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from the birds, and they frequently tend their grandchildren about the pueblo. They also bring water from the river to the dwelling.

Old women seem generally busy. They prepare and cook foods, and they spin materials for women’s skirts and girdles. The blind women share in these labors, even going to the river for water.

By labor of the group is meant the common effort of two or more people whose everyday possessions and accumulations are not in common, as they are in a family, to perform some definite labor which can be better done by such effort than by the separate labors of the several members of the group.

A pueblo war probably represents the largest necessary group-occupation, because at such time all available warriors unite in a concerted effort. Next to this, though possibly coming before it, is the group assembled for the erection of a dwelling. As has been noted, all dwellings are built by a group, and when a rich man’s domicile is to be put up a great many people assemble — the men to erect the dwelling, and the women to prepare and cook the food. A great deal of agricultural labor is performed by the group. New irrigation ditches are built by, or at the instance of, all those who will benefit by them. The dam built annually across the river at Bontoc pueblo is constructed by all, or at the instance of all, who benefit from the additional irrigation water. Wild carabaos are hunted by a group of men, and the domestic carabaos can be caught only when several men surround and attack them.

All interpueblo commerce is carried on by a group of people. Almost never does a person pass from one pueblo to another alone, and commerce is the chief thing which causes the interpueblo communication. These groups of traveling merchants consist of from two or three persons to a dozen or more — as in the case of the Samoki pottery sellers.

Wages, and exchange of labor

The woman receives the same wage as the man. There are two reasons why she should. First, all labor is by the day, so the facts of sickness and maternity never keep the woman from her labor when she is expected and is depended on; and, second, she is as efficient in the labors she performs as is the man — in some she is recognized as more efficient. She does as much work as a man, and does it as well or better. It is worth so much to have a certain work done in a particular time, and the Igorot pays the wage to whomever does the work. The growing boy or girl who performs the same labors as an adult receives an equal wage.

Not only do the people work by the day, but they are paid daily also. Every night the laborer goes to the dwelling of his employer and receives the wage; the wages of unmarried children are paid to their parents.

To all classes of laborers dinner and sometimes supper is supplied. For weeding and thinning the sementeras of young palay and for watching the fruiting palay to drive away the birds, the only wage is these two meals. But this labor is light, and frightening away the birds is usually the work of children or very old people who can not perform hard labors. In all classes of work for which only food is given, much time is left to the laborers in which the men may weave their basket work and the women spin the bark-fiber thread for skirts.

Five manojos of palay is the daily wage for all laborers except those mentioned in the last paragraph. This is the wage of the wood gatherer in the mountains, of the builder of granaries, sementeras, irrigating ditches, and dikes, and of those who prepare soils and who plant and harvest crops.

There is much exchange of labor between individuals, and even between large groups of people, such as members of an ato. Formerly exchange of labor was practiced slightly more than at present, but to-day, as has been noted, all dwellings are built by the unpaid labor of those who come for the accompanying feast and “good time,” and because their own dwellings were or will be built by such labor. A great deal of agricultural labor is now paid for in kind; practically all the available labor in an ato turns out to help a member when a piece of work is urgent. However, it is not customary for poor people to exchange their labor, since they constantly need food for those dependent on them. When the poor man desires a wage for his toil he needs only to tell some rich person that he wishes to work for him — both understand that a wage will be paid.

Distribution

By the term “distribution” is here meant the ordinary division of the productions of Bontoc area among the several classes of Igorot in the area — in other words, what is each person’s share of that which the area produces?

It must be said that distribution is very equitable. Wages are uniform. No man or set of men habitually spoils another’s accumulations by exacting from him a tax or “rake off.” There is no form of gambling or winning another’s earnings. There are no slaves or others who labor without wages; children do not retain their own wages until they marry, but they inherit all their parents’ possessions. There is almost no usury. There is no indigent class, and the rich men toil as industriously in the fields as do the poor — though I must say I never knew a rich man to go as cargador on the trail.

Theft

Higher forms of society, even such society as the Christianized Filipinos of the coastal cities, produce and possess a considerable number of people who live and often raise families on personal property stolen and carried away from the lawful owners. Almost no thief in the Bontoc area escapes detection — the society is too simple for him to escape — and when he is apprehended he restores more than he took away. There is no opportunity for a thief class to develop, consequently there is no chance for theft to distort the usual equitable division of products.

Conquest

Conquest, or the act of gaining control and acquisition of another’s property by force of arms, is not operative in the Bontoc area. Moro and perhaps other southern Malayan people frequently capture people by conquest whom they enslave, and they also bring back much valuable loot in the shape of metals and the much-prized large earthen jars.

Certain Igorot, as those of Asin, make forcible conquests on their neighbors and carry away persons for slavery. Asin made a raid westward into Suyak of Lepanto Province in 1900, and some American miners joined the expedition of natives to try to recover the captives. But Bontoc has no such conquests, and, since the people have long ago ceased migration, there is no conquest of territory. In their interpueblo warfare loot is seldom carried away. There is practically nothing in the form of movable and easily controlled valuable possessions, such as domestic cattle, horses, or carabaos, so the usual equilibrium of Bontoc property distribution has little to disturb it.

The primitive agriculturist is thought of in history as the victim of warlike neighbors who make predatory forays against him, repeatedly robbing him of his hard-earned accumulations. In Igorot land this is not the case. There are no savage or barbaric people, except the Negritos who are not agriculturists. Sometimes, however, some of the Igorot groups descend to the settlements of the Christians in the lowlands and in the night bring back a few carabaos and hogs. The Igorot of Quiangan are noted for such robberies made on the pueblos of Bagabag and Ibung to the south in central Nueva Vizcaya. Sometimes, also, one Igorot group speaks of another as Busol, or enemy, and says the Busol come to rob them in the night. I believe, however, from inquiries made, that relatively very small amounts of property pass from one Igorot group to another by robbery or conquest.

The Bontoc Igorot appears to be in a transition stage, not usually emphasized, between the communism of the savage or barbarian in which each person is said to have a share as long as necessities last, and the more advanced forms of society in which many classes are able to divert to their own advantage much which otherwise would not come to them. The Igorot is not a communist, neither in any sense does he get the monopolist’s share. He is living a life of such natural production that he enjoys the fruits of his labors in a fairer way than do many of the men beneath him or above him in culture.

Consumption

Under this title will be considered simply the foods and beverages of the people. No attempt will be made to treat of consumption in its breadth as it appears to the economist.

Foods

There are few forms of animal life about the Igorot that he will not and does not eat. The exceptions are mainly insectivora, and such larger animals as the mythology of the Igorot says were once men — as the monkey, serpent-eagle, crow, snake, etc. However, he is not wholly lacking in taste and preference in his foods. Of his common vegetable foods he frequently said he prefers, first, beans; second, rice; third, maize; fourth, camotes; fifth, millet.

Rice is the staple food, and most families have sufficient for subsistence during the year. When rice is needed for food bunches of the palay, as tied up at the harvest, are brought and laid in the small pocket of the wooden mortar where they are threshed out of the fruit head. One or two mortarsful is thus threshed and put aside on a winnowing tray. When sufficient has been obtained the grain is put again in the mortar and pounded to remove the pellicle. Usually only sufficient rice is threshed and cleaned for the consumption of one or two days. When the pellicle has been pounded loose the grain is winnowed on a large round tray by a series of dexterous movements, removing all chaff and dirt with scarcely the loss of a kernel of good rice.

The work of threshing, hulling, and winnowing usually falls to the women and girls, but is sometimes performed by the men when their women are preoccupied. At one time when an American wished two or three bushels of palay threshed, as horse food for the trail, three Bontoc men performed the work in the classic treadmill manner. They spread a mat on the earth, covered it with palay, and then tread, or rather “rubbed,” out the kernels with their bare feet. They often scraped up the mass with their feet, bunching it and rubbing it in a way that strongly suggested hands.

Rice is cooked in water without salt. An earthern pot is half filled with the grain and is then filled to the brim with cold water. In about twenty minutes the rice is cooked, filling the vessel, and the water is all absorbed or evaporated. If there is no great haste, the rice sets ten or fifteen minutes longer while the kernels dry out somewhat. As the Igorot cooks rice, or, for that matter, as the native anywhere in the Islands cooks it, the grains are not mashed and mussed together, but each kernel remains whole and separate from the others.

Cooked rice, ma-kan’, is almost always eaten with the fingers, being crowded into the mouth with the back of the thumb. In Bontoc, Samoki, Titipan, Mayinit, and Ganang salt is either sprinkled on the rice after it is dished out or is tasted from the finger tips during the eating. In some pueblos, as at Tulubin, almost no salt is eaten at any time. When rice alone is eaten at a meal a family of five adults eats about ten Bontoc manojo of rice per day.

Beans are cooked in the form of a thick soup, but without salt. Beans and rice, each cooked separately, are frequently eaten together; such a dish is called “sib-fan’.” Salt is eaten with sib-fan’ by those pueblos which commonly consume salt.

Maize is husked, silked, and then cooked on the cob. It is eaten from the cob, and no salt is used either in the cooking or eating.

Camotes are eaten raw a great deal about the pueblo, the sementera, and the trail. Before they are cooked they are pared and generally cut in pieces about 2 inches long; they are boiled without salt. They are eaten alone at many meals, but are relished best when eaten with rice. They are always eaten from the fingers.

One dish, called “ke-le’-ke,” consists of camotes, pared and sliced, and cooked and eaten with rice. This is a ceremonial dish, and is always prepared at the lis-lis ceremony and at a-su-fal’-i-wis or sugar-making time.

Camotes are always prepared immediately before being cooked, as they blacken very quickly after paring.

