Tagalog people

“ Narrated by Gregorio Velasquez, a Tagalog from Pasig, Rizal. He says, “This is a primitive Tagalog fable. I think. I heard it from old people.”
Once there lived a poor man who had three sons. When the father was on his death-bed, he called his sons, and said to them, “My sons, I shall die very soon; and I shall not be able to leave you much wealth, for wealth I have not. But I will give each one of you something which, if you will only be able to find a place in which it has no equal, will make you happy men.” The father then gave to one a rooster, to another a cat, and to the third a scythe. ”

“ Another tribe of people, the Zambales, are to be found toward the center of Luzon. Few Igorrotes, Ilocanes, and Negritos live in the province of Zambales or Pangasinan. Pampanga Province also has its own tribe and a different dialect. Tagalog is spoken around Manila, in Laguna Province, in Batangas, and the Camarines; Visayan is the language of the southern islands.
A monotonous sameness is the characteristic of most of the small Filipino towns. In seeing one you have seen all ”

“ Separatism, vulgarly called filibusterism, has always, in the Philippines, been marked by essential characteristics. It was always, under the circumstances by which it was surrounded, necessarily anti-patriotic. One thing which helped to give it the robust life it enjoyed among the middle class of people, was the supposition of the existence of a Tagalog civilization anterior to the discovery of the archipelago by the famous Magallanes. This fantastic doctrine was preached and propagated principally by two of the more prominent Filipinos, Pedro Paterno and José Rizal. ”

“ The initiated were masked (79) as also was the person to be initiated; before a table was placed a skull and crossbones, a triangle and two candles; the person about to be initiated was told that the object of the Katipunan2 was the liberating of the Tagalog people, and the expulsion of the Spaniards from the archipelago, or their [41] destruction (80) ”

“ Some of them are much given to writing on the ground in a squatting posture, which is the usual way both men and women sit.
421. The cultured languages, as already stated, are six in number—for one cannot reckon the languages of the Negritos and mountain people as such, since each settlement has its own distinct language, which results from the lack of human intercourse. Among the cultured languages, the chief and mother languages are considered the Tagálog, the Pampanga, and the Visayan; and even among these the Tagálog is considered the most polished and powerful. ”

“ I knew his parents, and had friendly relations with them while I was minister in that village. Both men were esteemed for their abilities and venerated for their virtues, in Tagalos and Visayas.” In addition, “those reared in any of the four colleges in Manila, for the clerical estate are all the sons of chiefs, people of distinction among the Indians themselves, and not of the timaua, or of the class of olipon, as the Visayan says, or maharlica or alipin, as the Tagálog calls the slaves and freedmen. The reverend fathers of St. ”

“ Their customs resemble those of the Apayaos, their next neighbors; still they do not appear to be head-hunters. [108]
Aeta, see Negrito. (Variants: Aheta, Eta, Aita, Aigta, Ita, Atta, Agta, Inagta, Até, Atá, etc., from the Tagalog, ita, itim, Malay itam, Bicol, ytom, black) .
Agutainos.—Name of the natives of Malay race in the island of Agutaya, in the Cuyo archipelago (province of Calamianes) . They have their own dialect, called Agutaino; are Christianized and civilized.
Alibaon, Alibabaun.—Not the name of a people, but, it seems, a title of the Moro chief, settled on the bay of Davao. ”

“ At breakfast and dinner in the club-house I no longer have to whistle to be waited on, for my slave is always behind the chair, ready to spill the soup on my coat or pass the plum-pudding. These serving-boys all belong to the Tagalog race, which seems to include in its numbers most of the native inhabitants in Manila and the adjacent towns. They all have straight, thick black hair, speak their peculiar Tagalog language, and only pick up enough Spanish to carry them through the performance of their simple duties. ”

“ At the coming of the Spaniards the Tagalogs, like the remaining native peoples of the archipelago, were met with in the depths of the savage ages, and were to a certain extent, of cannibalistic tendencies.
The average Tagalog is not wanting in courage, a fact he has often displayed, but this courage is never seen to advantage except when the indian is under the leadership of a person of exceptional valor or a strict disciplinarian. ”

“ As to the whence of the various Malayan tribes of the Philippines, it is most probable that they originally reached the Archipelago from Borneo, or the Malay Peninsula. From northern Borneo the Sulu islands form a series of stepping stones across to Mindanao. As the Tagalog language is looked upon as one of the purest of Malay dialects, and contains the least number of Sanscrit words, it may be inferred from this that the race has occupied the islands from an early date. ”

“ Tagalog women traders.It was difficult to procure the necessary means of transport for my baggage on the return journey to Paracale, the roads being so soaked by the continuous rains that no one would venture his cattle for the purpose. In Mambulao the influence of the province on its western border is very perceptible, and Tagalog is understood almost better than Bicol; the Tagalog element being introduced amongst the population by women, who with their families come here, from Lucban and Mauban, in the pursuit of trade. They buy up gold, and import stuffs and other wares in exchange. ”

“ The inhabitants of the island of Luçon call themselves Tagals, as do likewise all the inhabitants of the Philippines—they appear to derive their origin from the Malays, and exhibit features of their character—their language, though different from that of the Malays, has its pronunciation and its sweetness. All these islands seem to be inhabited by the same people, among whom their customs alone have been subjected to change. In Manila, such has been the intercourse with the Chinese and other nations, that they have become a mixed race. ”

“ The Filipino is fastidious and dainty—in his own way. He will shudder at the uncouth Tagalog who toasts locusts over a hot fire and eats them, and that evening will go home and eat a handful of damp guinimos, the littlest of fish. He takes an infinite amount of care of his white clothes, and swaggers about the streets immaculate; but just as soon as he gets home, the suit comes off and is reserved for future exhibition purposes. The women pay comparatively small attention to their personal adornment. Their hair is combed straight back upon their heads. ”

