Nueva Vizcaya, Philippines

Last modified: 2025-09-13 by zachary harden
Keywords: cagayan valley | nueva vizcaya |
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• About
• Flag
  Former flag

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• Philippines
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• Philippines provincial flags

About

The Philippine Republic's Region II, Cagayan Valley, contains two landlocked provinces, Quirino and Nueva Vizcaya. Both are relatively small in size (3057 sq.km. for Quirino, 4081 sq.km. for Nueva Vizcaya) and population (147,000 and 365,000, respectively, by the 2000 census). Both are ruggedly mountainous and heavily forested. Nueva Vizcaya is the remnant of the southern province created when Cagayan Province was divided in two in 1839. Both are ethnically and linguistically diverse, with a substrate of Agtas, Negritos who are food-gatherers with no fixed abode, overlaid by Ilonggos and  others in a number of tribes, some of whom were fierce head-hunters until recently (we are firmly assured that they have given up the practice), with the latest but largest element of the population being Ilocanos. Nueva Vizcaya comprises fifteen towns; Bayombong is the capital. Agriculture in both has until recently consisted of slash-and-burn cultivation of corn and maize, though more stable cultivation of vegetables and fruits is becoming established. Both also produce logs, and are trying to manage their forest resources so that production can be sustained indefinitely. They have deposits of gold, silver, copper, iron. Nueva Vizcaya has sand and clay. At Balete Pass in Nueva Vizcaya the retreating Japanese under General Yamashita dug in and held on for three months against the American and Filipino forces who eventually drove them out; the pass is now called Dalton Pass in honor of General Dalton, USA, who was killed in the fighting.
John Ayer, 24 March 2001

Nueva Vizcaya was probably named after Vizcaya (English 'Biscay', Basque 'Bizkaia') province in northern Spain. In this case there is some vexillological relationship between them, as the flag of New Biscay bears the arms of Biscay impaled on its seal.
Santiago Dotor, 2 April 2001

Flag

The flag used by the province is their seal on a green and yellow bi-color background. (Source)
Zachary Harden, 11 September 2025

Former flag