Millet is stored in the harvest bunches, and must be threshed before it is eaten. After being threshed in the wooden mortar the winnowed seeds are again returned to the mortar and crushed. This crushed grain is cooked as is rice and without salt. It is eaten also with the hands — “fingers” is too delicate a term.

Some other vegetable foods are also cooked and eaten by the Igorot. Among them is taro which, however, is seldom grown in the Bontoc area. Outside the area, both north and south, there are large sementeras of it cultivated for food. Several wild plants are also gathered, and the leaves cooked and eaten as the American eats “greens.”

The Bontoc Igorot also has preferences among his regular flesh foods. The chicken is prized most; next he favors pork; third, fish; fourth, carabao; and fifth, dog. Chicken, pork (except wild hog), and dog are never eaten except ceremonially. Fish and carabao are eaten on ceremonial occasions, but are also eaten at other times — merely as food.

The interesting ceremonial killing, dressing, and eating of chickens is presented elsewhere, in the sections on “Death” and “Ceremonials.” It is unnecessary to repeat the information here, as the processes are everywhere the same, excepting that generally no part of the fowl, except the feathers, is unconsumed — head, feet, intestines, everything, is devoured.

The hog is ceremonially killed by cutting its throat, not by “sticking,” as is the American custom, but the neck is cut, half severing the head. At Ambuklao, on the Agno River in Benguet Province, I saw a hog ceremonially killed by having a round-pointed stick an inch in diameter pushed and twisted into it from the right side behind the foreleg, through and between the ribs, and into the heart. The animal bled internally, and, while it was being cut up by four men with much ceremony and show, the blood was scooped from the rib basin where it had gathered, and was mixed with the animal’s brains. The intestines were then emptied by drawing between thumb and fingers, and the blood and brain mixture poured into them from the stomach as a funnel. A string of blood-and-brain sausages resulted, when the intestines were cooked. The mouth of the Bontoc hog is held or tied shut until the animal is dead. The Benguet hog could be heard for fifteen minutes at least a quarter of a mile.

After the Bontoc hog is killed it is singed, cut up, and all put in the large shallow iron boiler. When cooked it is cut into smaller pieces, which are passed around to those assembled at the ceremonial.

Fish are eaten both ceremonially and privately whenever they may be obtained. The small fish, the kacho, are in no way cleaned or dressed. Two or three times I saw them cooked and eaten ceremonially, and was told they are prepared the same way for private consumption. The fish, scarcely any over 2 inches in length, were strung on twisted green-grass strings about 6 inches in length. Several of these strings were tied together and placed in an olla of water. When cooked they were lifted out, the strings broken apart, and the fish stripped off into a wooden bowl. Salt was then liberally strewn over them. A large green leaf was brought as a plate for each person present, and the fish were divided again and again until each had an equal share. However, the old men present received double share, and were served before the others. At one time a man was present with a nursing babe in his arms, and he was given two leaves, or two shares, though no one expected the babe could eat its share. After the fish food was passed to each, the broth was also liberally salted and then poured into several wooden bowls. At one fish feast platters of cooked rice and squash were also brought and set among the people. Handful after handful of solid food followed its predecessor rapidly to the always-crammed mouth. The fish was eaten as one might eat sparingly of a delicacy, and the broth was drunk now and then between mouthfuls.

Two other fish are also eaten by the Igorot of the area, the liling, about 4 to 6 inches in length — also cooked and eaten without dressing — and the chalit, a large fish said to acquire the length of 4 feet.

Several small animals, crustaceans and mollusks, gathered in the river and picked up in the sementeras by the women, are cooked and eaten. All these are considered similar to fish and are eaten similarly. Among these is a bright-red crab called “agkama.”[30] This is boiled and all eaten except part of the back shell and the hard “pinchers.” A shrimp-like crustacean obtained in the irrigated sementeras is also boiled and eaten entire. A few mollusks are eaten after being cooked. One, called kitan, I have seen eaten many times; it is a snail-like animal, and after being boiled it is sucked into the mouth after the apex of the shell has been bitten or broken off. Two other animals said to be somewhat similar are called finga and lischug.

The carabao is killed by spearing and, though also eaten simply as food, it is seldom killed except on ceremonial occasions, such as marriages, funerals, the building of a dwelling, and peace and war feasts whether actual events at the time or feasts in commemoration.

The chief occasion for eating carabao merely as a food is when an animal is injured or ill at a time when no ceremonial event is at hand. The animal is then killed and eaten. All is eaten that can be masticated. The animal is neither skinned, singed, nor scraped. All is cut up and cooked together — hide, hair, hoofs, intestines, and head, excepting the horns. Carabao is generally not salted in cooking, and the use of salt in eating the flesh depends on the individual eater.

Sometimes large pieces of raw carabao meat are laid on high racks near the dwelling and “dried” in the sun. There are several such racks in Bontoc, and one can know a long distance from them whether they hold “dried” meat. If one pueblo, in the area exceeds another in the strength and unpleasantness of its “dried” meat it is Mayinit, where on the occasion of a visit there a very small piece of meat jammed on a stick-like a “taffy stick” — and joyfully sucked by a 2-year-old babe successfully bombarded and depopulated our camp.

Various meats, called “it-tag’,” as carabao and pork, are “preserved” by salting down in large bejuco-bound gourds, called “fa’-lay,” or in tightly covered ollas, called “tu-u’-nan.” All pueblos in the area (except Ambawan, which has an unexplained taboo against eating carabao) thus store away meats, but Bitwagan, Sadanga, and Tukukan habitually salt large quantities in the fa’-lay. Meats are kept thus two or three years, though of course the odor is vile.

The dog ranks last in the list of regular flesh foods of the Bontoc man. In the Benguet area it ranks second, pork receiving the first place. The Ibilao does not eat dog — his dog is a hunter and guard, giving alarm of the approaching enemy.

In Bontoc the dog is eaten only on ceremonial occasions. Funerals and marriages are probably more often celebrated by a dog feast than are any other of their ceremonials. The animal’s mouth is held closed and his legs secured while he is killed by cutting the throat. Then his tail is cut off close to the body — why, I could not learn, but I once saw it, and am told it always is so. The animal is singed in the fire and the crisped hair rubbed off with sticks and hands, after which it is cut up and boiled, and then further cut up and eaten as is the carabao meat.

Young babies are sometimes fed hard-boiled fresh eggs, but the Igorot otherwise does not eat “fresh” eggs, though he does eat large numbers of stale ones. He prefers to wait, as one of them said, “until there is something in the egg to eat.” He invariably brings stale or developing eggs to the American until he is told to bring fresh ones. It is not alone the Igorot who has this peculiar preference — the same condition exists widespread in the Archipelago.

Locusts, or cho’-chon, are gathered, cooked, and eaten by the Igorot, as by all other natives in the Islands. They are greatly relished, but may be had in Bontoc only irregularly — perhaps once or twice for a week or ten days each year, or once in two years. They are cooked in boiling water and later dried, whereupon they become crisp and sweet. By some Igorot they are stored away, but I can not say whether they are kept in Bontoc any considerable time after cooking.

The locusts come in storms, literally like a pelting, large-flaked snowstorm, driving across the country for hours and even days at a time. All Igorot have large scoop nets for catching them and immense bottle-like baskets in which to put them and transport them home. The locust catcher runs along in the storm, and, whirling around in it with his large net, scoops in the victims. Many families sometimes wander a week or more catching locusts when they come to their vicinity, and cease only when miles from home. The cry of “enemy” will scarcely set an Igorot community astir sooner than will the cry of “cho’-chon.” The locust is looked upon by them as a very manna from heaven. Pi-na-lat’ is a food of cooked locusts pounded and mixed with uncooked rice. All is salted down in an olla and tightly covered over with a vegetable leaf or a piece of cloth. When it is eaten the mixture is cooked, though this cooking does not kill the strong odor of decay.

Other insect foods are also eaten. I once saw a number of men industriously robbing the large white “eggs” from an ant nest in a tree. The nest was built of leaves attached by a web. Into the bottom of this closed pocket the men poked a hole with a long stick, letting a pint or more of the white pupae run out on a winnowing tray on the earth. From this tray the furious ants were at length driven, and the eggs taken home for cooking.

Beverages

The Igorot drinks water much more than any other beverage. On the trail, though carrying loads while the American may walk empty handed, he drinks less than the American. He seldom drinks while eating, though he makes a beverage said to be drunk only at mealtime. After meals he usually drinks water copiously.

Ba-si is the Igorot name of the fermented beverage prepared from sugar cane. “Ba-si,” under various names, is found widespread throughout the Islands. The Bontoc man makes his ba-si in December. He boils the expressed juice of the sugar cane about six hours, at which time he puts into it a handful of vegetable ferment obtained from a tree called “tub-fig’.” This vegetable ferment is gathered from the tree as a flower or young fruit; it is dried and stored in the dwelling for future use. The brewed liquid is poured into a large olla, the flat-bottom variety called “fu-o-foy'” manufactured expressly for ba-si, and then is tightly covered over and set away in the granary. In five days the ferment has worked sufficiently, and the beverage may be drunk. It remains good about four months, for during the fifth or sixth month it turns very acid.

Ba-si is manufactured by the men alone. Tukukan and Titipan manufacture it to sell to other pueblos; it is sold for about half a peso per gallon. It is drunk quite a good deal during the year, though mostly on ceremonial occasions. Men frequently carry a small amount of it with them to the sementeras when they guard them against the wild hogs during the long nights. They say it helps to keep them warm. One glass of ba-si will intoxicate a person not accustomed to drink it, though the Igorot who uses it habitually may drink two or three glasses before intoxication. Usually a man drinks only a few swallows of it at a time, and I never saw an Igorot intoxicated except during some ceremony and then not more than a dozen in several months. Women never drink ba-si.

