If a street is understood as a passage which people use to go from one place to another, Naga’s first street was the “salog,” the Naga river. Just like Manila whose first settlements were along the Pasig, the nucleus of Naga’s early activities was centered on the river. The first cathedral was built by the river, on what is now the public market. Next was the San Francisco church whose main door faced the river, with the cemetery of course at the back -- which is now the front façade (which explains why skeletal remains were dug up when they pushed the church up to the street a few years ago). If the Franciscans who built the church were the Decalced (from “discalced”) Franciscans who wore no shoes, the river was just right for them to clean their feet. Then the Penafrancia chapel, built by the cimarrones also near the river. For sure, the first houses in Naga and the markets or places where people traded were along the riverbanks. The “salog” indeed was a wide highway where plied bancas and other watercrafts as trimobiles and jeepneys do Naga streets today.

        There were very few streets in Naga when the “salog” was at its height of glory. Maybe three or four, the rest were just path-walks. Probably the first that could be called a real street was Padian. It was the road leading to the side of the cathedral by the altar; hence, convenient for the priests. The convent was probably what is now Fiesta hotel, then a few more houses of the religious orders. The street of priests, “kapadian,” shortened later to Padian. A few years ago, it was changed to “Caceres” St. by some persons whose sense of place could be similar to an OFW feeling sentimental of his adopted country. The declared intention was to honor the quadricentennial of the archdiocese. Such buffoonery was preceded by the renaming of Igualdad St., and could again be matched by the present plan to change Plaza Quezon to Plaza Arejola.

        The “salog” divided early Naga into the old and new. The old native settlements were on the eastern bank of the river, along what is now Blumentritt St. and probably up to Balintawak St. The new Spanish ciudad was being built on the western bank, around the cathedral by the river and Padian, and going to a new street passing a small Chinese settlement near what is now Dinaga, and leading to a garden at the back of the cemetery of San Francisco church. It was a leafy avenue of sorts, and was to become the main street. In Spanish times, the main street in Everytown was Calle Real -- the Royal Street -- of course in honor of the monarch in Spain (not my friend, Pete Real). For about 300 years, that main street in Naga was known as Calle Real, until the early 1900s when it was changed to Rizal St. In fact, all calles real in the Philippines during the post-revolution period were renamed to either Rizal or Del Pilar (Marcelo, not Gregorio), two heroes who were no longer alive during the American conquest and were thus found to be proper for Filipinos to idolize (Bonifacio also died before America came but being the “violent” type, Americans frowned naming streets after him; and Mabini fought the Americans and became popular for street names only in the 1920s when honoring his memory was already safe). M.H. Del Pilar St. in Ermita was also Calle Real before.

        Rizal St. in Naga had a short existence. It was soon changed to Elias Angeles St., the reasoning probably was that a Plaza Rizal with his monument had already been put up and a street alongside it still named after him would be an over-kill. Anyway, they named another street “Dimasalang,” one of Rizal’s two pseudonyms (it is Tagalog for “untouchable,” an allusion to his first novel). It was around this period, probably in the 1910s, that a massive naming or renaming of Naga streets was made. No records of the old municipal council survived the burning of Naga twice in the Pacific War -- first by the guerillas and then by the Americans (the Japanese did not burn it even as they fled to Isarog for a last stand). So who and when of the naming and renaming are forever lost to history, as were the old street names of the Spanish period that were changed.

        The streets in the centro were named mostly after the heroes of the revolution and a few of the Fil-Am War, understandably since the renaming was done just over a decade had passed after these great events. It would then make history a pleasurable tour in this part of Naga. What was already the main street became Gen. Luna St., which was quite daring of the street-namers since Luna fought valiantly against the Americans though killed treacherously by our own. A short street connecting the two main streets (Gen. Luna and Elias Angeles) along the southern side of Plaza Rizal was named after another anti-American hero, Gen. Edilberto Evangelista. And Mabini, the quintessential anti-American, got the street fronting San Francisco church. To think that this was in the early American colonial period, and we could really credit the men who were in the municipal board at that time.

        The priests-martyrs, all 3 of them, had their streets: P. Burgos straddling the two main streets; while P. Gomez and P. Zamora in the Sabang district where most of the merchants and traders were. In addition to their monument, most of the 15 martyrs were also named with streets: Abella (presumably includes all the three of them), Lerma, P. Diaz, Prieto (two of them), Jacob, Arana and Valentin. No reason why the rest did not get their streets, probably their heirs did not lobby enough or the heirs could have been threats to the influence and new-found power of the council members (the most likely). Of the propaganda movement, only Panganiban was honored, aside from Rizal, of course. The longest street before in Naga, and probably the grandest as it would run from the south entry of the city straight up to Plaza Rizal, was named after him. A street diagonal to Panganiban was named after Rizal’s friend and confidant, the Austrian Ferdinand Blumentritt.

