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Accustomed Othering in Colonial Writing

A Review of “Customs of the Tagalogs”
(two relations) by Juan de Plasencia From
The Philippine Islands 1493-1898
Full text accessible via: gutenberg.org
by Sherwin Altarez Mapanoo

September 2015--There are at least three major discursive issues that can be extracted
from the document, Customs of the Tagalogs written by Juan de Plasencia in 1589, if
we are to put socio-political context into the text – first, the issue of authorship;
second, the discourse of power in colonial writing; and third, the logic of binarism or
the Occident-Other dichotomy. These are interrelated threads that probably constitute
major segments of colonial historical writing in the Philippines.

The authorial voice or authorship plays a pivotal role in putting meaning(s) to this
colonial text. The author, Juan de Plasencia was, in the first place, not a native
Tagalog but a Franciscan missionary who first arrived in the Philippines in 1577. He
was tasked by the King of Spain to document the customs and traditions of the
colonized (“natives”) based on, arguably, his own observations and judgments.
Notably, de Plasencia wrote the Doctrina Cristiana, an early book on catechism and is
believed to be the first book ever printed in the Philippines. Such initiatives were an
accustomed practice of the colonizer during the Age of Discovery to enhance their
superiority over the colonized and validity of their so-called duties and legacies to the
World. It is a common fact that during this era, the Spanish colonizers, spearheaded
by missionaries, drew a wide variety of texts ranging from travel narratives and
accounts of the colony to even sermons.

In this particular text, de Plasencia tried to avoid discussing the “conflicting reports of
the Indians” through an “informed observation” to obtain the “simple truth.” This
“truth,” however, is debatable, and the manner of how he actually arrived to his
reports is even more problematic. The text foregrounds two important figures: the
observer (de Plasencia) himself, with his own background, subjectivites and biases;
and the observer’s subject (Tagalogs), seen as the “Other,” a metonymic amalgam of
communal characteristics, local customs and traditions, etc. In colonial situations, the
relationship of these figures – the colonizer and the colonized – flows in both but
unequal directions; the former being the dominant, while the latter is the inferior one,
or as Edward Said put it, “a relationship of power, of domination, of varying degrees
of a complex hegemony… a sign of European-Atlantic power over the Orient than it
is a veridic discourse about the Orient” (72). Seen from the center looking toward the
culturally and politically inferior periphery, the colonizers find identity in its
compelling position as the sophisticated dominating “self” versus the inferior
dominated “Other.” The use of politically incorrect terms such as “Indians,” “tribal”
and “natives,” and adjectives such as “amusing,” “foolish” and “absurd” in the text is
just a manifestation of the conflicting Occident-Other paradigm.

Clearly serving immediate colonial interests, many portions of the narrative are
problematic insofar as they posit the Tagalogs in such a way as to enhance the validity
of the colonizer’s allegiances. Skewed preconception and descriptive biases thrive
throughout the entire document. In de Placensia’s account on land ownership, for
example, he said that “the lands were divided among the barangay and…no one
belonging to another barangay would cultivate them unless after the purchase or
inheritance.” However, “since the advent of the Spaniards, it is not so divided.” Such
statement implies that the intervention of the colonizer has put order into the
divisiveness. He also made a conclusion that Catholicism was able to expel primitive
and evil belief systems of the Tagalogs regarding gods, burials and superstitions,
saying that “all the Tagalogs not a trace of this is left; and that those who are now
marrying do not even know what it is, thanks to the preaching of the holy gospel,
which has banished it.” This claim undermines that the Tagalog population did not
fully embrace Catholicism but appropriated it according to their indigenous religious
practices. Generalized and essentialist claims were also made by de Placencia in his
discussion of the local customs in “Laguna and tingues, and among the entire Tagalo
race.” What constituted the Tagalo race in the first place? How did he come up with
such a category? The people of Laguna were just a small member of the Tagalogs and
referring them as the mirror of the entire Tagalo race is erroneous.
Tagalog royal couple from the Boxer Codex (c. 1595)

A large fraction of his accounts were also based on false comparisons, and not
coupled with accurate information. He repetitively compared local traditions with
Western paradigm/parameters. The Tagalog idol, lic-ha, for example, was matched up
with Romans’ statue of deity of a dead man who was brave in war and endowed with
special faculties. These two objects are evidently different in nature and don’t fall
under the same category. Datos were also described as the equivalent of the European
“nobles,” hence undermining the indigenous political systems. Worse, the ritualistic
and superstitious beliefs of the Tagalogs were mocked by de Placencia, by coming up
with various categories of devil-ish beliefs. The mangagauay and mangagayoma, for
instance, were both regarded as “witches” who performed deceitful healing
procedures, a judgment made by an outsider who knew nothing about the complexity
of indigenous psyche. What he failed to realize is that in traditional cultures, these so-
called “evil” practices were an integral part of Filipino folk beliefs; and the early
Tagalogs, in reality, never considered them as acts of the devil. Needless to say, the
application of Western parameters to local traditions has often proven fractious
especially in classifying and describing local and colonial situations.