Ta-pu-i is a fermented drink made from rice, the cha-yet’-it variety, they say, grown in Bontoc pueblo. It is a very sweet and sticky rice when cooked. This beverage also is found practically everywhere in the Archipelago. Only a small amount of the cha-yet’-it is grown by Bontoc pueblo. To manufacture ta-pu-i the rice is cooked and then spread on a winnowing tray until it is cold. When cold a few ounces of a ferment called “fu-fud” are sprinkled over it and thoroughly stirred in; all is then put in an olla, which is tied over and set away. The ferment consists of cane sugar and dry raw rice pounded and pulverized together to a fine powder. This is then spread in the sun to dry and is later squeezed into small balls some 2 inches in diameter. This ferment will keep a year. When needed a ball is pulverized and sprinkled fine over the cooked rice. An olla of rice prepared for ta-pu-i will be found in one day half filled with the beverage.

Ta-pu-i will keep only about two months. It is never drunk by the women, though they do eat the sweet rice kernels from the jar, and they, as well as the men, manufacture it. It is claimed never to be manufactured in the Bontoc area for sale. A half glass of the beverage will intoxicate. At the end of a month the beverage is very intoxicating, and is then commonly weakened with water. Ta-pu-i is much preferred to ba-si.

The Bontoc man prepares another drink which is filthy, and, even they themselves say, vile smelling. It is called “sa-fu-eng’,” is drunk at meals, and is prepared as follows: Cold water is first put in a jar, and into it are thrown cooked rice, cooked camotes, cooked locusts, and all sorts of cooked flesh and bones. The resulting liquid is drunk at the end of ten days, and is sour and vinegar-like. The preparation is perpetuated by adding more water and solid ingredients — it does not matter much what they are.

The odor of sa-fu-eng’ is the worst stench in Bontoc. I never closely investigated the beverage personally — but I have no reason to doubt what the Igorot says of it; but if all is true, why is it not fatal?

Salt

Throughout the year the pueblo of Mayinit produces salt from a number of brackish hot springs occupying about an acre of ground at the north end of the pueblo.

Mayinit has a population of about 1,000 souls, probably half of whom are directly interested in salt production. It is probable that the pueblo owes its location to the salt springs, although adjoining it to the south is an arable valley now filled with rice sementeras, which may first have drawn the people.

The hot springs slowly raise their water to the surface, where it flows along in shallow streams. Over these streams, or rather sheets of sluggish water, the Igorot have built 152 salt houses, usually about 12 feet wide and from 12 to 25 feet long. The houses, well shown in Pl. CXV, are simply grass-covered roofs extending to the earth.

There is no ownership in the springs to-day — just as there is no ownership in springs which furnish irrigating water — one owns the water that passes into his salt house, but has no claim on that which passes through it and flows out below. So each person has ownership of all and only all the water he can use within his plant, and the people claim there are no disputes between owners of houses — as they look at it, each owner of a salt house has an equal chance to gather salt.

The ground space of the salt house is closely paved with cobblestones from 4 to 6 inches in diameter. The water passes among the bases of these stones, and the salt is deposited in a thin crust over their surface. (See Pl. CXVI.)

These houses are inherited, and, as a consequence, several persons may ultimately have proprietary interest in one house. In such a case the ground space is divided, often resulting in many twig-separated patches, as is shown in fig. 7.

About once each month the salt is gathered. The women of the family work naked in the stream-filled house, washing the crust of salt from the stones into a large wooden trough, called “ko-long’-ko.” Each stone is thoroughly washed and then replaced in the pavement. The saturated brine is preserved in a gourd until sufficient is gathered for evaporation.

FIGURE 7

Ground plan of Mayinit salt house.

Two or more families frequently join in evaporating their salt. The brine is boiled in the large, shallow iron boilers, and from half a day to a day is necessary to effect the evaporation. Evaporation is discontinued when the salt is reduced to a thick paste.

The evaporated salt is spread in a half-inch layer on a piece of banana leaf cut about 5 inches square. The leaf of paste is supported by two sticks on, but free from, a piece of curved broken pottery which is the baking pan. The salt thus prepared for baking is set near a fire in the dwelling where it is baked thirty or forty minutes. It is then ready for use at home or for commerce, and is preserved in the square, flat cakes called “luk’-sa.”

Analyses have been made of Mayinit salt as prepared by the crude method of the Igorot. The showing is excellent when the processes are considered, the finished salt having 86.02 per cent of sodium chloride as against 90.68 per cent for Michigan common salt and 95.35 for Onondaga common salt.

Table of salt composition

Constituent elements
Mayinit salt[31]
Common fine —

Saturated brine
Evaporated salt
Baked salt
Michigan salt[32]
Onondaga salt.

PER CENT
PER CENT
PER CENT
PER CENT
PER CENT

Calcium sulphate
0.73
1.50
0.46
0.805
1.355

Sodium sulphate
.92
6.28
10.03

Sodium chloride
7.95
72.19
86.02
90.682
95.353

Insoluble matter
2.14
.16
.45

Water
88.03
19.19
1.78
6.752
3.000

Undetermined
.23
.68
.1.26

Calcium chloride



.974
.155

Magnesium chloride



.781
.136

Total
100
100
100
99.994
99.999

One house produces from six to thirty cakes of salt at each baking. A cake is valued at an equivalent of 5 cents, thus making an average salt house, producing, say, fifteen cakes per month, worth 9 pesos per year. Salt houses are seldom sold, but when they are they claim they sell for only 3 or 4 pesos.

Sugar

In October and November the Bontoc Igorot make sugar from cane. The stalks are gathered, cut in lengths of about 20 inches, tied in bundles a foot in diameter, and stored away until the time for expressing the juice.

The sugar-cane crusher, shown in Pl. CXVIII, consists of two sometimes of three, vertical, solid, hard-wood cylinders set securely to revolve in two horizontal timbers, which, in turn, are held in place by two uprights. One of the cylinders projects above the upper horizontal timber and has fitted over it, as a key, a long double-end sweep. This main cylinder conveys its power to the others by means of wooden cogs which are set firmly in the wood and play into sockets dug from the other cylinder. Boys commonly furnish the power used to crush the cane, and there is much song and sport during the hours of labor.

Two people, usually boys, sitting on both sides of the crusher, feed the cane back and forth. Three or four stalks are put through at a time, and they are run through thirty or forty times, or until they break into pieces of pulp not over three or four inches in length.

The juice runs down a slide into a jar set in the ground beneath the crusher.

The boiling is done in large shallow iron boilers over an open fire under a roof. I have known the Igorot to operate the crusher until midnight, and to boil down the juice throughout the night. Sugar-boiling time is known as a-su-fal’-i-wis.

A delicious brown cake sugar is made, which, in some parts of the area, is poured to cool and is preserved in bamboo tubes, in other parts it is cooked and preserved in flat cakes an inch in thickness.

There is not much sugar made in the area, and a large part of the product is purchased by the Ilokano. The Igorot cares very little for sweets; even the children frequently throw away candy after tasting it.

Meals and mealtime

The man of the family arises about 3.30 or 4 o’clock in the morning. He builds the fires and prepares to cook the family breakfast and the food for the pigs. A labor generally performed each morning is the paring of camotes. In about half an hour after the man arises the camotes and rice are put over to cook. The daughters come home from the olag, and the boys from their sleeping quarters shortly before breakfast. Breakfast, called “mang-an’,” meaning simply “to eat,” is taken by all members of the family together, usually between 5 and 6 o’clock. For this meal all the family, sitting on their haunches, gather around three or four wooden dishes filled with steaming hot food setting on the earth. They eat almost exclusively from their hands, and seldom drink anything at breakfast, but they usually drink water after the meal.

The members of the family who are to work away from the dwelling leave about 7 or 7.30 o’clock — but earlier, if there is a rush of work. If the times are busy in the fields, the laborers carry their dinner with them; if not, all members assemble at the dwelling and eat their dinner together about 1 o’clock. This midday meal is often a cold meal, even when partaken in the house.

Field laborers return home about 6.30, at which time it is too dark to work longer, but during the rush seasons of transplanting and harvesting palay the Igorot generally works until 7 or 7.30 during moonlight nights. All members of the family assemble for supper, and this meal is always a warm one. It is generally cooked by the man, unless there is a boy or girl in the family large enough to do it, and who is not at work in the fields. It is usually eaten about 7 or 7.30 o’clock, on the earth floor, as is the breakfast. A light is used, a bright, smoking blaze of the pitch pine. It burns on a flat stone kept ready in every house — it is certainly the first and crudest house lamp, being removed in development only one infinitesimal step from the Stationary fire. This light is also sometimes employed at breakfast time, if the morning meal is earlier than the sun.

Usually by 8 o’clock the husband and wife retire for the night, and the children leave home immediately after supper.

Transportation

The human is the only beast of burden in the Bontoc area. Elsewhere in northern Luzon the Christianized people employ horses, cattle, and carabaos as pack animals. Along the coastwise roads cattle and carabaos haul two-wheel carts, and in the unirrigated lowland rice tracts these same animals drag sleds surmounted by large basket-work receptacles for the palay. The Igorot has doubtless seen all of these methods of animal transportation, but the conditions of his home are such that he can not employ them.

He has no roads for wheels; neither carabaos, cattle, nor horses could go among his irrigated sementeras; and he has relatively few loads of produce coming in and going out of his pueblo. Such loads as he has can be transported by himself with greater safety and speed than by quadrupeds; and so, since he almost never moves his place of abode, he has little need of animal transportation.

To an extent the river is employed to transport boards, timbers, and firewood to both Bontoc and Samoki during the high water of the rainy season. Probably one-fourth of the firewood is borne by the river a part of its journey to the pueblos. But there is no effort at comprehensive water transportation; there are no boats or rafts, and the wood which does float down the river journeys in single pieces.

