay as the actual place where the Sandugo took place on March 25, 1565. The panel concluded that the compact happened aboard the flagship San Pedro, anchored off Hinawanan Bay in Loay. The same report says site inspections and interviews in Tagbilaran and Loay were held on February 9 to 11, 2005, with experts from the National Mapping and Resources Information Authority and the University of the Philippines.
The dispute also involves dates. The Bohol tourism office gives March 16, while the Loay account gives March 25. A separate 2017 report in The Freeman notes that Republic Act 9093 declared March 16, 1565 a special working public holiday for Bohol to commemorate the Sandugo, but reportedly did not say where the event took place.
The same 2017 report describes a March 2017 letter from the National Historical Commission of the Philippines to Governor Edgar Chatto asking that the marker “Blood Compact Between Sikatuna and Legaspi in Tagbilaran City” be removed. The commission argued that removal would end the confusion among tourists and the public about where the compact truly occurred. The governor was reportedly open to the request but suggested that a related shrine be installed at the Bool site, and by late July 2017 the report described the matter as a deadlock, with Bool remaining the site in practice.
Loay has promoted its own claim. At the town’s celebration of the 450th year of the compact, The Freeman reported the blessing and unveiling of a Blood Compact marker and life-sized sculptures of Sikatuna and Legazpi, alongside the Higalaay Festival and a reenactment. In 2026 The Bohol Times reported that the provincial government joined Loay on March 25 and proudly recognised the town as the place where the historic Sandugo took place; that year’s 461st-anniversary programme began with a wreath laying, a holy mass and an afternoon program at the municipal gym.
How Bohol remembers the Sandugo
The compact is marked across the calendar, with the largest celebration in July. The tourism office explains that the annual event was first held in March and later moved to July, to coincide with Tagbilaran Charter Day on July 1 and Bohol Day on July 22. Its main highlights are the street parade, the street dancing competition and the re-enactment of the Blood Compact, and the month-long programme also includes a trade and agri-food fair, nightly entertainment and a search for Miss Bohol Sandugo.
The festival grew through sustained provincial support. The same tourism office account credits the administration of Governor Constancio Chatto Torralba, from April 1975 to June 1992, with giving the celebration much attention and lasting momentum. For a month-by-month view of the island’s calendar, including how the Sandugo sits beside town fiestas and harvest events, see the guide to bohol festivals.
Smaller anniversary events fall in March. The 2024 observance in Tagbilaran combined the blood compact anniversary with the launch of the city’s Saulog festivities, while Loay holds its own ceremony on its own date. A visitor who arrives in March can therefore find commemorations at two places within the same fortnight, each tied to a different reading of the record.
Visiting the Sandugo sites
Two places carry the story. The Bool shrine and Friendship Park sit in Tagbilaran City, the provincial capital and the usual arrival point for the island. Loay lies about 18 kilometers east of the capital, according to The Freeman, and the same report says its Sandugo site has long been part of the Bohol tourism circuit on the way to the Chocolate Hills in Carmen. Some tour guides explain the dispute to visitors yet still include the Bool monument as a stopover.
A few points help the visit make sense. The Bool monument is a modern commemorative sculpture rather than a surviving structure from 1565, and the two sites reflect different readings of the record. Reading the NHI and NHCP statements above before arriving makes the two sites easier to compare. Opening arrangements for the grounds are managed by local authorities and can change, so confirm them with the Tagbilaran City government or the Loay municipal government before planning around them.
Visitors who want more of the island’s colonial-era story can continue to the baclayon church, another heritage landmark in the province. An independent traveller can keep this page as a short briefing: the ritual is documented, the sculpture is a Tagbilaran landmark and the exact spot of the event remains a matter of public record and local pride.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the blood compact shrine?
The shrine and its sculpture are in Barangay Bool, Tagbilaran City, within the Tagbilaran Friendship Park and Dejaresco Cultural Amphitheater area described in the 2024 Bohol Island News report.
What does Sandugo mean?
The Visayan word translates as “one blood”, a reference to the cup in which the two leaders mixed their blood with wine.
Was the compact really held in Bool?
The National Historical Institute concluded in its 2005 resolution that the ritual took place aboard a ship off Hinawanan Bay in Loay, and Bohol’s provincial government recognised Loay in 2026. The Bool sculpture remains a recognised cultural property and a focus of the city’s anniversary events.
Who made the Bool sculpture?
National Artist for Sculpture Napoleon Abueva, a native of Tagbilaran, created the Sandugo sculpture that stands in Bool.
