Igorot Stone Kingdom in Baguio
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La Trinidad Valley at quarter past eight in the evening… the heart of Benguet in all its glory
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IGOROT STAIRS
It’s an open stairway at Upper Session Road with igorot statues all over and that’s it… lots of classy food hubs too nearby. Stairs itself is a nice spot for solitude
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[Time Trowel] Seriously, let go of the myth about the Ifugao Rice Terraces’ age
The fact is, there is no archaeological evidence for [the 2,000-year-old rice terraces] claim. The model was created by early 20th-century American scholars H. Otley Beyer and Roy Barton, who based their arguments not on data but on racialized theories of culture and human development. Their ideas have long been repeated in textbooks, tourist promotions, and nationalist histories, often reshaping Indigenous narratives to serve national agendas. The evidence, however, tells a very different story.
[…] In Taiwan, long thought to be the starting point of the so-called Austronesian expansion, millet rather than rice dominated the diet two millennia ago. Rice accounts for less than 5% of archaeobotanical samples and was grown in rainfed fields rather than irrigated paddies. Terracing and irrigated rice only began in the 17th century when Han Chinese settlers arrived, transforming landscapes within decades. If they could do so quickly, why assume Cordillera farmers could not have built the terraces later and with similar speed?
In Madagascar, the story is similar — rice appears only around 1,200 to 1,400 years ago, introduced much later than once believed. Local varieties emerged through hybridization and adaptation, not through inheritance from a timeless tradition.
Similarly, archaeobotanical studies in the Philippines show that taro and millet were staples long before rice became dominant. The large-scale turn to wet rice farming accelerated only under Spanish colonization, when rice became taxable. Irrigation ditches known as zanjas were introduced, and Ilocano farmers transformed them into zanjeras, cooperative systems that combined Indigenous practices with colonial structures.
[…] Beyer, often called the Father of Philippine Anthropology, explicitly argued that the terraces were not the work of the Ifugao themselves. He wrote in 1955:
“I do not believe that the physical type, language, or culture of these people is wholly a native development. The evidence seems to indicate that the present-day Ifugaos are the result of mixture, perhaps one or more thousand years ago, of several widely different native types with an incoming people of high culture.” In other words, he thought the Ifugao were incapable of such innovation and that outsiders must have introduced the practice.
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A Tattooed Igorot Beauty Smoking Ganja: Migo Kamandag
‘A serene smoke curls,
Wisdom in the painted breasts,
Earth’s breath on the wind.’
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Photographs of the Bua School for Igorot Girls
(First three images are from the University of Michigan Library, last image is from the Ortigas Foundation Library)
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Happy Day of Valor!
It’s National Heroes’ Day in the Philippines!
Some stuff I’m reading:
• Category Archives: Igorot Heroes by Bill Bilig. Link: https://igorotblogger.com/category/people/igorot-heroes
The link above leads to the following:
- Public Servants and Heroes: Siegfred Ngoloban and Richard Balusdan
- Major Dennis Molintas Sr: A Gallant Igorot
- The List: More on Itneg-Ilokano Warrior Gabriela Silang
- FtB Lister Macliing Dulag: In Good Company
• Igorots of 66th Infantry: Baguio’s wartime heroes. Inquirer article by Vincent Cabreza. Link: https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/2056082/igorots-of-66th-infantry-baguios-wartime-heroes
• The Legend of Biag, an Igorot Culture Hero by William Henry Scott. Asian Folklore Studies, Vol. 23, No. 1 (1964), pp. 93-110 (18 pages). Link: https://doi.org/10.2307/1177639
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Posible nga bang magkaroon ng lipunan kung saan walang kaso at konsepto ng rape? Is it possible for a society to exist wherein there was no case nor concept of rape?
Walang Rape sa Bontok (2014) dir. Lester Valle