The characteristic of Bontoc transportation is that the men invariably carry all their heavy loads on their shoulders, and the women as uniformly transport theirs on their heads.

In Benguet all people carry on their backs, as also do the women of the Quiangan area.

In all heavy transportation the Bontoc men carry the spear, using the handle as a staff, or now and then as a support for the load; the women frequently carry a stick for a staff. Man’s common transportation vehicle is the ki-ma’-ta, and in it he carries palay, camotes, and manure. He swings along at a pace faster than the walk, carrying from 75 to 100 pounds. He carries all firewood from the mountains, directly on his bare shoulders. Large timbers for dwellings are borne by two or more men directly on the shoulders; and timbers are now, season of 1903, coming in for a schoolhouse carried by as many as twenty-four men. Crosspieces, as yokes, are bound to the timbers with bark lashings, and two or four men shoulder each yoke.

Rocks built into dams and dikes are carried directly on the bare shoulders. Earth, carried to or from the building sementeras, in the trails, or about the dwellings, is put first in the tak-o-chug’, the basket-work scoop, holding about 30 or 40 pounds of earth, and this is carried by wooden handles lashed to both sides and is dumped into a transportation basket, called “ko-chuk-kod’.” This is invariably hoisted to the shoulder when ready for transportation. When men carry water the fang’-a or olla is placed directly on the shoulder as are the rocks.

When the man is to be away from home over night he usually carries his food and blanket, if he has one, in the waterproof fang’-ao slung on his back and supported by a bejuco strap passing over each shoulder and under the arm. This is the so-called “head basket,” and, as a matter of fact, is carried on war expeditions by those pueblos that use it, though it is also employed in more peaceful occupations. As a cargador the man carries his burdens on the shoulder in three ways — either double, the cargo on a pole between two men; or singly, with the cargo divided and tied to both ends of the pole; or singly, with the cargo laid directly on the shoulder.

Women carry as large burdens as do the men. They have two commonly employed transportation baskets, neither of which have I seen a man even so much as pick up. These are the shallow, pan-shaped lu’-wa and the deeper, larger tay-ya-an’. In these two baskets, and also at times in the man’s ki-ma’-ta, the women carry the same things as are borne by the men. Not infrequently the woman uses her two baskets together at the same time — the tay-ya-an’ setting in the lu’-wa, as is shown in Pls. CXIX and CXXI. When she carries the ki-ma’-ta she places the middle of the connecting pole, the pal-tang on her head, with one basket before her and the other behind. At all times the woman wears on her head beneath her burden a small grass ring 5 or 6 inches in diameter, called a “ki’-kan.” Its chief function is that of a cushion, though when her burden is a fang’-a of water the ki’-kan becomes also a base — without which the round-bottomed olla could not be balanced on her head without the support of her hands.

The woman’s rain protector is often brought home from the camote gardens bottom up on the woman’s head full of camote vines as food for the pigs, or with long, dry grass for their bedding. And, as has been noted, all day long during April and May, when there were no camote vines, women and little girls were going about bearing their small scoop-shaped sug-fi’ gathering wild vegetation for the hogs.

Almost all of the water used in Bontoc is carried from the river to the pueblo, a distance ranging from a quarter to half a mile. The women and girls of a dozen years or more probably transport three-fourths of the water used about the house. It is carried in 4 to 6 gallon ollas borne on the head of the woman or shoulder of the man. Women totally blind, and many others nearly blind, are seen alone at the river getting water.

About half the women and many of the men who go to the river daily for water carry babes. Children from 1 to 4 years old are frequently carried to and from the sementeras by their parents, and at all times of the day men, women, and children carry babes about the pueblo. They are commonly carried on the back, sitting in a blanket which is slung over one shoulder, passing under the other, and tied across the breast. Frequently the babe is shifted forward, sitting astride the hip. At times, though rarely, it is carried in front of the person. A frequent sight is that of a woman with a babe in the blanket on her back and an older child astride her hip supported by her encircling arm.

When one sees a woman returning from the river to the pueblo at sundown a child on her back and a 6-gallon jar of water on her head, and knows that she toiled ten or twelve hours that day in the field with her back bent and her eyes on the earth like a quadruped, and yet finds her strong and joyful, he believes in the future of the mountain people of Luzon if they are guided wisely — they have the strength and courage to toil and the elasticity of mind and spirit necessary for development.

Commerce

The Bontoc Igorot has a keen instinct for a bargain, but his importance as a comerciante has been small, since his wants are few and the state of feud is such that he can not go far from home.

His bargain instinct is shown constantly. The American stranger is charged from two to ten times the regular price for things he wishes to buy. Early in April of the last two years the price of palay for the American has, on a plea of scarcity, advanced 20 per cent, although it has been proved that there is at all times enough palay in the pueblo for three years’ consumption.

Rather than spoil a possible high price of a product, outside pueblos have left articles overnight with Bontoc friends to be sold to the American next day at his own price, and when those pueblos came again to vend similar wares the high prices were maintained.

Barter

Most commerce is carried on by barter. Within a pueblo naturally having neither stores nor a legalized currency people trade among themselves, but the word “barter” as here used means the systematic exchange of the products of one community for those of another.

To note the articles produced for commerce by two or three pueblos will give a fair illustration of the importance which interpueblo commerce carried on entirely by barter has assumed among the Igorot. of the Bontoc culture group, though the comerciante rarely remains from home more than one night at a time.

The luwa, the woman’s shallow transportation basket, is made by the pueblo of Samoki only, and it is employed by fifteen or eighteen other pueblos. Samoki also makes the akaug, or rice sieve, which is used commonly in the vicinity. Bontoc and Samoki alone make the woman’s deeper transportation basket, the tayyaan, and it is used quite as extensively as is the luwa.

The sleeping hat is made only by Bontoc and Samoki; it goes extensively in commerce. The large winnowing tray employed universally by the Igorot is said to be made nowhere in the vicinity except in Samoki and Kamyu. Bontoc and Samoki alone make the man’s dirt scoop, the takochug, and it is invariably employed by all men laboring in the sementeras.

Neither Bontoc nor Samoki is within the zone of bejuco, from which a considerable part of their basket work is made, and, as a consequence, the raw material is bartered for from pueblos one or two days distant. Barlig furnishes most of the bejuco. Every manojo of Bontoc and Samoki palay is tied up at harvest time with a strip of one variety of bamboo called “fika” made by the pueblos from sections of bamboo brought in bundles from a day’s journey westward to barter during April and May. The rain hat of the Bontoc man is coated with beeswax coming in trade from Barlig, as does also the clear and pure resin used by the women of Samoki in glazing their pots.

Towns to the east of Bontoc, such as Tukukan, Sakasakan, and Tinglayan, grow tobacco which passes westward in trade from town to town nearly, if not quite, through the Province of Lepanto. It doubles its value for about every day of its journey, or at each trading.

Samoki pottery and the salt of Mayinit offer as good illustrations as there are of the Igorot barter. A dozen loads of earthenware, from sixty to seventy-five pots, leave Samoki at one time destined for a single pueblo (see Pl. CXXIII). The Samoki pot is made for a definite trade. Titipan uses many of a certain kind for her commercial basi and the potters say that they make pots somewhat different for about all the two dozen pueblos supplied by them. The potter has learned the art of catering to the trade. There is not only a variety of forms made but the capacity of the fangas ranges from about one quart to ten and twelve gallons, and each variety is made to satisfy a particular and known demand. Samoki ware seldom passes as far east as Sakasakan, only four or five hours distant, because similar ware is made in Bituagan, which supplies not only Sakasakan but the pueblos farther up the river.

There are supposed to be between 280 and 290 families dwelling in Bontoc, and, at a conservative estimate, each family has eight fangas. Each dwelling of a widow has several, so it is a fair estimate to say there are 300 dwellings in the pueblo, having a total of 2,400 fangas. Samoki has about 1,200 fangas in daily use. The estimated population of the several towns that use Samoki pots is 24,000.

There is about one pot per individual in daily use in Bontoc and Samoki, and this estimate is probably fair for the other pueblos. So about 24,000 Samoki pots are daily in use, and this number is maintained by the potters. Igorot claim the average life of a fanga of Samoki is one year or less, so the pueblo must sell at least 24,000 pots per annum. At the average price of 5 centavos about the equivalent of 1,200 pesos come to the pueblo annually from this art, or about 40 pesos for each of the thirty potters, whether or not she works at her art. A few years ago, during a severe state of feud, Samoki pots increased in value about thirty-fold; it is said that the potters purchased carabao for ten large ollas each. To-day the large ollas are worth about 2 pesos, and carabaos are valued at from 40 to 70 pesos.

Mayinit salt passes in barter to about as many pueblos as do the Samoki pots, but while the pots go westward to the border of the Bontoc culture area the salt passes far beyond the eastern border, being bartered from pueblo to pueblo. It does not go far north of Mayinit, or go at all regularly far west, because those pueblos within access of the China Sea coast buy salt evaporated from sea water by the Ilokano of Candon. In April at two different times twelve loads of Candon salt passed eastward through Bontoc on the shoulders of Tukukan men, but during the rainy season and the busy planting and harvesting months Mayinit salt supplies a large demand.

In Bontoc and Samoki there are about one hundred and fifty gold earrings which came from the gold-producing country about Suyak, Lepanto Province. Carabaos are almost invariably traded for these. Sometimes one carabao, sometimes two, and again three are bartered for one gold earring. During the months of March and April the pueblo of Balili traded three of these earrings to Bontoc men for carabaos, and this particular form of barter has been carried on for generations.

