Customs of Tagalogs

By Juan de Plasencia
(Edited by Emma Helen Blair)
“This people always had chiefs called by them “datos” who governed them and
were captains in their wars and whom they obeyed and reverenced. The subject who
committed any offense against them or spoke but a word to their wives and children
was severely punished. These chiefs ruled over but few people; sometimes as many as
hundred houses, sometimes even less than thirty. This tribal gathering is called in
Tagalog a barangay. It was inferred that the reason for giving themselves this name
rose from the fact (as they are classed by their language among the Malay nations) that
when they came to this land, the head of the barangay was called a dato. The chiefs in
their various wars helped one another with their respective barangays…
Further, Plasencia described the social classes…
In these three classes, those who are maharlikas on both the father and mother’s
side continue to be so forever; and if it happens that they should become slaves, it is
through marriage as I shall soon explain. If these maharlikas had children among their
slaves, the children and their mothers became free; if one of them had children by the
slave-woman of another, she was compelled, when preganant, to give her master half
of a gold tael because of her risk of death and her inability to labor during the
pregnancy. In such case half of the child was free-namely, the half belonging to the
father who supplied the child with the food. If he did not do this, he showed that he did
not recognize him as his child which cases the latter was wholly slave. If a free woman
had children by a slave, they were all free provided he were not her husband.
If two person married of whom was a maharlika and the other a slave, whether
namamahay or saguguilid, the children were divided: the first whether male or female,
belonged to the father, as did the third and fifth; the second. The fourth and the sixth fell
to the mother, and so on. In this manner, if the father were free, all those who belonged
to him were free; if he were a slave, all those who belonged to him were slaves; and the
same applied to the mother. If there should be more than one more child, he was half
free and half slaves. The only question here concerned the division, whether the child
was male or female.
Those who became slaves fell under the category of servitude which was their
parent’s either namamahay or saguguilid. If there were odd number of children, the odd
one was half free and half slave. I have not been able to ascertain with any certainty
when or what age the division of the children was made, for each one suited himself in
their respect. Of these two kinds of slaves the saguguilid could be sold, nor could they
be transferred. However, they could be transferred from the barangay by inheritance,
provided they remained in the same village.
They condemned no one slavery, unless he merited the death-penalty. As for the
witches, they killed them, and their children and accomplices became slaves of the
chief, after he had made some recompense to the injured person. All other offenses
were published by fines in gold, which if not paid with promptness, exposed the culprit
to serve, until the payment should be made, the person aggrieved. To whom the money
was to be paid. This was done in the following way: Half the cultivated lands and all
their produce belonged to the master. The master provided the culprit and his children
until such time as he might amass enough money to pay fine. If the father should by
chance pay his debt, the master then claimed that he had fed and clothed his children,
and should be paid therefore…
In what concerns loans, there was formerly, and is today, an excess of usury
which is great hindrance to baptism as well as to confession; for it turns out in the same
way as I have showed in the case of the one under judgement, who gives half of his
cultivated lands and profits until he pays the debt. The debtor become slaves, and after
the death of the father, the children pay the debt. Not doing so, double the amount must
be paid…
In the case of a child by a free married woman, born while she was married, if the
husband punished the adulterer this was considered a dowry; and the child entered with
the others into partition in the inheritance. His share equaled the part left by the father,
nothing more. If there were no other sons that he, the children and the nearest relatives
inherited equally with him. But if the adulterer were not punished by the husband of the
woman who had the child, the latter was not considered by the punishment inflicted, not
the husband leave the woman. By the punishment of the father the child was fittingly
made legitimate.
Dowries are given by the men to the women’s parents. If the latter re living, they
enjoy the use of it. At their death, provided the dowry has not been consumed, it is
divided like the rest of the estate, equally among the children, except in case the father
should care to bestow something additional upon the daughter. If the wife, at the time of
her marriage, has neither father, mother, nor grandparents, she enjoys her dowry, which
in such case, belongs to no other relative or child. It should be noticed that the
unmarried women can own no property, in land or dowry, for the result of all their labors
accrues to their parents…
The above is what I have been able to ascertain clearly concerning customs
observed among these natives in all this Laguna and the tinges and among the entire
tagalog race. The old man says that a dato who did anything contrary to this would not
be esteemed; and in relating tyrannies which they had committed, some condemned
them and adjudged them wicked…
In all the villages, or in other parts of the Filipinas Islands, there are no temples
consecrated to the performing of sacrifices, the adoration of their idols, or the general
practice of idolatry. It is true that they have the name simbahan, which means temple or
place of adoration; but this is because, formerly, when they wished to celebrate festival,
which they called pandot, or “worship”, they celebrated it in the large house of a chief.
