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Founded in 1620, Dumaguete City is one of the older parishes in Negros and its parochial administration included the southeastern part of the island from Sibulan up to Bayawan as well as Siquijor.
Administration of the parish was entrusted in the beginning to the secular clergy, and Fr. Juan de Roa y Herrera served as its first resident priest up to 1623.
Amlan was one of four existing parishes when the ecclesiastical administration of Negros Island was turned over to the Augustinian Recollects on June 30, 1848.
At that time, it didn’t amount to much, according to parish writings quoting Fr. Licinio Ruiz, who described it as a “miserable fishing hamlet consisting of 13 houses and a few Christians scattered on its outskirts.” Ruiz, appointed Recollect chronicler in 1922, added that Amblan, as the Spanish friars called it, was established into a parish separate from Tanjay in 1848.
Jimalalud was among the early missions turned over to the Augustinian Recollects when they took over the evangelization of Negros in 1848.
One of their first few acts when they assumed control was to create Tayasan into a parish separate from Tanjay together with the missions of Jimalalud and Ayungon on May 8, 1849.
Manjuyod was established as a parish in 1854 and a Recollect priest arrived that same year to oversee its spiritual administration.
It was, however, the successor of Fr. Jose Maria Ruiz, the town’s first parish priest, who was credited as the “real architect of the town,” according to the publication “Handurawan: Visita Iglesia Negros Y Recoletors.”
Bais was organized into an independent town in 1801 but some time passed before it would be established as a parish by the Augustinian Recollects.
Before November 1872, the town was under the parish of Tanjay and, a few years later, of Manjuyod. Nevertheless, the parish priest of Manjuyod continued to minister to the town until it was appointed its down spiritual administrator beginning 1873.
One of the oldest missions in the Philippines founded in 1580, Tanjay once served as the mother church of the independent parishes of Dumaguete (1620), Siaton (1848), Amlan (1854), San Jose (1895), and Pamplona (1952) in Negros Oriental.
Its name was derived from the words Tanay, Tanai, and Taytay that originated from the beautiful and thickly settled river valley by mostly members of an indigenous group from Bohol, explained the book “Handurawan: Visita Iglesia Negros Y Recoletos” published by Tolle et Lege.
Dedicated to St. Anthony of Padua, this church of Sibulan was the third built on site since the founding of the parish in the mid 19th century.
Although it became a parish in 1838, Sibulan already had a resident priest beginning in 1833. Fr. Mateo Saplad was credited with the construction of the first church and convent made of wood. Both structures were razed by fire in 1854.
Dauin was among the oldest towns organized in Negros Oriental but it stayed for a long time as a visita of the parish of Siaton.
Before it became a parish, Fr. Jose Barredo ministered to the town from 1796 until his death in 1835. Frequent pirate incursions prompted him to transfer Dauin to where it is now currently located.
The parish of Dauin was entrusted to the Recollects beginning in 1857 by order of Bishop Romualdo Jimeno of Cebu and Fr. Manuel Navarro became the town’s first Recollect parish priest.
A popular folktale claims it was because of an old man who was hard of hearing and dwelt by the banks of an unnamed river that this coastal town became known as Siaton.
The story continues that a band of Moro traders in search of drinking water approached him and he thought they were asking for his name. He replied “Si Aton” and that is how the place came to be called Siaton.
Bayawan started out as a mission established by Royal Decree of 1868 along with San Sebastian and Inayauan. It was then known as “New Tolong” and served as the seat of government from which the poblacion and Sta. Catalina (Old Tolong) was administered.
The mission supervised the town center and the barrios of Pangadban, Camayan, and Basay.