Your writing is still around (1)
THE Mangyan Heritage Center will soon launch one hundred ambahan poems by the Mangyans of Oriental Mindoro, translated into English and Spanish. While waiting for the launch of this fascinating publication, certain images are coming to mind.
After college, I went straight to the National Museum to apply for a job. At that time, it was not located in those splendid edifices at the Agrifina Circle (Rizal Park). It was a forlorn agency attached to the Department of Education so part of it was tucked in the second floor of the Bureau of Mines building, another part shoved into the ground floor of the National Science Development Board. But, I wanted to work there; fortunately I was hired on the spot.
That was where I saw my first Mangyan, not a live one though, but a life-like model in full regalia, – woven loincloth, and a slender wooden bow slung on a shoulder, an awesome ceremonial headdress made of the beak and head of a lordly kalaw. “They live in Mindoro,” one of the archeologists explained, “and have preserved their ancient script, in fact, as late as the 1950’s, the Mangyans could vote using their own writing.” Samples of different Mangyan scripts, exquisitely etched on bamboo were laid out, under glass, in a display shelf.
Later I learned, there are actually eight groups of indigenous people encompassed by the generic name “Mangyan” living in the mountainous areas of Oriental and Occidental Mindoro, with the same cultural traditions, but speaking in eight different tongues.
In the next display case of the museum, a 15th century palayok (terracotta pot), excavated in Ca- latagan, Batangas, bore an inscription on its shoulder rim, but no one had yet deciphered the ancient message. There were many kinds of ancient writing, I was informed, and the Tagalogs (my tribe) also had one.
In 1997, the National Museum of the Filipino People declared the Buhid and Hanunoo Mangyan scripts, as well as the Tagbanua script of Palawan National Cultural Treasures. Subsequently, in 1999, these were inscribed in the Memory of the World Register of the UNESCO. Jose Rizal would have been so proud.
Apparently, Jose Rizal and some of his contemporaries, notably Isabelo de los Reyes, were researching about ancient forms of writing that existed in this archipelago long before the advent of colonialism. An essential part of their search for a Filipino identity was to find evidence that our history did not start with Spanish colonialism, that before Europeans came to these shores, the natives of these islands had their own syllabary and writing, culture and traditions, socioeconomic and political organizations, in short, a civilization of their own. (more) (ggc1898@gmail.com)