There’s one ancient Kapampangan who deserves to be recognized alongside Lapu-Lapu—“the brave youth from Macabebe” (also known as Tarik Soliman and sometimes Bambalito). If Lapu-Lapu is the first Filipino to defend the country, Tarik Soliman is the first Filipino to die defending the country. It happened 452 years ago, on June 3, 1571, when Miguel Lopez de Legazpi’s master-of-camp, Martin de Goiti, killed Tarik Soliman who had the courage to fight him at the Battle of Bangkusay (near Manila Bay) even after all the other Tagalog chieftains, Rajah Soliman, Rajah Matanda, and Lakandula (probably Tarik’s relatives) had already dropped their initial resistance and agreed to welcome the Spaniards.
Legazpi himself wrote in 1572, “There was a province called Macabebe from which came 2,000 heathens riding in 40 vessels who stationed near Lakandula’s town before our very eyes, where they stayed for three days threatening us. I could not do anything to accept their challenge. I had only nine boats ready. ”
So Legazpi “sent two Spaniards to see Lacandola and in his house they met the Macabebes and their chief named Bambalito,” according to a codex dated 1590.
Fray Gaspar de San Agustin, another Spanish chronicler, wrote that the Kapampangan chieftain “replied excitedly that neither he nor his followers wanted to see (Legazpi) nor have his friendship, nor did he expect to be his friend for the rest of his life, but rather to fight him.”
“Having said this,” continued Gaspar de San Agustin, “he stood up and with audacity and ferocity unsheathed his sword. Brandishing it he said, ‘May the sun strike me and cut me in two, and may I fall in disgrace before my women for them to hate me, if I ever became even for a moment a friend to these Castilians!”
“Then,” the account went on, “he left and without going down the stairs, to show his bravery, jumped out a window to the street then went directly to his caracoa (warship). He told the Spaniards to inform their captain that he was waiting at (Bangkusay) to fight him. After saying this, he began sailing, amid hurrahs, to the place he mentioned.”
At Bangkusay, when Tarik Soliman saw the Spaniards approaching, he courageously fired some shots. “He fought animatedly and without showing any weakness or disarray, until he died from a rifle shot by one of our soldiers,” wrote Gaspar de San Agustin.
Miguel Lopez de Legazpi himself admitted that “the heathens attacked our boats impetuously and discharged their artillery (of bronze cannons) with settled regularity. The commander of the heathens lost his life and he was the very one who had obstinately rejected our peace overtures.”
And that’s how Tarik Soliman’s glorious martyrdom planted the seeds of heroic courage in the DNA of all future Kapampangans who ever fought every evil ruler, colonizer and invader!