Balili, Alap, Sadanga, Takong, Sagada, Titipan and other pueblos between Bontoc pueblo and Lepanto Province to the west weave breechcloths and skirts which are brought by their makers and disposed of to Bontoc and adjacent pueblos. Agawa, Genugan, and Takong bring in clay and metal pipes of their manufacture. Much of these productions is bartered directly for palay. If money is paid for the articles it is invariably turned into palay, because this is the greatest constant need of manufacturing Igorot pueblos.

Sale

The Spaniard left his impress on the Igorot of Bontoc pueblo in no realm probably more surely than in that of the appreciation of the value of money.

The sale instinct, and not the barter instinct, is foremost now in Bontoc and Samoki when an American is a party to a bargain, and this is true in all pueblos on the main trail to Lepanto and the west coast. But one has little difficulty in bartering for Igorot productions if he has things the people want — such as brass wire, cloth for the woman’s skirt, the man’s breechcloth, a shirt, or coat. In many pueblos the people try to buy for money the articles the American brings in for barter, although it is true that barter will often get from them many things which money can not buy. To the northeast and south of Bontoc barter will purchase practically anything.

The conditions of peace among the pueblos since the arrival of the Americans and the money which is now everywhere within the area have been the important factors in helping to develop interpueblo commerce from barter to sale.

Most of the clothing worn in the pueblos of Lepanto Province is made from cotton purchased for money at the coast. With few exceptions the breechcloths and blankets worn by Bontoc and Samoki are purchased for money, though it is not very many years since the bark breechcloth made in Titipan and Barlig was worn, and in Tulubin, only two hours distant, Barlig blankets and breechcloths of whole bark are worn to-day.

One week in April a Bontoc Igorot traded a carabao to an Ilokano of Lepanto Province for a copper ganza, the customary way of purchasing ganzas, and the following week another Bontoc man sold a carabao for money to another Lepanto Ilokano.

The Baliwang battle-ax and spear are now more generally sold for money than is any other production made or disposed of within the Bontoc area. They are said to-day to be seldom bartered for.

Medium of exchange

That a people with such incipient social and political institutions as has the Bontoc Igorot should have developed a “money” is remarkable. The North American Indian with his strong tendency and adaptability to political organization had no such money. Nothing of the kind has been presented as belonging to the Australian of ultrasocial development, and I am not aware that anything equal has been produced by other similar primitive peoples. However, it seems not improbable that allied tribes (say, of Malayan stock) which have solved the problem of subsistence in a like way have a similar currency, although I find no mention of it among four score of writers whose observations on similar tribes of Borneo have come to hand, and nothing similar has yet been found in the Philippines.

The Bontoc Igorot has a “medium of exchange” which gives a “measure of exchange value” for articles bought and sold, and which has a “standard of value.” In other words he has “good money” probably the best money that could have been devised by him for his society. It is his staple product — palay, the unthreshed rice.

Palay is at all times good money, and it is the thing commonly employed in exchange. It answers every purpose of a suitable medium of exchange. It is always in demand, since it is the staple food. It is kept eight or ten years without deterioration. Except when used to purchase clothing, it is seldom heavier or more difficult to transport than is the object for which it is exchanged. It is of very stable value, so much so that as a purchaser of Igorot labor and products its value is constant; and it can not be counterfeited.

Aside from this universal medium of exchange the characteristic production of each community, in a minor way, answers for the community the needs of a medium of exchange.

Samoki buys many things with her pots, such as tobacco and salt from Mayinit; cloth from Igorot comerciantes, breechcloth and basi from the Igorot producers; chickens, pigs, palay, and camotes from neighboring pueblos. Mayinit uses her salt in much the same way, only probably to a less extent. Salt is not consumed by all the people.

To-day, as formerly, the live pig and hog and pieces of pork and carabao meat are used a great deal in barter. As far back as the pueblo memory extends pigs have been used to purchase a particularly good breechcloth called “balakes,” made in Balangao, three days east of Bontoc.

In all sales the medium of exchange is entirely in coin. Paper will not be received by the Igorot. The peso (the Spanish and Mexican silver dollar) passes in the area at the rate of two to one with American money. There is also the silver half peso, the peseta or one-fifth peso, and the half peseta. The latter two are not plentiful. The only other coin is the copper “sipen.”

No centavos (cents) reach the districts of Lepanto and Bontoc from Manila, and for years the Igorot of the copper region of Suyak and Mankayan, Lepanto, have manufactured a counterfeit copper coin called “sipen.” All the half-dozen copper coins current in the active commercial districts of the Islands are here counterfeited, and the “sipen” passes at the high rate of 80 per peso; it is common and indispensable. A crude die is made in clay, and has to be made anew for each “sipen” coined. The counterfeit passes throughout the area, but in Tinglayan, just beyond its eastern border, it is not known. Within two days farther east small coins are unknown, the peso being the only money value in common knowledge.

Measure of exchange value

The Igorot has as clear a conception of the relative value of two things bartered as has the civilized man when he buys or sells for money. The value of all things, from a 5-cent block of Mayinit salt to a P70 carabao, is measured in palay. To-day, as formerly, every bargain between two Igorot is made on the basis of the palay value of the articles bought or sold. This is so even though the payment is in money.

Standard of value

The standard of value of the palay currency is the sin fing-e’ — the Spanish “manojo,” or handful — a small bunch of palay tied up immediately below the fruit heads. It is about one foot long, half head and half straw. The value of such a standard is not entirely uniform, and yet there is a great uniformity in the size of the sin fing-e’, and all values are satisfactorily taken from it.

Palay currency

An elaborate palay currency has been evolved from the standard, of which the following are the denominations:

Denomination
Number of handfuls

Sin fing-e’
1

Sin i’-ting
5

Chu’-wa i’-ting
10

To-lo’ i’-ting
15

I’-pat i’-ting
20

Pu’-ak or gu’-tad
25

Sin fu tek’
50

Sin fu-tek’ pu’-ak
75

Chu’-wa fu-tek’
100

To-lo’ fu-tek’
150

I’-pat fu-tek’
200

Li-ma’ fu-tek’
250

I-nim’ fu-tek’
300

Pi-to’ fu-tek’
350

Wa-lo’ fu-tek’
400

Si-am’ fu-tek’
450

Sim-po’-o fu-tek’
500

Sin-o’-po
1,000

Trade routes

Commerce passes quite commonly within the Bontoc culture area from one pueblo to the next, and even to the second and third pueblos if they are friends; but the general direction is along the main river (the Chico), southwest and northeast, since here the people cling. This being the case, those living to the south and north of this line have much less commerce than those along the river route. For instance, practically no people now pass through Ambawan, southeast of Bontoc. It is the last pueblo in the area along the old Spanish calzada between the culture areas of Bontoc and Quiangan to the south. No people live farther southward along the route for nearly a day, and the first pueblos met are enemies of Ambawan, fearful and feared. The only commerce between the two culture areas over this route passes when a detachment of native Constabulary soldiers makes the journey. Naturally the area traversed by a comerciante is limited by the existing feuds. The trader will not go among enemies without escort.

Besides the general trade route up and down the river, there is one between Bontoc and Barlig to the east via Kanyu and Tulubin. At Barlig the trail splits, one branch running farther eastward through Lias and Balangao and the other going southward through the Cambulo area — a large valley of people said to be similar in culture to those of Quiangan.

Another route from Bontoc leaves the main trail at Titipan and joins the pueblos of Tunnolang, Fidelisan, and Agawa in a general southwest direction. From Agawa the trail crosses the mountains, keeping its general southwest course. It turns westward at the Rio Balasian, which it follows to Ankiling on the Rio del Abra. The route is then along the main road to Candon on the coast via Salcedo.

Mayinit, the salt-producing pueblo, has her outlet on the main trail via Bontoc, but she also passes eastward to the main trail at Sakasakan, going through Baliwang, the battle-ax pueblo. She has no outlet to the north.

Trade languages and traders

Since the commerce is to-day nearly all interpueblo, the common language of the Igorot is used almost exclusively in trade. While the Spaniards were occupying the country, Chinamen — the “Chino” of the Islands — passed up from the coast as far as Bontoc, and even farther; the Ilokano also came. They brought much of the iron now in the country, and also came with brass wire, cloth, cotton, gangsas, and salt. These two classes of traders took out, in the main, the money and carabaos of the Igorot, and the Spaniard’s coffee, cocoa, and money. To-day no comerciante from the coast dares venture farther inland than Sagada. Of the tradesmen the Chinese did not apparently affect the trade language at all, since the Chino commonly employs the Ilokano language. The Spanish gave the words of salutation, as “Buenos dias” (good day) and “a Dios” (adieu); he also gave some of the names of coins. The peso, the silver dollar, is commonly called “peho.” However, the medio peso is known as “thalepi,” from the Ilokano “salepi.” The peseta is called “peseta;” and the media peseta is known as “dies ay seis” (ten and six), or, simply, “seis” — it is from the Spanish, meaning sixteen quartos.

The Ilokano language was the more readily adopted, since it is of Malayan origin, and is heard west of the Igorot with increasing frequency until its home is reached on the coast. Among the Ilokano words common in the language of commerce are the following:

Ma’-no, how much; a-sin’, salt; ba’-ag, breechcloth; bu-ya’-ang, black; con-di’-man, red; fan-cha’-la, blanket, white, with end stripes; pas-li-o’, Chinese bar iron from which axes, spears, and bolos are made; ba-rot’, brass wire; pi-nag-pa’-gan, a woman’s blanket of distinctive design.

An Americanism used commonly in commercial transactions in the area, and also widely in northern Luzon, is “no got.” It is an expression here to stay, and its simplicity as a vocalization has had much to do with its adoption.

