Republic of the Philippines Republika ng Pilipinas
Flag Coat of arms
Motto: Maka-Diyos, Maka-Tao, Makakalikasan, at Makabansa[1] ("For God, People, Nature, and Country")
Anthem:  Lupang Hinirang
Capital		Manila[2] 14°35′N 121°0′E / 14.583°N 121°E / 14.583; 121
Largest city		Quezon City
Official language(s)		Filipino (Tagalog) English
Recognised regional languages		Bikol, Cebuano, Hiligaynon, Ilokano, Pampango, Pangasinense, Tagalog, Waray[3]
Optional languagesa		Spanish and Arabic[4]
National language		Filipino
Ethnic groups		30.1 % Visayans 28.1 % Tagalog 10.1 % Ilocano 9.1 % Moro 6.9 % Bicolano 3.3 % Kapampangan 1.75 % Pangasinense 1.30 % indigenous and non-indigenous.
Demonym		Filipino
Government		Unitary presidential constitutional republic
-	President	Benigno Aquino III (LP)
-	Vice President	Jejomar Binay (PDP-Laban)
-	Senate President	Juan Ponce Enrile (PMP)
-	House Speaker	Feliciano Belmonte, Jr. (LP)
-	Supreme Court Chief Justice	Vacant
Legislature		Congress
-	Upper house	Senate
-	Lower house	House of Representatives
Independence		from Spainb from United States
-	Established	April 27, 1565
-	Declared	June 12, 1898
-	Self-government	March 24, 1934
-	Recognized	July 4, 1946
-	Current constitution	February 2, 1987
Area
-	Land	299,764 km2 [3](73rd) 115,831 sq mi
-	Water (%)	0.61%[5] (inland waters)
Population
-	2010 census	92,337,852[6]
-	Density	308.0/km2 (43rd) 797.2/sq mi
GDP (PPP)		2011 estimate
-	Total	$390.408 billion[7]
-	Per capita	$4,073[7]
GDP (nominal)		2011 estimate
-	Total	$213.129 billion[7]
-	Per capita	$2,223[7]
Gini (2006)		45.8[5] (medium) (44th)
HDI (2011)		0.644[8] (medium) (112th)
Currency		Peso (Filipino: piso) ₱ (PHP)
Time zone		PST (UTC+8)
-	Summer (DST)	not observed (UTC+8)
Drives on the		right[9]
Internet TLD		.ph
Calling code		+63
1	^a The 1987 Philippine constitution specifies, "Spanish and Arabic shall be promoted on a voluntary and optional basis."
2	^b Philippine revolutionaries declared independence from Spain on June 12, 1898, but the Spanish claim of sovereignty was passed from Spain to the United States in the Treaty of Paris. This led to the Philippine–American War.
3	^c Rankings above were taken from associated Wikipedia pages as of October 2010 and may be based on data or data sources other than those appearing here.

The Philippines ⁱ/ˈfɪlɨpiːnz/ FI-lə-peenz (Filipino: Pilipinas [ˌpɪlɪˈpinɐs]), officially known as the Republic of the Philippines (Filipino: Republika ng Pilipinas) is a sovereign country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam. The Sulu Sea to the southwest lies between the country and the island of Borneo, and to the south the Celebes Sea separates it from other islands of Indonesia. It is bounded on the east by the Philippine Sea. Its location on the Pacific Ring of Fire and its tropical climate make the Philippines prone to earthquakes and typhoons but have also endowed the country with natural resources and made it one of the richest areas of biodiversity in the world. An archipelago comprising 7,107 islands, the Philippines is categorized broadly into three main geographical divisions: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. Its capital city is Manila.

With an estimated population of about 98 million people^[10], the Philippines is the 7th most populated Asian country and the 12th most populated country in the world. An additional 12.5 million Filipinos live overseas.^[11] Multiple ethnicities and cultures are found throughout the islands. In prehistoric times, Negritos were some of the archipelago's earliest inhabitants. They were followed by successive waves of Austronesian peoples who brought with them influences from Malay, Hindu, and Islamic societies. Trade introduced Chinese cultural influences which remain to this day.

