EPIFANIA MORENTE: FOUNDING MOTHER OF THE NIEVA CLAN: The wife of Calixto Nieva, the founding father of the present-day Nievas and other families who may not be surnamed Nieva but with Nieva blood flowing in their veins, was Epifania Morente nicknamed Maning. Thus, Maning could very well be referred to as the "Founding Mother" of the Nieva clan.
It is not known for sure if the Nievas who were originally from Camalig, Albay and who migrated to Marinduque had any foreign blood. But definitely, because of Calixto's marriage to Epifania, foreign blood was infused into the Nieva gene pool. I was told by the old folks that Maning was the oldest of four" love children of a Spanish friar with the name of Fr. Santiago del Rosario who was the parish priest of Boac in the early 1800s. Previously assigned in Bulacan, he brought along with him his mistress, a woman (name unknown) from a supposedly good family in Bulacan who was educated at one of Manila's leading school for women at the time.
It is believed that the mother of Epifania was given the priest's middle name of Morente. The priest himself must have been the a love child of a Spanish friar with a Filipina woman since such children were supposed to be given religious surnames like de los Santos, de Jesus or in the case of the priest, del Rosario.
Interestingly, to this day the lapida or tombstone of Fr. Del Rosario may be seen imbedded on the aisle of the Boac Cathedral, the only one such in the church. So when Nievas walk up the aisle, they better make sure they don't step on it. Give it the proper
respect it deserves. For without him, we Nievas would not be around today.
This is Chapter 6 of the series on the Ancestry of the Nieva clan of Marinduque authored by Rene Nieva. Previous Chapters have been published in my blogs just recently.
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