The Bontoc Igorot eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 387 pages of information about The Bontoc Igorot.

The Bontoc Igorot eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 387 pages of information about The Bontoc Igorot.

This ceremony, performed by Som-kad’ of ato Sipaat, occurs in the first period of the year, I-na-na’.  The usual pig or chicken is killed, and the priest says:  “In-fi-kus’-na ay pa-ku’ to-mo-no’-ka ad chay’-ya.”  This is:  “Fruit of the palay, grow up tall, even to the sky.”

Keeng

Ke’-eng ceremony is for the protection of the palay.  Ong-i-yud’, of ato Fatayyan, is the priest for this occasion, and the ceremony occurs when the first fruit heads appear on the growing rice.  They claim two good-sized hogs are killed on this day.  Then Ong-i-yud’ takes a ki’-lao, the bird-shaped bird scarer, from the pueblo and stealthily ducks along to the sementera where he suddenly erects the scarer.  Then he says: 

U-mi-chang’-ka Sik’-a
Ti-lin’ in kad La’-god yad Ap’-lay
Sik’-a o’-tot in lo-ko-lo’-ka nan fu-i’-mo.

Freely translated, this is —­

Ti-lin’ [the rice bird], you go away into the north country and the south country You, rat, you go into your hole.

Totolod

This ceremony, tot-o-lod’, occurs on the day following ke’-eng, and it is also for the protection of the rice crop.  Ong-i-yud’ is the priest for both ceremonies.

The usual hog is killed, and then the priest ties up a bundle of palay straw the size of his arm, and walks to the south side of the pueblo “as though stalking deer in the tall grass.”  He suddenly and boldly throws the bundle southward, suggesting that the birds and rats follow in the same direction, and that all go together quickly.

Safosab

This ceremony is recorded in the chapter on “Agriculture” in the section on “Harvesting,” page 103.  It is simply referred to here in the place where it would logically appear if it were not so intimately connected with the harvesting that it could not be omitted in presenting that phase of agriculture.

Lislis

At the close of the rice harvest, at the beginning of the season Li’-pas, the lis-lis ceremony is widely celebrated in the Bontoc area.  It consists, in Bontoc pueblo, of two parts.  Each family cooks a chicken in the fireplace on the second floor of the dwelling.  This part is called “cha-peng’.”  After the cha-peng’ the public part of the ceremony occurs.  It is called “fug-fug’-to,” and is said to continue three days.

Fug-fug’-to in Bontoc is a man’s rock fight between the men of Bontoc and Samoki.  The battle is in the broad bed of the river between the two pueblos.  The men go to the conflict armed with war shields, and they pelt each other with rocks as seriously as in actual war.  There is a man now in Bontoc whose leg was broken in the conflict of 1901, and three of our four Igorot servant boys had scalp wounds received in lis-lis rock conflicts.

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The Bontoc Igorot from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.