NARAG, MICHELLE MARIZ G.

BS GEOLOGY 2-1

SEPTEMBER 9, 2019

A REFLECTION ON THE SOURCE CRITICISM:

MARAGTAS AND KALANTIAW CODES

Over the course of my education, I have yet to encounter knowing that the Philippines managed to
established an organized system of penal codes that govern a particular area in the country way before the
Spanish empire colonization which, in no doubt, influenced us a lot in many aspects particularly in politics,
religion, economy, basically everything. The Maragtas and Kalantiaw codes could prove that way before we are
conquered, we already have a jurisdicial system of criminal law that includes penalties and punishments that
could describe the society of pre-hispanic Filipinos. But, as it was criticized externally and internally, it was
found out to have a lot of inconsistencies which could trample the veracity of the document and eventually
could put a hoax on a part of the history of the Philippines.

In examining the veracity of the evidence, it is very important to trace back the origin of it. Such doing of
Scott who use etymological methods in finding the roots of a document’s provenance gives emphasis on the
importance of finding the original document that could support and verify the secondary resources he traced
back pointing to the existence of the Kalantiaw code. He focused on finding the people who could have possibly
witnessed the original document but ended up getting none because such evidences of Leyendes by Jose Maria
Pavon, which could support the Kalantiaw codes, were lost during the destruction of the National Library
following the World War II.

In finding the truth, one way or method is not enough. Jocano’s approach on verifying the truthfulness of
the historical accounts further discovers many inconsistencies. The anthropological framework of Jocano which
linked his assumptions to the cultural attributes and beliefs in the development of human society narrows down
the veracity of the code and spurs out questions on the consistency of the accounts of other secondary authors.

It must be frustrating for the authors as it was frustrating for me that as the historical account was
continually being criticized, inconsistencies keep on adding up on the veracity of the codes. Inconsistencies on
the date it was created, published and discovered, inconsistencies on the context of the terms used by the
secondary authors, anachronisms of the events, significant people etc. With these numbers of inconsistencies, it
seems impossible to verify it as true and has existed, but still, people search and continues to criticize the
evidences to prove and disprove the veracity of the historical account. What was still the point?

Maybe the point was the numerous omissions and inconsistencies in the corroboration of the historical
account will lead us to a conclusion as to how it was created. It was concluded by Jocano and Scott that the
codes of Maragtas and Kalantiaw were merely folk histories and are not true histories but, folk histories were
not entirely false because it reflects the folkloric culture and ethnographic values of the particular people. It still
manages to achieve the goal of criticizing the veracity of evidences by knowing the history of a particular
subject which could later be used as reference for further studies.

Evidences could not always point us to the truth we wanted but these false evidences still guides us to the
right path because it enables us to eliminate numerous speculated truths and narrows us to the ultimate truth.
Ending up finding false evidences is a constructive way of finding what really is the truth that could shape the
history of a particular subject. Instead of viewing it as a failure, as someone who seeks for the truth of the past,
it should be viewed as an opportunity.