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History · Philippines
Lupang Hinirang
Reference entry · last updated August 30, 2026
Lupang Hinirang ("Chosen Land") is the national anthem of the Philippines. Julián Felipe composed its melody in 1898 as a wordless ceremonial march, and it was not sung at all for its first year of existence. José Palma later fitted it with Spanish lyrics, and those lyrics were rewritten into Tagalog three separate times over the following six decades before Republic Act No. 8491 fixed the current text into law in 1998 and made Filipino the only language in which it may be sung.[1]
Origin: a wordless 1898 march
On 5 June 1898, Emilio Aguinaldo, head of the Philippines' Dictatorial Government, commissioned composer Julián Felipe to write a new national march, after rejecting an earlier one as unsatisfactory.[1] Felipe's piece went through two working titles, "Marcha Filipina-Magdalo" and then "Marcha Nacional Filipina," and drew on three existing marches for its shape: Spain's "Marcha Real," the grand march from Verdi's Aida, and France's "La Marseillaise."[1] The Banda San Francisco de Malabón performed it in public for the first time on 12 June 1898, at Aguinaldo's residence in Kawit, Cavite, during the proclamation of Philippine independence from Spain.[1]
It was adopted purely as an instrumental piece, with the same ceremonial, wordless status as Spain's own "Marcha Real" held in Spain.[2] No lyrics existed for more than a year after that first performance.
José Palma's "Filipinas" (1899)
In August 1899, soldier and poet José Palma wrote a Spanish-language poem titled "Filipinas" while staying at a hacienda in Bautista, Pangasinan.[1] The poem drew on an earlier Kapampangan piece, "Labuad Mapalad" ("Blessed Land"), written the previous year by Mariano Proceso Pabalan.[1] "Filipinas" was first published on 3 September 1899, in the newspaper La Independencia, marking the paper's first anniversary, and it was set to Felipe's already-existing march soon after.[1] Palma's Spanish text, not Felipe's melody, is the part of the anthem that every later version has translated and retranslated.
The English interlude
An English-language version entered official use in the American colonial period. Accounts of exactly when and by whom vary: one source dates a translation effort to the 1920s, following the 1919 repeal of a 1907 law that had banned display of the Philippine flag,[1] while another source dates the widely used English lyrics, credited to Senator Camilo Osías together with Mary A. Lane and titled "Philippine Hymn," without giving a specific year.[1] What is clear from the primary legislative record is narrower than either translation story: Commonwealth Act No. 382, approved 5 September 1938, adopted Julián Felipe's musical arrangement as the official national anthem, but the Act addresses only the music, not any set of English or other-language lyrics.[1]
Three Tagalog rewrites
The Tagalog lyrics sung today are the third of three distinct Tagalog versions, not a single translation carried forward unchanged.
| Version | Period | Note |
|---|---|---|
| "Diwa ng Bayan" ("Spirit of the Nation") | 1940s, Japanese occupation | Produced for the Japanese-sponsored Second Republic; framed around the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere," with the flag itself reduced to a passing mention in the final verse.[1][3] |
| "O Sintang Lupa" ("O Beloved Land") | 1948–1956 | Credited to Julián Cruz Balmaceda, Ildefonso Santos, and Francisco Caballo; adopted two years after independence as a version closer to Palma's original Spanish than the Japanese-era text had been.[1][3] |
| "Lupang Hinirang" | 1956–present | Produced by a commission Education Secretary Gregorio Hernández formed under President Ramon Magsaysay; sung for the first time on 26 May 1956, then revised again in the 1960s into the text still sung today.[1][4] |
Two independent accounts of this sequence agree on both the ordering and the general character of each rewrite, even where they differ on secondary detail such as exact dates, which is why this entry presents the sequence as a table rather than a single narrated chain of dates.[1][3]
Republic Act No. 8491 (1998)
Republic Act No. 8491, the Flag and Heraldic Code of the Philippines, approved 12 February 1998, is the law that ended the anthem's history of successive rewrites by fixing its text and terms of use.[5] Quoting the Act directly:
"The National Anthem shall always be sung in the national language within or without the country[.]"[5]
"The rendition of the National Anthem, whether played or sung, shall be in accordance with the musical arrangement and composition of Julian Felipe."[5]
