Read with care. Read this together with the Family Code, which now governs both surnames and legitimation. The Family Code gives a legitimate child the right to bear the surnames of the father and the mother, so “principally… the surname of the father” is not the whole of the rule. Legitimation itself is governed by the Family Code as amended by Republic Act No. 9858 (2009), not by the Civil Code provisions this article assumes. The text below is reproduced as originally enacted.
Text of the provision
Art. 364. Legitimate and legitimated children shall principally use the surname of the father.
Civil Code of the Philippines, Republic Act No. 386, approved June 18, 1949, effective August 30, 1950. Reproduced in full; verified verbatim against the LawPhil and ChanRobles official-text renderings.
What this article means
Legitimate and legitimated children principally use the surname of the father. Legitimation is the process by which a child born outside marriage acquires the status of a legitimate child when the parents later marry.
The word principally signals a default rather than an exclusive command — it establishes the father’s surname as the ordinary rule for legitimate and legitimated children without itself listing every circumstance in which a different result might follow. The article groups legitimate children, who are born to parents validly married to each other, together with legitimated children, whose status arises only after their parents’ subsequent marriage cures what would otherwise have been an illegitimate birth.
Questions about this provision
Related provisions
- Article 365 — Surname of an Adopted Child.
Cases citing this article
- Anacleto Ballaho Alanis III vs. Court of Appeals, Cagayan de Oro City and Hon, G.R. No. 216425, November 11, 2020 — read the decision on LawPhil →
- Richelle Busque Ordoña vs. The Local Civil Registrar of Pasig City and Allan D, G.R. No. 215370, November 9, 2021 — read the decision on LawPhil →
- Emelita Basilio Gan vs. Republic of the Philippines, G.R. No. 207147, September 14, 2016 — read the decision on LawPhil →
- In Re: Petition for Change of Name and/or Correction/Cancellation of Entry in Civil Registry of Julian Lin Carulasan Wang vs. Cebu City Civil Registrar. P.E.T. Case No. 002 March 29, 2005 Ronald Allan Poe vs. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, G.R. No. 159966, March 30, 2005 — read the decision on LawPhil →
Compiled automatically from Supreme Court decisions published on LawPhil that expressly cite this article, most frequently cited first. A listing means the decision cites the provision — it is not a statement that the case is the leading authority, and it does not show whether a ruling has since been modified or abandoned. Always read the decision itself.