Stages of commerce

The commerce of the Igorot illustrates what seems to be the first distinctively commercial activity. Preceding it is the stage of barter between people who casually meet and who trade carried possessions on the whim of the moment. If we wish to dignify this kind of barter, it may properly be called “Fortuitous Commerce.”

The next stage, one of the two illustrated by the Igorot of the Bontoc culture area, is that in which commodities are produced before a widespread or urgent demand exists for them in the minds of those who eventually become consumers through commerce. Such commodities result largely from a local demand and a local supply of raw materials. Gradually they spread over a widening area, carried by their producers whose home demand is, for the time, supplied, and who desire some commodity to be obtained among another people. Such venders never or rarely go alone to exchange their goods, which, also, are seldom produced by simply one person, but by a number of individuals or a considerable group. The motive prompting this commerce is the desire on the part of the trader to obtain the commodity for which he goes. In order to obtain it in honor, he attempts to thrust his own productions on the others by carrying his commodities among them. Commerce in this stage may be called “Irregular Intrusive Commerce.” It also has its birth and development in barter.

A higher stage of commerce, an immediate outgrowth of the preceding, is that in which the producer anticipates a known demand for his commodity, and at irregular times carries his stock to the consumers. This commerce may be called “Irregular Invited Commerce.” It is in this stage that a medium of exchange is likely to develop. This class of commerce is also in full operation in Bontoc to-day.

A higher form is that in which the producer keeps a supply of his commodity on hand. and periodically displays it repeatedly in a known place — a “market.” This stage also may be developed simply through barter, as is seen among certain pueblo Indians of southwestern United States, but the Bontoc man has not begun to dream of a “market” for satisfying his material wants. Such commerce may be called “Periodic Free Commerce.” It is widespread in the Philippines, displaying both barter and sale. In many places in the Archipelago to-day, especially in Mindanao, periodic commerce is carried on regularly on neutral territory. Market places are selected where products are put down by one party which then retires temporarily, and are taken up by the other party which comes and leaves its own productions in exchange.

Growing out of these monthly, semimonthly, weekly, biweekly, and triweekly markets, as one sees them in the Philippines, is a still higher form of commerce carried on very largely by sale, but not entirely so. It may be called “Continual Free Commerce.”

Property right

The idea of property right among the Igorot is clear. The recognition of property right is universal, and is seldom disputed, notwithstanding the fact that the right of ownership rests simply in the memory of the people — the only property mark being the ear slit of the half-wild carabao.

The majority of property disputes which have come to light since the Americans have been in Bontoc probably would not have occurred nor would the occasion for them have existed in a society of Igorot control. It is claimed in Bontoc that the Spaniard there settled most disputes which came to him in favor of the party who would pay the most money. In this way, it is said, the rich became the richer at the expense of the poor. This condition is suggested by recent RECLAMOS made by poor people. Again, since the American heard the RECLAMOS of all classes of people, the poor who, according to Igorot custom, forfeited sementeras to those richer as a penalty for stealing palay, have come to dispute the ownership of certain real property.

Personal property of individual

Most articles of personal property are individual. Such property consists of clothing, ornaments, implements, and utensils of out-of-door labor, the weapons of warfare, and such chickens, dogs, hogs, carabaos, food stuffs, and money as the person may have at the time of marriage or may inherit later.

Four of the richest men of Bontoc own fifty carabaos each, and one of them owns thirty hogs. Two other men and a woman, all called equally rich, own ten head of carabaos each. Others have fewer, while two of the ten richest men in the pueblo, have no carabaos. Some of these men have eight granaries, holding from two to three hundred cargoes each, now full of palay. Carabaos are at present valued in Bontoc at about 50 pesos, and hogs average about 8 pesos. All rich people own one or more gold earrings valued at from one to two carabaos each.

The so-called richest man in Bontoc, Lak-ay’-eng, has the following visible personal property:

Articles
Value in peso

Fifty carabaos, at 50 pesos each
2,500

Thirty hogs, at 8 pesos each
240

Eight full granaries, with 250 1-peso cargoes 2,000

Eight earrings, at 75 pesos each
600

Coin from sale of palay, hogs, etc.
1,000

Total
6,340

The above figures are estimates; it is impossible to make them exact, but they were obtained with much care and are believed to be sufficiently accurate to be of value.

Personal property of group

All household implements and utensils and all money, food stuffs, chickens, dogs, hogs, and carabaos accumulated by a married couple are the joint property of the two.

Such personal property as hogs and carabaos are frequently owned by individuals of different families. It is common for three or four persons to buy a carabao, and even ten have become joint owners of one animal through purchase. Through inheritance two or more people become joint owners of single carabao, and of small herds which they prefer to own in common, pending such an increase that the herd may be divided equally without slaughtering an animal. Until recent years two, three, and even four or five men jointly owned one battle-ax.

As the Igorot acquires more money, or, as the articles desired become relatively cheaper, personal property of the group (outside the family group) is giving way to personal property of the individual. The extinction of this kind of property is logical and is approaching.

Real property of individual

The individual owns dwelling houses, granaries, camote lands about the dwellings and in the mountains, millet and maize lands. in the mountains, irrigated rice lands, and mountain lands with forests. In fact, the individual may own all forms of real property known to the people.

It is largely by the possession or nonpossession of real property that a man is considered rich or poor. This fact is due to the more apparent and tangible form of real than personal property. The ten richest people in Bontoc, nine men and a woman, own, it is said, in round numbers one hundred sementeras each. The average value of a sementera is 10 pesos for every cargo of palay it produces annually. A sementera producing 10 cargoes is rated a very good one, and yet there are those yielding 20, 25, 30, and even 40 cargoes.

It is practically impossible to get the truth concerning the value of the personal or real property of the Igorot in Bontoc, because they are not yet sure the American will not presently tax them unjustly, as they say the Spaniard did. But the following figures are believed to be true in every particular. Mang-i-lot’, an old man whose ten children are all dead, and who says his property is no longer of value because he has no children with whom to leave it, is believed to have spoken truthfully when he said he has the following sementeras in the five following geographic areas surrounding the pueblo:

Geographic area
Number of sementeras
Number of cargoes produced

Magkang
6
15

Kogchog
3
5

Felas
1
8

Toyub
1
5

Samuiyu
2
10

Total
13
43

These sementeras produce the low average of 3 1/3 cargoes. The average value of Mang-i-lot’s’ sementeras, then, is 33 1/3 pesos — which is thought to be a conservative estimate of the value of the Bontoc sementera. Mang-i-lot’ is rated among the lesser rich men. He is relatively, as the American says, “well-to-do.” However, when a man possesses twenty sementeras he is considered rich.

The richest man in Bontoc, with one hundred sementeras, has in them, say, 3,330 pesos worth of real property in addition to his 6,340 pesos of personal property.

It is claimed that each household owns its dwelling and at least two sementeras and one granary, though a man with no more property than this is a poor man and some one in his family must work much of the time for wages, because two average sementeras will not furnish all the rice needed by a family for food.

A dwelling house is valued at about 60 pesos, which is less than it usually costs to build, and a granary is valued at about 10 or 15 pesos. It is constructed with great care, is valueless unless rodent proof, and costs much more than its avowed valuation.

Title to all buildings, building lands in the pueblo, and irrigated rice lands is recognized for at least two generations, though unoccupied during that time. They say the right to such unoccupied property would be recognized perpetually if there were heirs. At least it is true that there are now acres of unused lands, once palay sementeras, which have not been cultivated for two generations because water can not be run to them, and the property right of the grandsons of the men who last cultivated them is recognized. However, if one leaves vacant any unirrigated agricultural mountain lands — used for millet, maize, or beans — another person may claim and plant them in one year’s time, and no one disputes his title.

Real property of group

All real property accumulated by a man and woman in marriage is their joint property as long as both live and remain in union.

No form of real property, except forests, can be the joint property of other individuals than man and wife. Forests are most commonly the property of a considerable group of people — the descendants of a single ancestral owner. The lands as well as the trees are owned, and the sale of trees carries no right to the land on which they grow. It is impossible even to estimate the value of any one’s forest property, but it is true that persons are recognized as rich or poor in forests.

Public property

Public lands and forests extend in an irregular strip around most pueblos. There is no public forest, or even public lands, between Bontoc and Samoki, but Bontoc has access to the forests lying beyond her sister pueblo. Neither is there public forest, or any forest, between Bontoc and Tukukan, and Bontoc and Titipan, though there are public lands. In all other directions from Bontoc public forests surround the outlying private forests. They are usually from three to six hours distant. From them any man gathers what he pleases, but until the American came to Bontoc the Igorot seldom went that far for wood or lumber, as it was unsafe. Now, however, the individual will doubtless claim these lands, unless hindered by the Government. In this manner real property was first accumulated — a man claimed public lands and forests which he cared for and dared to appropriate and use. There have been few irrigated sementeras built on new water supplies in two generations by people of Bontoc pueblo. The “era of public lands” for Bontoc has practically passed; there is no more undiscovered water. However, three new sementeras were built this year on an island in the river near the pueblo, and are now (May, 1903) full of splendid palay, but they can not be considered permanent property, as an excessively rainy season will make them unfit for cultivation.

Sale of property

Personal property commonly passes by transfer for value received from one party to another. Such a thing as transfer of real property from one Igorot to another for legal currency is unknown; the transfer is by barter. The transfer of personal property was considered in the preceding section on commerce.

Real property is seldom transferred for value received except at the death of the owner or a member of the family; at such times it is common, and occurs from the necessity of quantities of food for the burial feasts and the urgent need of blankets and other clothing for the interment.

Again, camote lands about the dwellings are disposed of to those who may want to build a dwelling. Dwellings are also disposed of if the original occupant is to vacate and some other person desires to possess the buildings.

