Warrior Society

Bagobos of Davao region, especially in the olden days are reputed to be fierce warriors. They are very protective about their ancestral lands and boundaries and carry a serious-like demeanor wherever they go. Being uptight about the concept of social respect, they rarely laugh or smile about especially when dealing with outsiders or foreigners. They are diplomatic however and carry about themselves an aura of ancient dignity and power. However, when situations call for a tribal war or pangayao, the Bagobos offer their ritual prayers to their war-deity called Mandarangan, and thereby asked for his protection and victory against their enemies. Mandarangan’s home is supposedly on the mount of the Apo.

Then a war party is thereby commissioned. Led by a Datu or Magani wearing his blood-red suit, young and veteran warriors hasten to the lair of their enemies. A pangayao is impelled by theft, murder or killing of a relative, breaking of a taboo, kidnapping of a wife or child or even trespass to ethnic borders.

To assure a winning outcome of the conflict, Bagobos resort to ambuscades, surprise attacks, poisons or even magic. In their weapon inventory, they have swords called palihuma, krisses, spear, bows and arrows and their kaasag or shields. Thus, the opposing tribe may have to defend themselves in a similar fashion. On occasion of obtaining slaves and women, Bagobos will even conduct hostile raids on Bilaan territories in Davao del Sur. Bilaans are also a group of people found particularly in Malita, Davao del Sur.

Bagobos have also met formidable foes in the past.
The Muslim tribes. There are ancient stories recalling of skirmishes between the Bagobos and their neighboring Muslim brothers.

Maguindanao

Bordering the Davao highlands and North Cotabato where most Bagobo territories are situated, is the landlocked region of Maguindanao. This is the home of the powerful Maguindanao Sultanate. Home of the powerful Sultan Dipatuan Kudarat. Leader of the war campaign waged against the Spanish colonial forces in the mid 1600’s. It is said that there were border skirmishes that involved both people.

In fact, in the work of Historian Heidi K. Gloria, The Bagobos: their Ethno history and Acculturation, 1987, an account was made on an encounter between the two: the Bagobos using a kind of magic as defense against the invading “Muslims”.

Sultan Dipatuan Kudarat

Thus it is quoted, “My Grandfather, Datu Gapao, used to tell me that wars were very common between the Moros and the Bagobos in the past. The Bagobos possessed knowledge of the art and craft of warfare, so that eventually the Moros gave up fighting us. As an example, one of our techniques is called “pagtangka”, a charm which is placed along the path, e.g. a river, of enemies. As soon as the Moros step on the water where the pagtangka has been placed they will begin to feel strange and would not want to travel further. Another art known to us Bagobos is that of the felling all the banana trees of the enemy with just one arrow. Still another is the “kasin”, which is spun around a surface on which a sketch of the enemy territory is drawn. Wherever the kasin falls when it stops spinning, all the Moros found in that direction will die.”

Davao: Home of Mindanao’s Finest Warriors

Davao was once a home to one of Mindanao’s finest warrior tribes, the Bagobos.

The Bagobo warriors, known among themselves as the Bahani or Magani, were the pillar of strength of the community.Many among those who wore these red kerchiefs (klobow or tanggkulo) prided themselves as the defenders of their territories against those who would invade them. A Bahani, gradually attaining Datuship of the community, would become the lawgiver, arbitrator and executioner of the Bagobo’s law on retributive justice. Largely territorial, these Bagobo warriors were once feared by other tribes from neighboring regions.

According to existing private and government records, the Bagobos inhabited Davao before the arrival of the Spanish colonizers and religious imperialists. Their territory extended from the Davao to Davao del Sur and North Cotabato.

According to one eminent American anthropologists Faye-Cooper Cole, who have made excursions in Davao during the early 1900″s would eventually discover this group of proud people. In his work The Peoples of Malaysia, published 1945,  Cole remarks that ” the Bagobos are without doubt, the most handsomely dressed wild tribe in the Philippines. The men confine their long hair in head-kerchiefs, the edges of which are decorated with beads and tassels. A close-fitting undershirt is often worn, and above this is an elaborately beaded or embroidered band. Two belts are worn, one to hold up the trousers, the other to support the fighting or work knives that each man carries.”

Cole goes further to elucidate that, ” Both men women pierce the earlobes ot the ears and stretch them until they will admit large wooden or ivory ear plugs made like enormous collar buttons. The also file  or chip the upper incisors and blacken the lower teeth, but tatooing, scarifying, or other forms of body decorating or mutilation are not practiced. ”

Referring to the warrior qualities of the Bagobos, Cole states that, ” their warriors (Bagobo) have made themselves feared in all the neighboring country and even the haughty moro have found it wise to seek their friendship.” The name Magani, he further asserts, is applied to a man who has killed two or more persons. He is then entitled to wear a peculiar, chocolate-colored head covering with white patterns in it. After his score has reached six he is permitted to wear a blood-red suit a carry a bag of the same color. His dress does not change as the number of his victims increases, but his influence grows with each life out to his credit.

Even Davao during the mid-1800’s was not as easily conquered without a fierce fight being put up by Datu Bago with other Muslim,  Bagobo,  Mandaya and tribal maganis against the Spanish conquering forces led by Don Jose Oyanguren.

Postscript:

Many other accounts of tribal history relating to this warrior race have remained largely unwritten. This may be attributed to the fact that; a. Bagobos value oral tradition. Similar with other ancient peoples, the Bagobos largely take their historical traditions through stories, folklore or myth,  b. Many Bagobos, even those who have obtained a modest education, have not yet adopted the habit of writing or recording with technological devices the aspects of their culture and history, c. It was the foreign victors in Davao’s colonial past who wrote much about their biased and adulterated perspectives of the Bagobo people, that has probably overwhelmed a lot of historical truths about these tribal peoples. True to fact, the the first Spanish religious missionaries who reduced Davao into “settlements“, called the Bagobos, “savages, natives and heathens”.

All tribal peoples, in Mindanao, in the Philippines and to all the colonized peoples and cultures from all over the world, must inevitably tell their stories. Tribal peoples from all over the world must CORRECT these false truths. False truths that have already been written in books.

Tribal peoples in Davao such as the Bagobos are strong, proud and wise in the ancient ways. We consider ourselves a dignified race. That is the reason why, you can never see any of us build cathedrals, steal or habitually buy other people’s lands, abuse nature or provoke discussions about religious beliefs. Many visitors to Davao especially foreign imperialists, as recorded in the annals of Davao’s history did not respect Bagobo ways. They called them heathens, savages, liver-eaters and needing to be civilized.

Then they built edifices, churches and other monuments.

Conquer, dominate, evangelize and educate.

And today, they ask for a tuition fee increase.

What ingratitude! They came in for free. They don’t pay taxes. Then they charge atrocious tuition fee rates. Walang-hiyang mga moneymakers na ito!  They openly teach us to be man for others, yet they don’t exactly practice what they preach. Tang-na niyan !

That seems to be the character of many “friar-like” institutions in Mindanao, especially in Davao. They never even openly thank the original people who received them and their teachings. They could just as easily thank the Bagobos, Mandayas, Tagakaolos, Tausug or Maguinandawaon and other Davao tribes  during the annual Araw ng Dabaw Celebrations for having allowed them to live permanently in the City. Davao was hospitable to them. Davao assisted them in their work. Yet they are still, in many respects,  arrogant like their forebears.

I can only hope that one day, starting today, Davao’s history will be at the start of being rewritten, starting from the truth.