Cuyonon

The Cuyonon are a Visayan ethnolinguistic group from the low-lying Cuyo Islands in the Sulu Sea, who later settled the northern and central coasts of Palawan. Their language is closely related to Kinaray-a of Panay and served for centuries as the lingua franca of Palawan, understood by Tagbanwa, Agutaynen and other island peoples.

Before the Spanish arrived, Cuyo was ruled by Datu Magbanua and Taytay by the Cabaylo royal family, whose people sheltered the survivors of Magellan's fleet after the Battle of Mactan in 1521.

In the early seventeenth century Augustinian Recollect friars opened missions in Cuyo and Taytay, and the Spanish later walled the church towns and posted garrisons against Moro raiders; the sultan of Brunei ceded southern Palawan to Spain in 1749. Long regarded as an elite among Palawan peoples, the Cuyonon became mostly Roman Catholic.