Given the plethora of biases and to a great extent, inaccurate judgments and
pretensions of the author, the text was clearly not written for local consumption, but
for Western readers. Customs of the Tagalogs, just like any other colonial texts
written during the Spanish colonial period, was intentionally made to provide an
exoticize description of the Tagalog natives, clearly fed by politics and propaganda
and operated with the Western-outsider's gaze, that would be appealing to them.

Work Cited:

Said, Edward W. The Edward Said Reader. New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing
Group, 2007.

Sherwin Altarez Mapanoo is a multidisciplinary writer, researcher, and nomadic

visual ethnographer. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Art Studies (Interdisciplinary)
from the University of the Philippines and a double post-graduate degree with
distinction in International Performance Research and Theory of Art and Media,
Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of Warwick, United Kingdom and the
University of Arts, Belgrade, Serbia, respectively under the Erasmus Mundus
programme.
The Aswang Project
February 7, 2013 ·
Excerpt from: CUSTOMS OF THE TAGALOGS
by Juan de Plasencia, O.S.F.
From: The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898. Volume 7, 1588-1591
The distinctions made among the priests of the devil were as follows:
1. The first, called CATOLONAN, as above stated, was either a man or a woman. This office was an
honorable one among the natives, and was held ordinarily by people of rank, this rule being general in all the
islands.
2. The second they called MANGAGAUAY, or witches, who deceived by pretending to heal the sick. These
priests even induced maladies by their charms, which in proportion to the strength and efficacy of the
witchcraft, are capable of causing death. In this way, if they wished to kill at once they did so; or they could
prolong life for a year by binding to the waist a live serpent, which was believed to be the devil, or at least his
substance. This office was general throughout the land.
3. The third they called MANYISALAT, which is the same as magagauay. These priests had the power of
applying such remedies to lovers that they would abandon and despise their own wives, and in fact could
prevent them from having intercourse with the latter. If the woman, constrained by these means, were
abandoned, it would bring sickness upon her; and on account of the desertion she would discharge blood and
matter. This office was also general throughout the land.
4. The fourth was called MANCOCOLAM, whose duty it was to emit fire from himself at night, once or
oftener each month. This fire could not be extinguished; nor could it be thus emitted except as the priest
wallowed in the ordure and filth which falls from the houses; and he who lived in the house where the priest
was wallowing in order to emit this fire from himself, fell ill and died. This office was general.
5. The fifth was called HOCLOBAN, which is another kind of witch, of greater efficacy than the mangagauay.
Without the use of medicine, and by simply saluting or raising the hand, they killed whom they chose. But if
they desired to heal those whom they had made ill by their charms, they did so by using other charms.
Moreover, if they wished to destroy the house of some Indian hostile to them, they were able to do so without
instruments. This was in Catanduanes, an island off the upper part of Luzon.
6. The sixth was called SILAGAN, whose office it was, if they saw anyone clothed in white, to tear out his
liver and eat it, thus causing his death. This, like the preceding, was in the island of Catanduanes. Let no one,
moreover, consider this a fable; because, in Caavan, they tore out in this way through the anus all the intestines
of a Spanish notary, who was buried in Calilaya by father Fray Juan de Merida.
7. The seventh was called MAGTATANGAL, and his purpose was to show himself at night to many persons,
without his head or entrails. In such wise the devil walked about and carried, or pretended to carry, his head to
different places; and, in the morning, returned it to his body - remaining, as before, alive. This seems to me to
be a fable, although the natives affirm that they have seen it, because the devil probably caused them so to
believe. This occurred in Catanduanes.

8. The eighth they called OSUANG, which is equivalent to " sorcerer;" they say that they have seen him fly,
and that he murdered men and ate their flesh. This was among the Visayas Islands; among the Tagalogs these
did not exist.

9. The ninth was another class of witches called MANGAGAYOMA. They made charms for lovers out of
herbs, stones, and wood, which would infuse the heart with love. Thus did they deceive the people, although
sometimes, through the intervention of the devil, they gained their ends.

10. The tenth was known as SONAT, which is equivalent to " preacher." It was his office to help one to die, at
which time he predicted the salvation or condemnation of the soul. It was not lawful for the functions of this
office to be fulfilled by others than people of high standing, on account of the esteem in which it was held.
This office was general through- out the islands.
11. The eleventh, PANGATAHOJAN, was a soothsayer, and predicted the future. This office was general in
all the islands.
12. The twelfth, BAYOGUIN, signified a " cotquean," a man whose nature inclined toward that of a woman.

dato
(ˈdɑːtəʊ) or

datto
n, pl -tos

(Sociology) the chief of any of certain Muslim tribes in the Philippine Islands

[C19: from Spanish, ultimately from Malay dato' grandfather]