Death may destroy one’s personal property, such as hogs and carabaos, but almost never does an Igorot “lose his property,” if it is real. Only a protracted family sickness or a series of deaths requiring the killing of great numbers of chickens, hogs, and carabaos, and the purchase of many things necessary for interment can lose to a person real property of any considerable value.

There is no formality to a “sale” of property, nor are witnesses employed. It is common knowledge within the ato when a sale is on, and the old men shortly know of and talk about the transaction — thenceforth it is on record and will stand.

Rent, loan, and lease of property

Until recent years, long after the Spaniards came, it was customary to loan money and other forms of personal property without interest or other charge. This generous custom still prevails among most of the people, but some rich men now charge an interest on money loaned for one or more years. Actual cases show the rate to be about 6 or 7 per cent. The custom of loaning for interest was gained from contact with the Lepanto Igorot, who received it from the Ilokano.

It is claimed that dwellings and granaries are never rented.

Irrigated rice lands are commonly leased. Such method of cultivation is resorted to by the rich who have more sementeras than they can superintend. The lessee receives one-half of the palay harvested, and his share is delivered to him. The lessor furnishes all seed, fertilizers, and labor. He delivers the lessee’s share of the harvest and retains the other half himself, together with the entire camote crop — which is invariably grown immediately after the palay harvest.

Unirrigated mountain camote lands are rented outright; the rent is usually paid in pigs. A sementera that produces a yield of 10 cargoes of camotes, valued at about six pesos, is worth a 2-peso pig as annual rental. In larger sementeras a proportional rental is charged — a rental of about 33 1/3 per cent. All rents are paid after the crops are harvested.

Inheritance and bequest

As regards property the statement that all men are born equal is as false in Igorot land as in the United States. The economic status of the present generation and the preceding one was practically determined for each man before he was born. It is fair to make the statement that the rich of the present generation had rich grandparents and the poor had poor grandparents, although it is true that a large property is now and then lost sight of in its division among numerous children.

Children before their marriage receive little permanent property during the lives of their parents, and they retain none which they may accumulate themselves. A mother sometimes gives her daughter the hair dress of white and agate beads, called “apong;” also she may give a mature daughter her peculiar and rare girdle, called “akosan.” Either parent may give a child a gold earring; I know of but one such case. This custom of not allowing an unmarried child to possess permanent property is so rigid that, I am told, an unmarried son or daughter seldom receives carabaos or sementeras until the death of the parents, no matter how old the child may be.

At the time of marriage parents give their children considerable property, if they have it, giving even one-half the sementeras they possess. If parents are no longer able to cultivate their lands when their children marry, they usually give them all they have, and their wants are faithfully met by the children.

The conditions presented above are practically the only ones in which the property owner controls the disposition of his possessions which pass in gift to kin.

The laws of inheritance and bequest are as firmly fixed as are the customs of giving and not giving during life.

Since all the property of a husband and wife is individual, except that accumulated by the joint efforts of the two during union, the property of each is divided on death. The survivor of a matrimonial union receives no share of the individual property of the deceased if there are kin. It goes first to the children or grandchildren. If there are none and a parent survives, it goes to the parent. If there are neither children, grandchildren, nor parents it goes to brothers and sisters or their children. If there are none of these relatives the property goes to the uncles and aunts or cousins. This seems to be the extent of the kinship recognized by the Igorot. If there are no relatives the property passes to the survivor of the union. If there is no survivor the property passes to that friend who takes up the responsibilities of the funeral and accompanying ceremonies. The law of inheritance, then, is as follows: First, lineal descendants; second, ascendants; third, lateral descendants; fourth, surviving spouse; fifth, self-appointed executor who was a personal friend of the deceased.

Primogeniture is recognized, and the oldest living child, whether male or female, inherits slightly more than any of the others. For instance, if there were three or four or five sementeras per child, the eldest would receive one more than the others.

This law of primogeniture holds at all times, but if there are three boys and one girl the girl is given about the same advantage over the others, it is said, as though she were the eldest. If there are three girls and only one boy, no consideration is taken of sex. When there are only two children the eldest receives the largest or best sementera, but he must also take the smallest or poorest one.

It is said that division of the property of the deceased occurs during the days of the funeral ceremonies. This was done on the third day of the ceremonies at the funeral of old Som-kad’, mentioned in the section on “Death and Burial?” The laws are rigid, and all that is necessary to be done is for the lawful inheritors to decide which particular property becomes the possession of each. This is neither so difficult nor so conducive of friction as might seem, since the property is very undiversified.

Tribute, tax, and “rake off”

There is no true systematic tribute, tax, or “rake off” among the Bontoc Igorot, nor am I aware that such occurs at all commonly sporadically. However, tribute, tax, and “rake off” are all found in pure Malayan culture in the Archipelago, as among the Moros of the southern islands.

Tribute may be paid more or less regularly by one group of people to a stronger, or to one in a position to harass and annoy — for the protection of the stronger, or in acknowledgment of submission, or to avoid harassment or annoyance. Nothing of the sort exists in Bontoc. The nearest approach to it is the exchange of property, as carabaos or hogs, between two pueblos at the time a peace is made between them — at which time the one sueing for peace makes by far the larger payment, the other payment being mere form. This transaction, as it occurs in Bontoc, is a recognition of submission and of inferiority, and is, as well, a guarantee of a certain amount of protection. However, such payments are not made at all regularly and do not stand as true tributes, though in time they might grow to be such.

Nothing in the nature of a tax for the purpose of supporting a government exists in Bontoc. The nearest approach to it is in a practice which grew up in Spanish time but is of Igorot origin. When to-day cargadors are required by Americans, as when Government supplies must be brought in, the members of each cargador’s ato furnish him food for the journey, though the cargador personally receives and keeps the wage for the trip. The furnishing of food seems to spring from the feeling that the man who goes on the journey is the public servant of those who remain — he is doing an unpleasant duty for his ato fellows. If this were carried one step further, if the rice were raised and paid for carrying on some regular function of the Igorot pueblo, it would be a true tax. It may be true, and probably is, in pure Igorot society that if men were sent by an ato on some mission for that ato they would receive support while gone. This would readily develop into a true tax if those public duties were to be performed continually, or even frequently with regularity.

“Rake off,” or, as it is known in the Orient, “squeeze,” is so common that every one — Malay, Chino, Japanese, European, and American — expects his money to be “squeezed” if it passes through another’s hands or another is instrumental in making a bargain for him. In much of the Igorot territory surrounding the Bontoc area “rake off” occurs — it follows the advent of the “headman.” It is one of the direct causes why, in Igorot society, the headman is almost always a rich man. During the hunting stage of human development no “rich man” can come up, as is illustrated by the primitive hunter folk of North America. As soon, however, as there are productions which may be traded in, there is a chance for one man to take advantage of his fellows and accumulate a part of their productions — this opportunity occurs among primitive agricultural people. The Bontoc area, however, has no “headman,” no “rich man,” and, consequently, no “rake off.”

PART 5

Political Life and Control

It is impossible to put one’s hand on any one man or any one group of men in Bontoc pueblo of whom it may be said, “Here is the control element of the pueblo.”

Nowhere has the Malayan attained national organization. He is known in the Philippines as a “provincial,” but in most districts he is not even that. The Bontoc Igorot has not even a clan organization, to say nothing of a tribal organization. I fail to find a trace of matriarchy or patriarchy, or any mark of a kinship group which traces relationship farther than first cousins.

The Spaniard created a “presidente” and a “vice-presidente” for the various pueblos he sought to control, but these men, as often Ilokano as Igorot, were the avenue of Spanish approach to the natives — they were almost never the natives’ mouthpiece. The influence of such officials was not at all of the nature to create or foster the feeling of political unity.

Aside from these two pueblo officers the government and control of the pueblo is purely aboriginal. Each ato, of which, as has been noted, there are seventeen, has its group of old men called “in-tug-tu’-kan.” This in-tug-tu’-kan is not an organization, except that it is intended to be perpetual, and, in a measure, self-perpetuating. It is a thoroughly democratic group of men, since it is composed of all the old men in the ato, no matter how wise or foolish, rich or poor — no matter what the man’s social standing may be. Again, it is democratic — the simplest democracy — in that is has no elective organization, no headmen, no superiors or inferiors whose status in the in-tug-tu’-kan is determined by the members of the group. The feature of self-perpetuation displays itself in that it decides when the various men of the ato become am-a’-ma, “old men,” and therefore members of the in-tug-tu’-kan. A person is told some day to come and counsel with the in-tug-tu’-kan, and thenceforth he is a member of the group.

In all matters with which the in-tug-tu’-kan deals it is supreme in its ato, but in the ato only; hence the opening statement of the chapter that no man or group of men holds the control of the pueblo. The life of the several ato has been so similar for such a number of generations that, in matters of general interest, the thoughts of one in-tug-tu’-kan will be practically those of all others. For instance, there are eight ceremonial occasions on which the entire pueblo rests from agricultural labors, simply because each ato observes the same ceremonials on identical days. In one of these ceremonials, all the men of the entire pueblo have a rock contest with all the men of Samoki. Again, when a person of the pueblo has been killed by another pueblo treacherously or in ambush, or in any way except by fair fight, the pueblo as a unit hastens to avenge the death on the pueblo of the slayer.

In such matters as these — matters of common defense and offense, matters of religion wherein food supply is concerned — custom has long since crystallized into an act of democratic unity what may once have been the result of the councils of all the in-tug-tu’-kan of the pueblo. It is customary for an ato to rest from agricultural labor on the funeral day of any adult man, but the entire pueblo thus seeks to honor at his death the man who was old and influential.

