‘Golden Tara’ finder’s kin want relic returned, ‘finder’s fee’

By BEN SERRANO
Correspondent

BUTUAN City–Relatives of the Manobo woman who discovered the four-pound, eight-inch, 24-carat Golden Tara has called for the return of the relic to the country.

The relic, considered as one of the most important archeological discoveries in the Philippines whose image was said to be of the 13th century, is now at the Chicago Fields Museum in the US. At the Chicago Museum the relic is referred to as the “Golden Image of Agusan.”

Constancia Guiral and Danilo Isid, great grandchildren of Bilay Campos, the Manobo woman who found the Golden Tara along Agusan River in 1917, said they want it returned to the Philippines, specifically in Agusan where it was found.

Isid said his family also want a “finder’s fee.”

Guiral, 66, said Bilay accidentally found the Golden Tara underneath an acacia tree along Agusan River after a storm and flood in 1917.

“She and her sisters thought at first was a shining doll at first. Later, the siblings and their parents started worshipping the Tara, and placed it in an altar,” Guiral said.

She said the Tara was stolen a few months later but it was returned. But then, it was stolen again, and subsequently, it became the property of another person.

“Because all of them were unschooled, they did not know what to do. All they did was just remember that once the Godlen Tara belonged to them,”  Guiral said.

A group called the Golden Tara Community of Agusan was organized and elected Dr. Potenciano Malvar as president, and local historian Greg Hontiveros as vice president. The group is planning a Golden Tara centennial in 2017.