There they constructed, for the purpose of sheltering the assembled people, a
temporary shed on each side of the house, with a roof, called sibi, to protect the people
from the wet when it rained. They so constructed the house that it might contain many
people-dividing it, after the fashion of the ships, into three compartments. On the posts
of the house they set small lamps, called sorihile; in the center of the house they placed
one large lamp, adored with leaves of the white palm, rough into many designs. They
also brought together many drums, large and small, which they beat successively while
the feast lasted, which was usually four days. During this time the whole barangay, or
family, united and joined in the worship which they call nagaanitos. The house, for the
above-mentioned period of time, was called a temple…
Among their many idols there was once called badhala, whom they especially
worshiped. The title seems to signify “all powerful” or “maker of all things” they also
worshiped the sun, which on the account of its beauty, is almost universally respected
and honored by heathens. They worshiped, too, the moon.
These natives had no established division of years, months and days; these are
determined by the cultivation of the soil, counted by moons and the different effect
produced upon the trees when yielding flowers, fruits, and leaves: all this helps them in
maing up the year the winter and summer are distinguished as sun-time and water-time
– the latter term designating winter in those regions, where there is no cold, snow or
ice…
The manner of offering sacrifice was to proclaim a feast, and offer to the devil
what they had to eat. This was done in front of the idol, which they anoint with fragrant
perfumes, such as musk and civet, or gum of the storax-tree and other odoriferous
woods, and praise it in poetic songs sung by the officiating priest, male or female, who
is called Catolonan. The participants made responses to the song, beseeching the idol
to favor them with those things of which they were in need, and generally, by offering
repeated healths, they all became intoxicated. In some of their idolatries they were
accustomed to place a good piece of cloth, doubled, over the idol and over the cloth a
chain or large, gold ring, thus worshipping the devil without having sight of him. The
devil was sometimes liable to enter into the body of the catolonan, and assuming her
shape and appearance, filled her so great arrogance, he being the cuse of it – that she
seemed to shoot flames from her eyes; her hair stood on end, a fearful sight to those
beholding, and she uttered words of arrogance and superiority. In some districts,
especially in the mountains, when in those idolatries the devil incarnated himself and
took on the form of his minister, the latter had to be tried to a tree by his companions, to
prevent the devil in his infernal fury from destroying him. Thus, however, happened but
rarely. The objects of sacrifice were goats, fowls, and swine, which were flayed
decapitated, and the laid before the idol…
In the case of young girls who first had their monthly courses, their eyes were
blindfolded four days and four nights; and in the meantime, the friends and relatives
were all invited to partake of food and drink. At the end of this period, the Catolonan
took the young girl to the water, bathed her and wash her head, and removed the
bandage from her eyes. The old men said that they did in order that the girls might bear
children, and have fortune in finding husbands to their taste, who would not leave them
widows in their youth…
The manner of burying the dead was as follows: the deceased was buried beside
his house; and, if he were a chief, he was placed beneath a little house or porch which
they constructed for this purpose. Before interring him, they mourned him for four days;
and afterward laid him on a boat which served as a coffin or bier, placing him beneath
the porch, where guard was kept over him by a slave…
 The infidels said that they knew that there was another life of rest which they
called maca, just as if we should say “paradise”, or in other words, “village of rest”. They
say that those who go to this placeare the just, and the valiant, and those who lived
without ddoing harm, or possessed other moral virtues. They said also that in the other
life and mortality, there was a place of punishment, a grief, and affliction, called
casanaan, which was “a place of Anguish”, they also maintained that no one would go
to heaven, where dwelt only Bathala, “the maker of a\all things”, who governed from
above. There were also other pagans who confessed more clearly to a hell, which they
called, as I have said, casanaan; they said that all wicked went to that place, and there
dwelt the demons, whom they called sitan.
There were also ghosts, which they called vibit, and phantoms, which they called
Tigbaang. They had another deception; namely, that if any woman died in childbirth,
she and the child suffered punishment; and that, at night, she could be heard lamenting.
This was called patianac. May the honor and glory be the God our Lord’s, that among
all the Tagalogs not a trace of this is left; and that those who are now marrying do not
even know what it is, thanks to the preaching of the holy gospel, which had banished it.

Reference:
Galindo, M., (2019). Readings in Philippine history. SMKC Printshoppe: Davao City,
Philippines.