There is little differentiation of the functions of the in-tug-tu’-kan. It hears, reviews, and judges the individual disagreements of the members of the ato and makes laws by determining custom. It also executes its judgments or sees that they are executed. It makes treaties of peace, sends and accepts or rejects challenges of war for its ato. In case of interato disagreements of individuals the two in-tug-tu’-kan meet and counsel together, representing the interests of the persons of their ato. In other words, the pueblo is a federation made up of seventeen geographical and political units, in each of which the members recognize that their sanest, ripest wisdom dwells with the men who have had the longest experience in life; and the group of old men — sometimes only one man and sometimes a dozen — is known as in-tug-tu’-kan, and its wisdom is respected to the degree that it is regularly sought and is accepted as final judgment, being seldom ignored or dishonored. In matters of a common interest the pueblo customarily acts as a unit. Probably could it not so act, factions would result causing separation from the federation. This state of things is hinted as one of the causes why the ancestors of present Samoki separated from the pueblo of Bontoc. The fact that they did separate is common knowledge, and a cause frequently assigned is lack of space to develop. However, there may have been disagreement.

Crimes, detection and punishment

Theft, lying to shield oneself in some criminal act, assault and battery, adultery, and murder are the chief crimes against Igorot society.

There are tests to determine which of several suspects is guilty of a crime. One of these is the rice-chewing test. The old men of the ato interested assemble, in whose presence each suspect is made to chew a mouthful of raw rice, which, when it is thoroughly masticated, is ejected on to a dish. Each mouthful is examined, and the person whose rice is the driest is considered guilty. It is believed that the guilty one will be most nervous during the trial, thus checking a normal flow of saliva.

Another is a hot-water test. An egg is placed in an olla of boiling water, and each suspect is obliged to pick it out with his hand. When the guilty man draws out the egg the hot water leaps up and burns the forearm.

There is an egg test said to be the surest one of all. A battle-ax blade is held at an angle of about 60 degrees, and an egg is placed at the top in a position to slide down. Just before the egg is freed from the hand the question is asked “Is Liod (the name of the man under trial) guilty?” If the egg slides down the blade to the bottom the man named is innocent but if it sticks on the ax he is guilty.

There is also a blood test employed in Bontoc pueblo, and also to the west, extending, it is said, into Lepanto Province. An instrument consisting of a sharp spike of iron projecting about one-sixteenth of an inch from a handle with broad shoulders is placed against the scalp of the suspects and the handle struck a sharp blow. The projecting shoulder is supposed to prevent the spike from entering the scalp of one farther than that of another. The person who bleeds most is considered guilty — he is “hot headed.”

I was once present at an Igorot trial when the question to be decided was whether a certain man or a certain woman had lied. The old men examined and cross-questioned both parties for fully a quarter of an hour, at which time they announced that the woman was the liar. Then they brought a test to bear evidence in binding their decision. They killed a chicken and cut it open. The gall was found to be almost entirely exposed on the liver — clearly the woman had lied. She looked at the all-knowing gall and nodded her acceptance of the verdict. If the gall had been hidden by the upper lobe of the liver, the verdict would not have been sustained.

If a person steals palay, the injured party may take a sementera from the offender.

If a man is found stealing pine wood from the forest lands of another, he forfeits not only all the wood he has cut but also his working ax.

The penalty for the above two crimes is common knowledge, and if the crime is proved there is no longer need for the old men to make a decision — the offended party takes the customary retributive action against the offender.

Cases of assault and battery frequently occur. The chief causes are lovers’ jealousies, theft of irrigating water during a period of drought, and dissatisfaction between the heirs of a property at or shortly following the time of inheritance.

It is customary for the old men of the interested ato to consider all except common offenses unless the parties settle their differences without appeal.

A fine of chickens, pigs, sementeras, sometimes even of carabaos, is the usual penalty for assault and battery.

Adultery is not a common crime. I was unable to learn that the punishment for adultery was ever the subject for a council of the old men. It seems rather that the punishment — death of the offenders — is always administered naturally, being prompted by shocked and turbulent emotions rather than by a council of the wise men. In Igorot society the spouse of either criminal may take the lives of both the guilty if they are apprehended in the crime. To-day the group consciousness of the penalty for adultery is so firmly fixed that adulterers are slain, not necessarily on the spur of the moment of a suspected crime but sometimes after carefully laid plans for detection. A case in question occurred in Suyak of Lepanto Province. A man knew that his faithless wife went habitually at dusk with another man to a secluded spot under a fallen tree. One evening the husband preceded them, and lay down with his spear on the tree trunk. When the guilty people arrived he killed them both in their crime, thrusting his spear through them and pinning them to the earth.

Among a primitive people whose warfare consists much in ambushing and murdering a lone person it is not always possible to predict whether the taking of human life will be considered a criminal act or an act of legitimate warfare.

It is considered warfare by the group of the murdered person, and as such to be met by return warfare unless the group of the murderer is a friendly one and at once comes to the offended people to sue for continued peace. This applies to political groups within a pueblo as well as to the people of distinct pueblos.

When murder is considered simply as a crime, its punishment may be one of two classes: First, the murderer may lose his life at the hands of his own group; second, the crime may be compounded for the equivalent of the guilty man’s property. In this case the settlement is between the guilty person and the political group of the victim, and the value of the compound is consumed by feastings of the group. No part of the price is paid the family of the deceased as a compensation for the loss of his labor and other assistance.

The three following specific cases of misdemeanors will illustrate somewhat, more fully the nature of differences which arise between individuals in pure Igorot society:

In Samoki early in November, 1902, Bisbay pawned an iron pot — a sugar boiler — to Yagao for 4 pesos. In about two months, when sugar season was on, Bisbay went to redeem his property, but Yagao would neither receive the money nor give up the boiler. The old men of the ato counseled together over the matter, and, as a result, Yagao received the 4 pesos and returned the pot, and the matter was thus amicably settled between the two.

Early in January, 1903, Mowigas, of the pueblo of Ganang, cut and destroyed the grasshopper basket of Dadaag, of the pueblo of Mayinit, and also slightly cut Dadaag with his ax, but did not attempt to kill him. The cause of the assault was this: Mowigas had killed a chicken and was having a ceremonial in his house at the time Dadaag passed with his basket of grasshoppers. According to Igorot custom he should not have taken grasshoppers past a house in which such a ceremony was being performed. The breach made it necessary to hold another ceremony, killing another chicken. Old men from Mayinit, the pueblo of Dadaag, came to Ganang and told Mowigas he would have to pay 3 pesos for his conduct, or Mayinit would come over and destroy the town. He paid the money, whereas the basket was worth only one-sixth the price. Trouble was thus averted, and the individuals reconciled. In this case the two pueblos are friends, but Mayinit is much stronger than Ganang, and evidently took advantage of the fact.

In January, 1903, a woman and her son, of Titipan, stole camotes of another Titipan family. The old men of the two ato of the interested families fined the thieves a hog. The fine was paid, and the hog eaten by the old men of the two ato.

Very often the fine paid by the offender passes promptly down the throats of the jury. However, it is the only compensation for their services in keeping the peace of the pueblo, so they look upon it as their rightful share — it is the “lawyer’s share” with a vengeance.

PART 6

War and Head-Hunting

En-fa-lok’-net is the Bontoc word for war, but the expression “na-ma’-ka” — take heads — is used interchangeably with it.

For unknown generations these people have been fierce head-hunters. Nine-tenths of the men in the pueblos of Bontoc and Samoki wear on the breast the indelible tattoo emblem which proclaims them takers of human heads. The fawi of each ato in Bontoc has its basket containing skulls of human heads taken by members of the ato.

There are several different classes of head-hunters among primitive Malayan peoples, but the continuation of the entire practice is believed to be due to the so-called “debt of life” — that is, each group of people losing a head is in duty and honor bound to cancel the score by securing a head from the offenders. In this way the score is never ended or canceled, since one or the other group is always in debt.

It seems not improbable that the heads may have been cut off first as the best way of making sure that a fallen enemy was certainly slain. The head was at all events the best proof to a man’s tribesmen of the discharge of the debt of life; it was the trophy of success in defeating the foe. Whatever the cause of taking the head may have been with the first people, it would surely spread to others of a similar culture who warred with a head-taking tribe, as they would wish to appear as cruel, fierce, and courageous as the enemy.

Henry Ling Roth[33] quotes Sir Spencer St. John as follows concerning the Seribas Dyaks of Borneo (p. 142):

A certain influential man denied that head-hunting is a religious ceremony among them. It is merely to show their bravery and manliness, that it may be said that so-and-so has obtained heads. When they quarrel it is a constant phrase, “How many heads did your father or grandfather get?” If less than his own number, “Well, then, you have no occasion to be proud!” Thus the possession of heads gives them great considerations as warriors and men of wealth, the skulls being prized as the most valuable of goods.

Again he quotes St. John (p. 143):

Feasts in general are: To make their rice grow well, to cause the forest to abound with wild animals, to enable their dogs and snares to be successful in securing game, to have the streams swarm with fish, to give health and activity to the people themselves, and to insure fertility to their women. All these blessings the possessing and feasting of a fresh head are supposed to be the most efficient means of securing.

He quotes Axel. Dalrymple as follows (p. 141)

The Uru Ais believe that the persons whose heads they take will become their slaves in the next world.

On the same page he quotes others to the same point regarding other tribes of Borneo.

Roth states (p. 163):

From all accounts there can be little doubt that one of the chief incentives to getting heads is the desire to please the women. It may not always have been so and there may be and probably is the natural blood-thirstiness of the animal in man to account for a great deal of the head-taking.

He quotes Mrs. F. F. McDougall in her statement of a Sakaran legend of the origin of head-taking to the effect that the daughter of their great ancestor residing near the Evening Star “refused to marry until her betrothed brought her a present worth her acceptance.” First the young man killed a deer which the girl turned from with disdain;