        Curiously, no Del Pilar had been honored. Gregorio, the boy-general killed by the Americans, would have been understandable; but Marcelo of Spanish vintage, and with almost every major city in the country having a street after him, was conspicuously left out. Also understandably, no Bonifacio and no Katipunan either, otherwise popular streets elsewhere. The nearest that could be related to Bonifacio was Balintawak St, across the river from the centro. Bagumbayan, the hallowed place of martyrdom, was remembered, probably because 11 of the Bicol martyrs were executed there.

        Also it would seem that, other than some of the 15 martyrs, the streets were not given local color. The Bicolanos who were prominent in both the revolution and the war against the Americans -- Vicente Lukban, Simeon Ola, Jose Ignacio Paua and the brothers Arejola -- seemed to have been missed out. The answer is that they were still all alive when the street-naming was done; reminding us of the lamentation of Nick Joaquin that the tragedy of Aguinaldo was that he lived too long (new streets and places -- and “new” must be emphasized -- should now be named after them, but please do not dishonor those who have already been honored by taking away their names on old streets).

        The church, formidable before and today, had the street leading to the present cathedral named after Barlin, the first Filipino bishop; also Calle Iglesia (“Church”) which runs parallel to the front side of the cathedral, and Paz (“Peace”) St. along the side of the Palacio. On the other side is Calle Santonja, named after a rector of the seminario who was an assistant to Obispo Gainza. Diagonal to Barlin, along the seminary wall, is Sta. Cruz (“Holy Cross”) St. Starting at the corner of Santonja and from where Calle Mabini ended in the direction to the shrine was Via Gainza, named to one considered by the historian Domingo Abella as the greatest Bishop of Caceres ever. Gainza envisioned this thoroughfare which is now Penafrancia Avenue as a tree-lined boulevard with the river bank cleared of houses. The acacia trees he planted (only three or four of them left and now rotting at their base trunk due to neglect) were lined up along the other side from the river. “Via” is commonly used in Italy to designate a street; it is seldom used by Spaniards who prefer Calle or Calzada or Avenida. On why Via Gainza was used is something for further research, but one cannot deny the romance in the name.

        During the Spanish period and before it was changed to Via Gainza, the street was known as Calle Sorral. Again research is needed on the identity of Sorral, or it could be a place in Spain. My father was born on Calle Sorral and it was still called by that name when he was growing up in the neighborhood, although by that time it was already renamed to Via Gainza. In the late 50s, Mabini and Via Gainza were fused and renamed as Penafrancia Avenue, ironically not for any Marian fealty but for a very political purpose: the sponsoring councilor, a distant uncle of mine, who lived on Via Gainza chose to widen his “baluarte” by extending it up to Mabini; hence, the voters of the two streets would all be called “mga taga Pransya” -- so his constituency doubled.

        Of charming interest are the streets Igualdad and Fraternidad, Spanish for two of three words forming the rallying cry of the French Revolution (the third is “Libertad”). We all know that Rizal et al. were inspired by it, and Naga honored the cry with those two. Why the third was not could probably never be known. It did not lessen however the linkage to European history and the arguable fact that Naga was somehow on a different intellectual or cultural plane. It showed that Naga at that time, while animated by a rural ethos (as it is still today), was holding on to a 19th-century gentility that was already influenced by the European ideas of change and revolution. It was really sad that Igualdad (“Equality”) St. fell victim to ignorance, if not political expediency. Sol Santos and I were in the committee hearing of the city sanggunian to oppose the change; this was during the first term of Mayor Robredo. We even had a position paper explaining why the name be not touched. But the forces of ignorance prevailed.

        Again curiously, despite the fact that the naming and renaming were during the early American period, no American names of streets were imposed in Naga. Legazpi has a Washington Drive. Manila had plenty before: Dewey, Lawton, Harrison, Taft, Jones, Forbes, Fergusson, Craig, Dakota, Nebraska, etc. Was there pressure on the municipal council of Naga to use American names? If there was, they obviously resisted. Again, during the Japanese occupation, were there streets that were changed or renamed as the Japanese did to Dewey Boulevard, to Heiwa (Peace) Boulevard? An era in history is clearly missing in the names of Naga’s streets, from the turn-of-the-century (the 20th) to the “Japanese time.” Some streets were later named after post-war presidents (Magsaysay and Roxas), and the “kiosk” which was the only American-related name here became Plaza Kiosko (or “Chosko” to children) then Plaza Quezon.

        Street names are part of history. They also reveal the character of the people in the place, and the kind of persons that they honor and the events that they remember. The streets mentioned here are mostly the landmark streets in Naga, but many of them have already been changed and renamed. These street names, in the words of Ambeth Ocampo, have been “sanctified by usage.” That they have already been changed, and with more threatened to be, certainly did not speak well of us and the kind of respect we gave to these old places. Padian for one was probably the first street name in Naga. The name was used for four centuries. The early street-namers did not even dare change it. If ever a name of a place was sanctified by long usage, this was it. But eventually it was not saved from the ignoramuses at City Hall. Truly, we must learn some proportion, in a manner of speaking, or a sense of appreciating little things that actually define us, and not be swayed by present fancies and the popular. Probably we could still get it by going back to the “salog.”