Character guide

Simoun

major

Also known as Señor Simoun, the jeweler Simoun, A Corpse Simoun

Simoun moves easily among friars, officials, and journalists, yet goes motionless and thoughtful when the old story of a hunted fugitive is retold on the river. He is wealth, influence, and buried grievance in one polished surface, and the men around him read only the surface. His presence quietly reframes the novel's questions about who profits from the colony and who pays for it.

Basilio

major

Also known as Capitan Basilio, poor Basilio

Basilio studies medicine and keeps his head down, but a seized book and a rumor of filibusterismo are enough to put him at the mercy of men who admit he is the most innocent of all. The General's logic — sacrifice one for the welfare of many — turns the young man's future into an instrument of prestige. His case shows how the machinery of authority manufactures guilt, and it draws him toward figures who promise a different answer.

Isagani

major

Also known as Señor Isagani, the poet Isagani, Poor Isagani

Isagani loves Paulita Gomez with the whole ardor of an idealist, and the theater night turns that ardor into jealousy, humiliation, and a wish to see the whole building fall. While his friends plan and congratulate themselves, he sits cold, hearing the waltz as a dirge. His private wound and his public hopes pull in different directions, making him the novel's most exposed nerve of youthful feeling.

Ben Zayb

supporting

Also known as Abraham Ben Zayb, the wretched Ben Zayb

Ben Zayb trades in cheap funerals and filibuster jokes, and he is the first to notice when Simoun falls silent on the water — then the first to misjudge why. He treats the colony as material for copy, and his cheerful errors make him useful to men with heavier purposes. His presence keeps the novel's satire sharp about how the press can amplify authority rather than question it.

Plácido Penitente

supporting

Also known as Penitente, XII Plácido Penitente

Plácido endures the classroom, the contributions, and the small daily degradations of a colonial student's life, while his mother begs him to be humble and silent like the others who rose by kissing hands. He has already suffered for months and can no longer pretend. His refusal of patience marks the point where quiet endurance gives way, and it places him near the center of the discontent the novel is tracing.

Cabesang Tales

supporting

Also known as Tales, Matanglawin, poor Tales

Tales is the sort of man who would rather pay than litigate, telling himself that to fight the friars is to smash a clay pot against an iron one. He lost his wife and eldest daughter to the clearing of that land, and now he is asked to be grateful for the privilege of farming it. His submission, and the slow cost of it, sets the novel's early measure of what patience actually purchases.

Don Custodio

supporting

Also known as Custodio, Don Custodio de Salazar y Sanchez de Monteredondo

Manila's endlessly titled 'Good Authority,' a liberal-minded official who wears his principles lightly and his self-importance heavily.

Julî

supporting

A country girl whose love for Basilio costs her peace, caught between a menacing friar's attentions and her family's uncomprehending scorn.

Juanito Pelaez

supporting

Also known as Juanito, Pelaez

The professor's pet and everyone's clown, a rich mestizo's son who laughs his way through other people's ruin.

Padre Irene

supporting

Also known as Irene, the humbler Padre Irene

A friar who moves between sacristy and salon, smiling, advising, and quietly arranging outcomes to suit the order he serves.

Padre Camorra

supporting

Also known as Camorra, Poor Padre Camorra

A jolly Franciscan curate whose guitar, jokes, and 'liberal' manners conceal an appetite that leaves wreckage behind him.

Padre Salví

supporting

The soft-spoken friar whose patient scheming once destroyed a young man's life, now returned to keep watch over his old victories.

Padre Fernandez

supporting

Padre Fernandez belongs to the same order that controls the University and the parishes, yet he is willing to sit down with the young men who despise his brethren and hear them out. His honesty cuts both ways: he concedes the abuses of his fellow friars, but he refuses to accept that freedom won by force will ever be anything but a new tyranny. In the charged debates of the novel's middle chapters, he becomes the one priest who treats a Filipino student as a mind worth arguing with, and his uneasy fairness throws the rest of the clergy into sharper relief.

Paulita Gomez

supporting

Also known as the brilliant Paulita

Paulita moves through Manila society as the prize everyone wants and no one quite owns, courted by the ardent student Isagani and by the well-connected Juanito Pelaez. Her charm is real, but so is her calculation: she wants love, comfort, and social safety all at once, and she is not sure any single man can supply them. Her wavering between the two suitors pulls Isagani's idealism and Juanito's opportunism into direct collision, making her a quiet engine of the plot's middle movement.

