It was a victory for heritage as the Cabatuan parish priest, stung by his illegal structure built infront of the Cabatuan cemetery chapel, demolished the extension.

Cabatuan’s beautiful cemetery chapel is one of a few existing in the country with its highly stylized bas reliefs and beautiful design. Now, the parish priest, Fr. Patricio A. Salarda is building a modern covered extension right infront of the central entrance.

Ten exceptional and poorly known Spanish colonial era cemetery chapels that are still existing in the Philippines scattered in Luzon and the Visayas.

Simbahan reader Handel Advento sent in pictures he took of the Oton cemetery chapel before it was renovated in October 1997.

A beautiful structure just along the highway of Saravia (now E. B. Magalona), Negros Occidental. Built by the Augustinian Recollects, this was made with mortar and bricks and is still complete with its chapel, niches, arch and perimeter fence with beautiful iron grills.

Thanx to Jobers Bersales, some Cebu archival images (scans) from the Ahlborn Collection was made available to me. Part of the collection are black and white images of Oslob Church, the mortuary chapel and the kumbento.

Extant mortuary chapels in the country are hard to find. Except maybe if you are in the province of Iloilo where there are a few excellent examples. However, beyond that province and Cebu, there are also scattered across the rest of the regions but not all and I haven’t seen one from Mindanao. During my travels, I was able to find some that are now posted here.

The cemetery and mortuary chapels in Cebu are not as grand as those in Iloilo and are in different degrees of condition with most having been renovated and one in near collapse. In this post, I am presenting the eight cemetery and mortuary chapels that can be found in Cebu: Calamba (Cebu City), Sibonga, Argao, Dalaguete and Oslob.