Philippines 1983 series

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In 1983 the Philippines issued a new design series. It was unusual in that it had a different design on each obverse and reverse. The obverse designs were devoted to the country's heroes, whilst the reverse designs depicted the nation's flora and fauna.

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1 sentimo, aluminium.  Lapu-Lapu.

From Wikipedia:

Lapu-Lapu was a ruler of Mactan in Visayas. Modern Filipino society regards him as the first Filipino hero because he was the first native to resist Spanish colonization. He is best known for the Battle of Mactan that happened at dawn on April 27, 1521, where he and his soldiers defeated Ferdinand Magellan. The battle ended up in the killing of Magellan and the end of his expedition, and it delayed the Spanish occupation of the islands by over forty years, until the expedition of Miguel López de Legazpi in 1564. Monuments to Lapu-Lapu have been built in Manila and Cebu, while the Philippine National Police and the Bureau of Fire Protection use his image.

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5 sentimo, aluminium. 

Melchora Aquino de Ramos (1812 – 1919) was a Filipina revolutionary who became known as "Tandang Sora" ("Elder Sora") because of her age. She is also known as the "Grand Woman of the Revolution" and the "Mother of Balintawak" for her contributions to the struggle against the Spanish.

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10 sentimo, aluminium. 

Francisco Baltazar (born Francisco Balagtas y de la Cruz; 1788 – 1862), also known as Francisco Balagtas, was a prominent Filipino poet. He is widely considered one of the greatest Filipino literary laureates for his impact on Filipino literature. The famous epic, Florante at Laura, is regarded as his defining work.

The name "Baltazar", sometimes misconstrued as a pen name, was a legal surname Balagtas adopted after the 1849 edict of Governor-General Narciso Claveria y Zaldua, which mandated that the native population adopt standard Spanish surnames instead of native ones.

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25 sentimo, brass.

Juan Luna y Novicio (October 23, 1857 – December 7, 1899), better known as Juan Luna was a Filipino painter, sculptor and a political activist of the Philippine Revolution during the late 19th century. He became one of the first recognized Philippine artists.

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50 sentimo, copper-nickel.

Marcelo Hilario del Pilar y Gatmaitán (born Marcelo Hilario y Gatmaytán; 1850 – 1896), better known by his pen name Plaridel, was a Filipino writer, lawyer, journalist, and freemason. Del Pilar, along with José Rizal and Graciano López Jaena, became known as the leaders of the Reform Movement in Spain.

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1 piso, copper-nickel.

José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda, widely known as José Rizal; 1861 – 1896), was a Filipino nationalist and polymath during the tail end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. An ophthalmologist by profession, Rizal became a writer and a key member of the Filipino Propaganda Movement which advocated political reforms for the colony under Spain.

He was executed by the Spanish colonial government for the crime of rebellion after the Philippine Revolution, inspired in part by his writings, broke out. Though he was not actively involved in its planning or conduct, he ultimately approved of its goals which eventually led to Philippine independence.

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2 piso, copper-nickel.

Andrés Bonifacio y de Castro (1863 – 1897) was a Filipino nationalist, revolutionary leader (the Father of the Philippine Revolution and Filipino Nation), and the first unofficial president of the Philippine archipelago.

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1 sentimo, aluminium.

A sea snail (Voluta imperialis), one of the species indigenous to the Philippines.

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5 sentimo, aluminium.  Waling-Waling orchid.

Vanda sanderiana is a flower of the orchid family. It is commonly called Waling-waling in the Philippines and is also called Sander's Vanda, after Henry Frederick Conrad Sander, a noted orchidologist. The orchid is considered to be the "Queen of Philippine flowers".

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10 sentimo, aluminium.

The dwarf pygmy goby or Philippine goby (Pandaka pygmaea) is a tropical species of fish in the family Gobiidae, from brackish water and mangrove areas in Southeast Asia. It is one of the smallest fish species in the world. Males reach maturity at a standard length of 0.9 cm (0.35 in) and can reach up to 1.1 cm (0.43 in) in standard length, while the females can grow up to 1.5 centimetres (0.59 in) in total length. Adults weight around 4 milligrams (0.00015 oz).

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25 sentimo, brass.

Graphium idaeoides is a species of butterfly in the family Papilionidae. It is endemic to the Philippines.

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50 sentimo, copper-nickel.

The Philippine eagle (Pithecophaga jefferyi), also known as the monkey-eating eagle or great Philippine eagle, is an eagle of the family Accipitridae, endemic to forests in the Philippines. It has red coloured plumage, and a shaggy crest, and generally measures 86 to 102 cm (2.82 to 3.35 ft) in length and weighs 4.7 to 8.0 kg (10.4 to 17.6 lb).

It is considered the largest of the extant eagles in the world in terms of length and wing surface, with Steller's sea eagle and the harpy eagle being larger in terms of weight and bulk. Among the rarest and most powerful birds in the world, it has been declared the Philippine national bird. It is critically endangered, mainly due to massive loss of habitat resulting from deforestation in most of its range.

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1 piso, copper-nickel.

The tamaraw or Mindoro dwarf buffalo (Bubalus mindorensis) is a small hoofed mammal belonging to the family Bovidae. It is endemic to the island of Mindoro in the Philippines, and is the only endemic Philippine bovine. It is believed, however, to have once also thrived on the larger island of Luzon. The tamaraw was originally found all over Mindoro, from sea level up to the mountains (2000 meters above sea level), but because of human habitation, hunting, and logging, it is now restricted to only a few remote grassy plains and is now an endangered species. Contrary to common belief and past classification, the tamaraw is not a subspecies of the local carabao, which is only slightly larger, or the common water buffalo.

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2 piso, copper-nickel.  Coconut palm tree.