“ The Civilized Malayan Peoples.—Their Later Arrival.—At a later date than the arrival of these primitive Malayan tribes, there came to the Philippines others of a more developed culture and a higher order of intelligence. These peoples rapidly mastered the low country and the coasts of all the islands, driving into the interior the earlier comers and the aboriginal Negritos. These later arrivals, though all of one stock, differed considerably, and spoke different dialects belonging to one language family. They were the ancestors of the present civilized Filipino people. ”

“ But let us suppose that in fact the populations of the Archipelago were quite generally to ask for independence. We must again ask ourselves, How genuine or real would this demand be? It is not very difficult to answer this question. The Filipino is most easily led and influenced; indeed, it is to be doubted if anywhere else in the world a being can be found more easily led and influenced.2 For example, it is relatively not an uncommon thing, certainly in the Tagálog provinces, for a man having a grudge against a neighbor to invite three or four friends to join him in boloing his enemy. ”

“ Besides these and Spanish, of which he was a master, he spoke Latin, Greek, Arab, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Swedish, Dutch, Catalan, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, Tagalog, Visayan, and the Moro dialects of Dapitan. One of his papers, a scientific treatise on the Visayan language, was read before the Ethnographical Society of Berlin. He was associated with Dr. Meyer and Dr. Blumentritt in the annotation of a Chinese codicil of the Middle Ages. While at Dapitan he began to write a scientific Tagalog grammar and a treatise on the resemblances between Tagalog and Visayan speech. ”

“ It is unsafe to attempt to trace a story with only three examples as data: but it appears to me not unreasonable to suppose that our Tagalog story is a refined, pious, Christianized modernization of the Visayan form represented by “The Two Wives and the Witch;” and that the Visayan form, in turn, goes back to some Indian or Malayan moral tale of two wives, rivals for the affection of their husband. The Bengali tale can hardly be the direct source of our Visayan form, but it appears to be fairly closely related to that source. ”

“ A week after our arrival we were divided among various provinces in order to learn the languages, and be able to minister to the Indians. I remained in the province of Manila, where I learned [297] the Tagálog language in company with others without much difficulty. If the grammar or other handbook were studied in Europa with the earnestness with which we study languages there, any person would become learned in a very brief time. Within five months we were all confessing and preaching, and in one year we were very capable in both, and in discussing the affairs of the Indians with them. ”

“ I think it probable that the tale was introduced into the Philippines through the medium of a French religious. The Catalan form differs from the French in mentioning a fourth “heirloom,” a raven, and was probably not the parent of our Tagalog version.
The Denied Mother. Narrated by Leopoldo Uichanco, a Tagalog from Calamba, Laguna.
(One day little Antonio fell down and sprained his elbow. His grandfather told him to put on his camisa and they would go to Tandang Fruto, an old manghihilot (a man who pretends to correct dislocated bones by means of certain prayers) . ”

“ However, be the degree of ignorance what it may, we cannot overlook the fact that the actions of the Tagalog freemasons, the katipunan if you will, for the one and the other are the same thing under different names, were the cause of no little surprise to the Grand Oriente Español. The filipino mason was a traitor to the mother which gave him being and nourished him into activity: a traitor who used the cover of the freemason lodge only that he might the easier and safer hatch out his plot to gain, by the most brutal means imaginable, [78] the independence of his country. ”

“ Of all the Malay peoples, the Tagalogs of Luzon have been the foremost to learn the arts of western civilization. They have surpassed their near relatives, the Visayans, who live in the central part of the islands. Perhaps it is the closer contact with the Spanish that has given the Tagalogs their great progress. At all events they have become well to do and prosperous as measured by other Malay peoples. ”

“ All the dialects spoken by the Filipinos of Malay and Japanese descent have their root in the pure Malay language. After the expulsion of all the adult male Japanese Lake settlers in the 17th century, it is feasible to suppose that the language of the males who took their place in the Lake district and intermarried there, should prevail over the idiom of the primitive settlers, and possibly this amalgamation of speech accounts for the difference between the Tagálog dialect and others of these islands peopled by Malays. ”

“ Well-to-do Tagalos, despite their undersized stature and dark-brown skins, affect all the culture—and the vices—of well-to-do white people. They conduct banks, engage in commerce, mingle with white society, and consider themselves as bright lights of civilization. Above all, every Tagalo takes keen interest in politics. Yet these Tagalos, up to date, are only veneered Malays.
This Filipino who was so patiently following Sergeants Hal and Noll appeared to belong to the well-to-do class. Certainly he was an immaculate dandy. ”

“ To an American of analytical tendencies a few years in the Philippines present not only an interesting study of Filipino life, but a novel consciousness of our own. The affairs of these people are so simple where ours are complex, so complex where ours are simple, that one’s angle of view is considerably enlarged.
The general construction of society is mediæval and aristocratic. The aristocracy, with the exception of a few wealthy brewers and cigar manufacturers of Manila, is a land-holding one. There is practically no bourgeoisie—no commercial class—between the rich and the poor. ”

“ In Manila, Cavite, Batangas, Bulacan, Morong, Infanta, Tayabas, and Bataan they form the bulk of the population, and they also appear in Zambales, Principe, Isabela, Nueva Ecija, Mindoro, Marinduque, Polillo, &c. Their language (Tagalog) especially has made extensive encroachments on the other Philippine tongues since the conquest. The Tagal is physically well developed, has a round head, high cheek bones, flattish nose, lowbrow, thickish lips, and large dark eyes. The lines from the nose to the mouth are usually strongly marked. The power of smell is of extraordinary acuteness. ”