Quiroga

supporting

Also known as Quiroga the Chinaman, the grateful Quiroga

Quiroga runs a bazaar that is half shopfront and half warehouse of contraband, and he will bribe, flatter, or grovel to keep it running. His consuming ambition is to be named consul for his country, a title that would let him stand before the Spaniards as something more than a tolerated foreigner. He is comic and pathetic at once, and his willingness to trade dignity for protection shows how the colonial order turns even outsiders into accomplices.

Sandoval

minor

A Spanish student who sympathizes with the Filipino students.

Tadeo

minor

Also known as the imperturbable Tadeo

A lazy and mischievous student who avoids studying.

Doña Victorina

minor

Also known as Victorina, This Doña Victorina

A pretentious Filipina who apes Spanish customs.

Capitan Tiago

minor

Also known as Christmas Capitan Tiago

Basilio's wealthy and pious patron who falls into decline.

Makaraig

minor

Also known as The rich Makaraig

A wealthy student who funds the campaign for a Spanish academy.

Pecson

minor

Also known as the pessimist Pecson

A cynical student who often makes dark jokes.

Don Timoteo Pelaez

minor

Also known as Don Timoteo, Timoteo

Juanito's wealthy and ambitious father.

Juan Crisóstomo Ibarra

minor

Also known as Ibarra, the unfortunate Ibarra

The protagonist of Noli Me Tangere, now believed dead.

María Clara

minor

Also known as Clara

Ibarra's lost love, now a nun who has died.

Sister Balî

minor

A nun who cares for María Clara in the convent.

Padre Florentino

minor

Also known as the young Florentine, Florentine, Poor Florentino

A retired Filipino priest who lives by the sea.

Camaroncocido

minor

A mysterious and deformed servant of Simoun.

Tandang Selo

minor

Also known as old Selo, Selo

Cabesang Tales' elderly and mute father.

Padre Millon

minor

A friar who teaches physics at the university.

Padre Sibyla

minor

Also known as the offended Padre Sibyla

A Dominican friar and former teacher of philosophy.

Sinang

minor

A lively young woman and friend of Paulita.

Sister Penchang

minor

Also known as Penchang, The pious Sister Penchang

A devout woman who takes Juli into her service.

Don Tiburcio de Espadaña

minor

Also known as Don Tiburcio

Doña Victorina's Spanish husband, a failed dentist.

Tanò

minor

Cabesang Tales' son who becomes a civil guard.

Chichoy

minor

Also known as the indignant Chichoy

A student who participates in the academy campaign.

Tio Quico

minor

Also known as Quico

A minor character associated with the students.

Serpolette

minor

A dancer at the Quiapo fair.

Mautang

minor

A Chinese usurer who lends money to Cabesang Tales.

Pepay

minor

A dancer and mistress of Don Custodio.

Mr. Leeds

minor

Also known as Legerdemain Mr. Leeds

An American magician who performs at the Quiapo fair.

Cabesang Andang

minor

Also known as So Cabesang Andang

A woman who sells lottery tickets.

Momoy

minor

A servant in the Pelaez household.

Carolino

minor

A young man who becomes involved with the bandits.

Aristorenas

minor

Also known as Martin, Martin Aristorenas

A student involved in the academy petition.

Capitana Loleng

minor

The wife of Capitan Tiago.

Sensia

minor

A young woman who appears at the Quiapo fair.

Capitan Tinong

minor

A friend of Capitan Tiago.

Don Primitivo

minor

A superstitious man who offers advice.

Capitana Tikâ

minor

A woman who gossips about the students.

Capitan Toringoy

minor

A wealthy man who hosts a party.

Carambas

minor

A bandit who joins Cabesang Tales.

Tiani

minor

A woman who helps Juli.

Padre Dámaso

minor

The deceased Franciscan friar from Noli Me Tangere.

Sinong

minor

Also known as the abused Sinong

A servant abused by the friars.

Tandang Basio Macunat

minor

Also known as Tandang Basio

An old man who represents conservative Filipino views.

Capitana Simona

minor

A woman who runs a gambling den.

Fray Ibañez

minor

A friar who investigates the explosion.

Germaine

minor

A French woman mentioned in passing.

Elías

minor

The deceased revolutionary from Noli Me Tangere.