Note 5 — Expeditions to the Province of Tuy

The Igorrotes first appear under the name Ygolot, which was applied to the inhabitants of Benguet; and those people probably represent the original tribe. The name was later applied to all the head-hunters of northern Luzon, then collectively to all in the Philippine Islands, and is now almost synonymous with “wild.” The district assigned to the real Igorrotes is a matter of controversy among various authors, as are also their various characteristics, and their origin. Certain characteristics point to infusions of Chinese and Japanese blood. Comparatively few of them have embraced Christianity. They live in villages of three or four hundred, with a chief in each, who is usually the richest man, and whose lands the common people cultivate. They are generally monogamous, and respect the marriage tie highly. They believe in a supreme being whom they call Apo or Lu-ma-oig; his wife Bangan; his daughter Bugan; and his son Ubban. There are two inferior gods Cabigat and Suyan. Their priests are called Maubunung [303n] and they heal sickness with charms and incantations. They believe in two places of abode after death: one pleasant and cheerful, for those who die a natural death; the other a real heaven, for warriors killed in battle and women who die in childbirth. They bury their dead in coffins in a sitting position, in clefts or caves, and often dry the corpse over a fire. Ancestor-worship is prevalent. They are an agricultural people, but do not breed cattle. They have worked the copper mines of their districts and extracted gold from the earliest times. As yet, however, exact and scientific knowledge regarding them is slight, as is true of many other Filipino tribes, owing to the confused state of Philippine ethnology. See Smithsonian Report, 1899, p. 538, “List of native tribes of Philippines” by Ferdinand Blumentritt (translated by Dr. O.T. Malon); Blumentritt’s “Über den Namen der Igorroten” in Ausland, no. 1, p. 17 (Stuttgart, 1882); Sawyer’s Inhabitants of the Philippines (New York, 1900); pp. 254–267; and Foreman’s Philippine Islands (London, 1890), pp. 212–215.