Banate, officially the Municipality of Banate (, ), is a 4th class municipality in the province of Iloilo, Philippines. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 33,376 people.
The town is primarily a fishing and agricultural municipality, with large areas planted with rice, sugarcane, vegetables, beans, coconut and bananas. Banate is well known for Kasag (crabs), krill or shimp paste called ginamos, and the fresh fish, which local entrepreneurs take to and sell in the capital of the province, in many of the non-coastal towns, and even in Manila.
History
Banate during the Pre-conquest Period
The settlement in Banate is of ancient origin. It was among the ancient organized territories of the Confederation of Madja-as in Panay (also called by the ancient Bornean migrants, the island of "Madya-as"), which the Spaniards found when they came to the Island. It was known to Spanish missionaries during the earliest dates of the colonization as Bobog. The Spanish Augustinian historian, Fray Gaspar de San Agustin, mentions it in an account about Dumangas and other coastal towns of the island, where in ancient times there was a principality and trade center that had the most illustrious nobility in the whole island of Panay. Bobog (Banate), Araut, Anilao, and Hapitan were among the ancient coastal civilizations in Panay.
There are theories that settlers from the powerful ancient thalassocratic Malay empire based on the island of Sumatra, modern-day Indonesia (which influenced much of Southeast Asia) arrived in Banate in around 600 A.D., during the second wave of migration from the Sulawesi Island of the southern archipelago of Southeast Asia. First, the most northern part of Iloilo, Estancia, was settled. Some migrants moved to Batad, Balasan and Carles. Then, Ajuy was settled, and from there communities spread to inhabit the present Conception and San Dionisio area. In time, communities of Ajuy spread upland to populate the hamlet of Sara. The families of Sara spread to Lemery. Other families inhabited the coast of Bobog (Banate-Viejo), and traversed the mountain now called San Rafael. Some families settled near the River Jalaud. Others moved further South and settled in Irong-irong and finally stopped at Ogtong. These independent coastal settlements were engaged in fishing, and settled near rivers.
The Maragtas of Pedro Alcantara Monteclaro mentions that the area near the Alakaygan River was among the first areas to be exploited by the early Malay settlers for agriculture. In these places they cultivated the land, planting kauayan, mabulo, hidiok, bagtikan, sibukao, buri, niog, kulo, kalamansi, paray, batad, kahangkugui and other seed, which they brought from Borneo. Alakaygan and Bubug (Bobog), which gave its name to the ancient society and where the future Spanish population would develop, were among the first settlements established by the Malays in Panay.
As a side note, Alakaygan is the only place in Banate where, until recent years, Tapukal (krill or hipon smoked in the bark of a native tree) was produced. It is a delicacy that can be found only in Banate.
Banate during the Spanish Regime
Origin of the Town's Name
At the beginning of the Christianisation of Panay, Bobog was a visita of the Augustinian parish and monastery of Dumangas. Gaspar de San Agustin mentioned the existence of the town in his book Conquistas de las Islas Filipinas (1565–1615). Another Augustinian historian Fray Juan Fernandez, in his Monografias de los pueblos de la isla de Panay, affirms that Banate was known in the ancient times as Bobog or Bog-og. The Augustinian friar says that the modern name Banate might have been derived from some flora that abundantly thrive in the town. One possibility is the Butacea, named by Carl Linnaeus as Murraya exotica. If the spelling and the pronunciation are corrupted, and instead of Banate what is written or pronounced is Bangate, it would therefore be the leguminous papilionácea called in botany as Abrus praecatorius.