The Act also restricts when the anthem may be performed at all, barring it from being "played and sung for mere recreation, amusement or entertainment purposes" outside a short list of permitted occasions: international competitions with Philippine representation, local competitions, the sign-on and sign-off of radio and television broadcasts, before the screening of films and the opening of theatrical presentations, and other occasions the National Historical Institute approves.[5] Where it is sung at a public gathering, the law requires the audience itself to sing, and to do so "with fervor."[5] Separate from the Act's own text, the National Historical Institute has specified a target tempo of 100 to 120 beats per minute in 2/4 time, with a full rendition running about 53 seconds.[1] Complicating enforcement of "the musical arrangement...of Julian Felipe" as the legal standard, Felipe's original holograph score has not been located, leaving no surviving autograph copy against which a performance can be checked.[1]
Full lyrics: Filipino and English
The Filipino column below is quoted verbatim from Section 36 of Republic Act No. 8491, the only text of the anthem with legal standing.[5] The English column is a literal, word-for-word rendering published on Wikisource, explicitly marked there as "not meant to be sung."[6] No singable official English lyric exists any more: Republic Act No. 8491 requires the anthem to "always be sung in the national language within or without the country," which supersedes the older singable English "Philippine Hymn" adaptation discussed above.[5]
| Filipino (official, RA 8491) | English (literal translation) |
|---|---|
| Bayang magiliw, Perlas ng Silanganan, Alab ng puso Sa Dibdib mo'y buhay. |
Beloved country, Pearl of the Orient, The burning [fervour] of the heart In your bosom is ever alive. |
| Lupang Hinirang, Duyan ka ng magiting, Sa manlulupig, Di ka pasisiil. |
Chosen Land, You are the cradle of the brave, To the conquerors You shall never be oppressed. |
| Sa dagat at bundok, Sa simoy at sa langit mong bughaw, May dilag ang tula, At awit sa paglayang minamahal. |
Through the seas and through the mountains, Through the air and through the skies of yours azure, There is splendour in the poem And song for freedom beloved. |
| Ang kislap ng watawat mo'y Tagumpay na nagniningning, Ang bituin at araw niya, Kailan pa ma'y di magdidilim. |
The sparkle of the flag that is yours Is a victory that is shining. The Star[s] and Sun of it Forever shall never dim. |
| Lupa ng araw ng luwalhati't pagsinta, Buhay ay langit sa piling mo, Aming ligaya na pag may mang-aapi, Ang mamatay ng dahil sa iyo. |
Land of the sun, of glory, and [of] love, Life is heaven in your embrace; It is our joy if there will be oppressors To die because of you. |
The English column is a literal crib for meaning, not a performance text; it is quoted here for reference and is not sung anywhere. The 1938 "Philippine Hymn" singable English lyric, discussed above, is a separate, older adaptation and is not reproduced on this page.
Enforcement and controversy
The 1998 law's tempo and arrangement rules have produced recurring, mostly minor friction with performers who deviate from them. In 2013, musician Joey Ayala performed an altered arrangement that changed the anthem's closing line and shifted its time signature from 4/4 to 6/8, drawing a mixed public reaction.[1] In 2018, Senate President Vicente Sotto III proposed rewriting the anthem's closing line, which he characterized as defeatist in tone, a suggestion that was not well received online.[1] Singers performing the anthem before boxer Manny Pacquiao's fights have at various times been both praised and criticized by the National Historical Institute for singing it too slowly or too quickly relative to the mandated tempo.[1]
References
- ↑ Wikipedia, "Lupang Hinirang." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lupang_Hinirang
- ↑ National Commission for Culture and the Arts, "National Anthem – Lupang Hinirang." https://ncca.gov.ph/about-culture-and-arts/culture-profile/philippine-fast-facts/national-anthem-lupang-hinirang/
- ↑ Flags of the World, "The Flag in the National Anthem (Philippines)." https://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/ph_anth.html
- ↑ Filipinas Heritage Library, "The Philippine National Anthem and R.A. 8491." https://www.filipinaslibrary.org.ph/himig/the-philippine-national-anthem-and-r-a-8491/
- ↑ Republic Act No. 8491, "Flag and Heraldic Code of the Philippines," approved 12 February 1998, §§35–38. https://www.lawphil.net/statutes/repacts/ra1998/ra_8491_1998.html
- ↑ Wikisource, "Translation:Lupang Hinirang," literal English translation via the Tagalog by Felipe Padilla de León, licensed CC BY-SA. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Translation:Lupang_Hinirang