Boxer Manuscript

- describes a special subclass of “oripun” known

as “horohan” who functioned as lower-level
warriors
(Alcina)in Visayan-speaking-refers to high
ranking commoners known as “gintobo”or
“mamahay”who served as warriors and maritime
raiders.
Nakuda
- a leader of a pirate or trading expedition
- supplied the fighting men and acted as organizer

In Visayan societies,the term for a chief or datus

alliance group or faction(including oripun and
timawa) “haop”is cognate with “sakop”or
“kindred”
In the Tagalog term for a political faction
under a datu,the “barangay”also refers to
traditional outrigger boats and the ancestral
kin units of Philippine myth who originally
settled various islands and valleys of the
Philippne.
Slavery in the Philippines

Early Spanish accounts emphasize the

prevalence of slavery in the Philippine
complex societies as elsewhere in Southeast
Asia and the tremendous economic
significance with an institutionalized slave
class.
Early historical accounts in describing the
dyadic vertical ties between patrons and
clients that might be better describe as
dependency.
Number of paths by which an individual
could enter into a state of slavery or bondage:
• Inheritance
• Economic reversal,causing an individual or his or
her kinsmen to sell the individual into bondage
• Failure to meet debts
• Judicial punishments for the inability to pay
assessed fines
• Capture in warfare
Debt-bondage

- whether as a result of inability to pay

bridewealth in marriage negotiations,inability
to meet trading agreements,borrowing against
crop failure,gambling or other economic
calamity.
Visayan ayuey and Tagalog alipin sa gigilid
Debt- bonded slaves lived in their master’s
house(or in close proximity)
Judicial punishment for what we would term
criminal cases(infractions against recognized
behavioral norms)and civil claims(disagreements
between individuals or kin groups concerning
resources such as land use or inheritable wealth)
involving people within their alliance groups or
factions.
The rules which they observe for punishing anyone so
severely as to enslave him are as follows:
For murder,adultery and theft,for insulting any woman
of rank or taking away her robe in public and leaving
her naked,or causing her to flee or defend herself so that
it falls off.
The Islamic polities of Mindanao(particularly
Sulu,Magindanao and Maranao)
- appear to have been the major Philippine
aggressors in slaving expeditions both within and
outside the archipelago.
Two upper Valley Magindanao datus:
Datu Utu of Buayan
Sultan of Kabuntulan
Slavery in Southeast Asia conformed to refer as
an “open slave system” in which captured or
purchased are eventually into the dominant
cultural group.
Sulu- was developing a “slave mode of
production”
Slaves – major components of brideprice
payments in many regions of the Philippines.
In the Visayas,slaves who could accumulate
gold or other valuables through trading and craft
activities might make a payment known “lowas”
IN BICOL REGION OF SOUTHEASTERN LUZON
Chiefs/Datus

Timawas and Hidalgos(nonchiefly elite)

Lower-ranking persons
IN TAGALOG SOCIETIES
Maginoo(upper class)

Maharlika

Timawa

Katalunan(ritual specialist) Slaves

IN VISAYAN SOCIETIES
Datus(sorcerers or shamans)

Babaylan

Gintobo(or mamahay)

Timawa Slaves