Before he was put to death at

age 35 by the Spanish colonial

authorities
in
1896,
the
national hero, Jose Rizal, had
romanced and conquered the
hearts of a succession of 10
women, according to several
Filipino historians.

Quite a feat for a young man who

stood no more than 411 tall .
-Guerrero;Author

In his love affairs, Rizals popular

image as a demigod is stripped
and he is revealed to be human
after all.
-Dr. Pablo Trillana ;The Loves of Rizal (2000)

Table of Contents

Julia
Segunda Katigbak
Leonor Valenzuela
Leonor Rivera
Consuelo Ortiga
Gertrude Beckette
Nelly Boustead
O Sei San
Suzanne Jacoby
Josephine Bracken

Rizal was only 15 when he first saw Julia

by accident in a river in Los Baos a few
days after Easter in 1877. She was
wearing a red wraparound skirt.
Julia could not catch the butterfly she was
chasing. Rizal, ever gallant, caught two,
Trillana wrote.
Heart beating with strange fondness, Rizal
offered her the butterflies and she laughed
with innocent pleasure.
He was instantly attracted to her. But for
lack of subsequent contact, Rizal
eventually forgot Julia whose surname was
never known.

Rizal next met Segunda Katigbak, a

charming girl from Lipa, Batangas.
She was his puppy love, according
to Trillana. Unfortunately, his first
love was engaged to be married to
a town mate- Manuel Luz.

After his admiration for a short girl in

the person of Segunda, then came
Leonor Valenzuela, a tall girl from
Pagsanjan. Rizal send her love notes
written in invisible ink, that could
only be deciphered over the warmth
of the lamp or candle. He visited her
on the eve of his departure to Spain
and bade her a last goodbye.

Almost simultaneously, Rizal was meeting

another Leonor. The girl, Leonor Rivera, would be
his girlfriend for the next 11 years. The two were
distant cousins.

Rivera was to him his ideal woman, his model for

Maria Clara, one of the main characters in his
first novel, Noli Me Tangere. He was ready to
marry her. Unfortunately, Riveras mother
disliked Rizal who was then earning the
reputation of being a dissident. The two last saw
each other before Rizal left for Spain in May
1882.

The mother hid from Rivera all the letters that

Rizal was sending from Spain. After a passage of
many years, thinking that Rizal had abandoned
her, Rivera sadly consented to marry Henry
Kipping, an Englishman who was her mothers
choice. Rizal was said to have cried shamelessly

Rizal met Consuelo Ortiga y Rey, the

prettier of Don Pablo Ortigas two
daughters, in Madrid. She fell in love
with him after only a few dates. He
dedicated to her A la Senorita C.O.
y R, which became one of his best
poems.

The Ortiga's residence in Madrid was

frequented
by
Rizal
and
his
compatriots. He probably fell in love
with her and Consuelo apparently
asked him for romantic verses. He
suddenly backed out before the

While
Rizal
was
in
London
annotating the Sucesos de las Islas
Filipinas, he boarded in the house of
the Beckett family, within walking
distance of the British Museum.
Gertrude, a blue-eyed and buxom
girl was the oldest of the three
Beckett daughters. She fell in love
with Rizal. Tottie helped him in his
painting and sculpture. But Rizal
suddenly left London for Paris to

Rizal having lost Leonor Rivera, entertained the thought

of courting other ladies. While a guest of the Boustead
family at their residence in the resort city of Biarritz, he
had befriended the two pretty daughters of his host,
Eduardo Boustead. Rizal used to fence with the sisters
at the studio of Juan Luna. Antonio Luna, Juan's brother
and also a frequent visitor of the Bousteads, courted
Nellie but she was deeply infatuated with Rizal. In a
party held by Filipinos in Madrid, a drunken Antonio
Luna uttered unsavory remarks against Nellie
Boustead. This prompted Rizal to challenge Luna into a
duel. Fortunately, Luna apologized to Rizal, thus
averting
tragedy
for
the
compatriots.
Their love affair unfortunately did not end in marriage.
It failed because Rizal refused to be converted to the
Protestant faith, as Nellie demanded and Nellie's
mother did not like a physician without enough paying
clientele to be a son-in-law. The lovers, however, parted
as good friends when Rizal left Europe.

On his second trip to Europe in 1888,

Rizal stopped by Japan where he met O
Sei San, a lovely and intelligent
daughter of a samurai. If all he wanted
was a good life, he would have married
O Sei San and stayed on in Japan
because a Spanish legation there was
offering him a well-paying job. But he
left Japan because he thought he was
destined for a greater task in the
Philippines and had to go home. In a
letter, he said of her: O Sei San, O Sei
San, sayonara. No woman, like you,
has ever loved me

In 1890, Rizal moved to

Brussels because of the high
cost of living in Paris. In
Brussels, he lived in the
boarding house of the two
Jacoby sisters. In time, they fell
deeply in love with each other.

While on exile in Dapitan, Zamboanga, in early

February 1895, Rizal met an 18-year-old petite
Irish girl, with bold blue eyes, brown hair and a
happy disposition. She was Josephine Bracken,
the adopted daughter of George Taufer who had
traveled to Dapitan from Hong Kong to have his
eye treated by Rizal.

Rizal was immediately attracted to Josephine. He

called her dulce estranjera, or sweet foreigner.
The loneliness and boredom of exile may have
taken its toll as he found himself falling in love
quite easily. However, Rizals sisters suspected
Josephine of being a spy for the Spanish
authorities and a threat to his security.

Rizal asked Josephine to marry him, but she was

not yet ready to make a decision due to her
responsibility to the blind Taufer. Since Taufer's
blindness was untreatable, he left for Hon Kong

The
women
came
at
varying
crossroads
in
Rizals
life.
And
with
varying
passion
and
devotion,
he
would
remember each in his
heart and works .

END