Rizal Shrine

The Rizal Shrine in Calamba (Filipino: Museo ni José Rizal Calamba) is a reproduction of the original two-story, Spanish-Colonial style house in Calamba, Laguna where José Rizal was born on June 19, 1861.[1] Rizal is regarded as one of the greatest national heroes of the Philippines.[2] The house is designated as a National Shrine (Level 1) by the National Historical Commission of the Philippines. It is located along Mercado Street and Rizal Street in Calamba's Poblacion 5 and is in close proximity to St. John the Baptist Parish Church and the City College of Calamba.

Rizal's father, Francisco Rizal Mercado, took two years to build the original Rizal ancestral house. The Spanish authorities confiscated the house in 1891. Paciano Rizal, brother of José Rizal, reoccupied the house during the Philippine Revolution, but lost it again to the friars. It was subsequently sold, destroyed in World War II[3] and eventually demolished. The government bought what remained of the Rizal House for ₱ 24,000.

In 1949, President Elpidio Quirino passed Executive Order no.145, facilitating reconstruction of the house. Filipino school children provided most of the funding for the project while Juan F. Nakpil served as the supervising architect. Staying true to the original home, the reconstructed house occupies the same site and is built from the materials during the time the house was built.

On June 19, 1950, the newly built home was inaugurated and now serves as a repository for Rizal's memorabilia.

During the Centenary of the Philippine Independence in 1998, the National Commission for Culture and the Arts in cooperation with the National Centennial Commission, decided that Rizal's Shrine should focus specifically on his childhood.

The house is intended to provide an accurate representation of the home Rizal grew up in until his formal schooling in Biñan (where Rizal was born.) Rizal's anecdotes often reference his childhood home, recounting the nipa hut in the garden where he learned to sleep and sculpt; the kitchen where he learned the alphabet; the bedroom where he learned to pray; the library where he discovered books and the azotea where he listened to his grandmother's stories of "skeletons, buried treasures and trees that bloomed with diamonds."