First Native Filipino Female Author and First Ever Kapampangan Author: Luisa Gonzaga de Leon (1805-1843)
She is the first native Filipino female author and the first ever Kapampangan author. She hails from the barrio of Cabambangan in the town of Bacolor, the cradle of the Kapampangan language.
She wrote the Ejercicio Cotidiano (Daily Devotion) which is the first book published that was written by a native Filipino woman, and the first-ever book written by a Kapampangan. It is a translation of Spanish catholic prayers and the missal (text of the Mass) into Kapampangan to help her fellow Kapampangans understand them.
She was truly way ahead of her time, as vernacular languages were not yet used in Mass during her lifetime until changes were made during the Second Vatican Council 120 years later (1962-1965).
In the preface of the book, she proudly identifies herself as an “India” (a Filipino woman of native ancestry) despite actually being a mestiza de sangley (a Filipino woman of mixed Chinese and native ancestry).
During her time, the Spanish Civil Code only allowed women to publish under their husbands’ permission, so she only pursued publishing her writing after widowhood which allowed her to bypass this. She died before the book got published, and her sons published it in 1844, a year after her death from tuberculosis.
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