150 Years. 150Things About The Ateneo (First 50)
I apologize to non-Ateneans who will be reading this. But this is a unabashed expression of love to my alma mater. This year is the Sesquicentennial (it means 150th year anniversary–I didn’t even know there was such a word until the Arneow started using the term!) of the school. And there are a lot to be thankful for. These are 150 odds and ends about the Ateneo:
GO TO PART 2 (51−100). PART 3 (101−150).
1. The Name. The name Ateneo is the Spanish form of Atheneum, which the Dictionary of Classical Antiquities defines as “the first educational institution in Rome” where “rhetoricians and poets held their recitations.” He further explains that Hadrian’s Roman school drew its title from a Greek temple dedicated to Athena, the goddess of wisdom, where the Encyclopedia Britannica says “poets and men of learning were accustomed to meet and read their productions.”
2. The Ateneo became a university on December 11, 1959, its centennial year.
3. The seal. The central symbol of the Ateneo de Manila seal is the shield of Onaz-Loyola, a device used by many Jesuit organizations. In heraldic terms, the shield may be blazoned thus: Party per pale: Or, seven bendlets Gules; Argent, a two-eared pot hanging on a chain between two wolves rampant. In plain English, the shield is gold, divided vertically. To the viewer’s left is a red and gold bendy of seven pairs—seven red bars on a field of gold—the arms of Onaz given in honor of the seven heroes of the family who fought with the Spaniards against 70,000 French, Navarrese, and Gascons. To the right is a white or silver field with the arms of Loyola: a two-eared pot hanging by hooks on a chain flanked by two rampant wolves, also symbols of the ricos hominess or nobility. The name Loyola itself is a contraction of lobos y alla, wolves and pot. The Loyolas were reputed to have provided so well for their own that they could afford to feed wild wolves.
4. The Motto. Lux in Domino (“Light in the Lord”, the Ateneo’s motto, is not the school’s original motto. The Escuela Municipal’s 1859 motto was Al merito y a la virtud (“In Merit and in Virtue”). This motto persisted through the school’s renaming in 1865 and in 1901.
5. The colors. The Ateneo has adopted blue and white, the colors of Our Lady, as its own school colors. The school colors are therefore signs of the Ateneo’s devotion to Mary and its commitment to become, like her, a constantly true and faithful servant of the Lord.
Marian blue, or ultramarine, is the purest and most enduring of blues. It is also the rarest and most expensive of pigments, and exceeds gold in value. The color must be extracted in tiny amounts from crushed lapis lazuli, a gem. Medieval artists therefore reserved blue for the robes of the Virgin and the Child Jesus.
White is also the color of Mary, conceived without sin and clothed with the sun. It is at once colorless and yet bears the entire spectrum of color. White is the color of openness, truth, purity, and hope.
6. The Blue Eagle. The Ateneo adopted the eagle as its mascot in the late ‘30s. The choice of mascot held iconic significance. It was a reference to the “high-flying” basketball team which would “sweep the fields away;” the dominating force in the NCAA. Furthermore, there was some mythological—even political—significance to the eagle as a symbol of power.
The eagle also appears in the standards of many organizations, schools, as nations as a guardian of freedom and truth. It is also worthwhile to note that the national bird of the philippines is an eagle as well.
The eagle is also often seen as a bird of God, the only bird that could fly above the clouds and stare directly at the sun. In fact, the eagle represents St. John, the Evangelist, in honor of the soaring spirit and penetrating vision of his gospel.
7. Before the Ateneo. The first Spanish Jesuits arrived in the country in 1581. While primarily missionaries, they were also custodians of the ratio studiorum, the system of Jesuit education formulated about 1559. In 1590, they founded one of the first colleges in the Philippines, the Colegio de Manila (also known as the Colegio Seminario de San Ignacio) under the leadership of Antonio Sedeño, S.J. The school formally opened in 1595.
8. In 1621, Pope Gregory XV, through the archbishop of Manila, authorized the San Ignacio to confer degrees in theology and the arts. Two years later, King Philip IV of Spain confirmed this authorization, making the school a royal and a pontifical university, the very first university in the Philippines and in Asia!
9. After the Jesuit Suppression in 1773, the Jesuits would return to the Philippines a century after. Authorized by a royal decree of 1852, ten Spanish Jesuits arrived in Manila on April 14, 1859. This Jesuit mission was sent mainly for missionary work in Mindanao and Jolo. However, despite almost a century away from the Philippines, the Jesuits’ reputation as educators remained entrenched in the minds of Manila’s leaders. On August 5, the ayuntamiento or city council requested the Governor-General for a Jesuit school financed by public money.
On October 1, 1859, the Governor-General authorized the Jesuits to take over the Escuela Municipal, then a small private school maintained for 30 children of Spanish residents. Partly subsidized by the ayuntamiento, it was the only primary school in Manila at the time. Under the Jesuits, the Escuela eventually became the Ateneo Municipal de Manila in 1865 when it was elevated to an institution of secondary education. The Ateneo Municipal offered the bachillerato as well as technical courses leading to certificates in agriculture, surveying, and business.
American Jesuits took over administration in 1921. In 1932, under Fr. Richard O’Brien, third American rector, the Ateneo transferred to Padre Faura after a fire destroyed the Intramuros campus.
11. Devastation hit the Ateneo campus once again during World War II. Only one structure remained standing – the statue of St. Joseph and the Child Jesus which now stands in front of the Jesuit Residence in the Loyola Heights campus. Ironwork and statuary salvaged from the Ateneo ruins have since been incorporated into various existing Ateneo buildings. Some examples are the Ateneo monograms on the gates of the Loyola Heights campus, the iron grillwork on the ground floor of Xavier Hall, and the statue of the Immaculate Conception displayed at the University archives.
But even if the Ateneo campus had been destroyed, the university survived. Following the American liberation, the Ateneo de Manila reopened temporarily in Plaza Guipit in Sampaloc. The Padre Faura campus reopened in 1946 with Quonset huts serving as buildings among the campus ruins.
12. In 1952, the university, led by Fr. William Masterson, S.J. moved most of its units to its present Loyola Heights campus. (See Loyola Heights and Fr. Masterson below). The Padre Faura campus continued to house the professional schools until 1976.
13. The first Filipino rector, Fr. Francisco Araneta, S.J. was appointed in 1958. And in 1959, its centennial year, the Ateneo became a university.
14. The Padre Faura campus was closed in 1976. A year after, the University opened a new campus for its professional schools in Salcedo Village, in the bustling business district of Makati. In October 1998, the University completed construction of a bigger site of the Ateneo Professional Schools at Rockwell, also in Makati.
15. Jose Rizal. Some call him the greatest Filipino who ever lived. He was one of nine hailed as sobresaliente in his graduating class of twelve from the Ateneo Municipal. He loved the Ateneo. Walking to his death by firing squad in Bagumbayan (what is now Luneta), he was supposed to have asked the Jesuit fathers who were marching with him if the school they were passing through was the Ateneo Municipal. When he learned that it is, he said, “I spent so many happy years there.” Like Rizal, I think we can also say the same thing every time we pass through the Ateneo of our times in Katipunan. “I spent so many happy years there.”