The Philippines has been part of several empires: the Spanish Empire during the age of Imperialism, the United States after the Spanish-American War of 1898, and the Japanese Empire during World War II, until the official Philippine independence in 1945.

The arrival of Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 marked the beginning of an era of Spanish interest and eventual colonization. In 1543, Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos named the archipelago Las Islas Filipinas in honor of Philip II of Spain. Miguel López de Legazpi arrived in the Philippines in 1565 and consolidated Spanish rule in the islands, which remained a colony of Spain for more than 300 years.

Manila became the Asian hub of the Manila–Acapulco galleon fleet. Christianity was widely adopted. As the 19th century gave way to the 20th, there followed in quick succession the Philippine Revolution, which spawned the short-lived First Philippine Republic; the Spanish-American War; and the Philippine–American War. In the aftermath, the United States emerged as the dominant power. Aside from the period of Japanese occupation, the United States retained sovereignty over the islands until the end of World War II when the Philippines gained independence. The United States bequeathed to the Philippines the English language and a stronger affinity for Western culture. Since independence the Philippines has had an often tumultuous experience with democracy, with popular "people power" movements overthrowing a dictatorship in one instance but also underlining the institutional weaknesses of its constitutional republic in others.

Etymology[link]

The name Philippines is derived from that of King Philip II of Spain. Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos during his expedition in 1542 named the islands of Leyte and Samar Felipinas after the then Prince of Asturias. Eventually the name Las Islas Filipinas would be used to cover all the islands of the archipelago. Before it became commonplace, other names such as Islas del Poniente (Islands of the West) and Magellan's name for the islands San Lázaro were also used by the Spanish to refer to the islands.^{[12][13][14][15][16]}

The official name of the Philippines has changed several times in the course of the country's history. During the Philippine Revolution, the Malolos Congress proclaimed the establishment of the República Filipina or the Philippine Republic. From the period of the Spanish-American War and the Philippine–American War until the Commonwealth period, American colonial authorities referred to the country as the Philippine Islands, a translation of the Spanish name. During the American period the name Philippines began to appear and it has since become the country's common name.^[17] Since independence the official name of the country has been the Republic of the Philippines.

History[link]

A page from the Boxer Codex. Left, is a general from the Rajahnate of Butuan and to the right is a princess of Tondo.

The metatarsal of Callao Man is reported to have been reliably dated by uranium-series dating to 67,000 years ago^[18] thereby replacing the Tabon Man of Palawan, carbon-dated to around 24,000 years ago^[19][20] as the oldest human remains found in the archipelago. Negritos were among the archipelago's earliest inhabitants but their appearance in the Philippines has not been reliably dated.^[21] There are several opposing theories regarding the origins of ancient Filipinos. F. Landa Jocano theorizes that the ancestors of the Filipinos evolved locally. Wilhelm Solheim's Island Origin Theory^[22] postulates that the peopling of the archipelago transpired via trade networks originating in the antediluvian Sundaland area around 48000 to 5000 BCE rather than by wide-scale migration. The Austronesian Expansion Theory states that Malayo-Polynesians coming from Taiwan began migrating to the Philippines around 4000 BCE, displacing earlier arrivals.^[23][24] Whatever the case, by 1000 BCE the inhabitants of the archipelago had developed into four kinds of social groups: hunter-gathering tribes, warrior societies, petty plutocracies, and maritime-centered harbor principalities.^[25]

Trade between the maritime-oriented peoples and other Asian countries during the subsequent period brought influences from Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam. During this time there was no unifying political state encompassing the entire Philippine Archipelago. Instead, the islands were divided among competing thalassocracies ruled by various datus, rajahs, or sultans. These thalassocracies were composed of autonomous barangays which were independent to or allied with larger nations. Among them were the kingdoms of Maynila, Namayan, and Tondo, the confederation of Madyaas, the state of Ma-i, the rajahnates of Butuan and Cebu, and the sultanates of Maguindanao and Sulu.^{[26][27][28][29]} Some of these societies were part of the Malayan empires of Srivijaya, Majapahit, and Brunei.^[30][31] Islam was brought to the Philippines by traders and proselytizers from Malaysia and Indonesia.^[32] By the 15th century, Islam was established in the Sulu Archipelago and by 1565 had reached Mindanao, the Visayas, and Luzon.^[33]