The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55, 1690-1691: Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century
History
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55, 1690-1691: Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century
Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources
108. It is not known whether there was any temple [25] in all these
islands, or any place assigned in common for worship; or that the
people ever assembled for public functions. In private they were
wont to have in their own houses (and not outside them in any cave
or like place) some kind of altars, on which they placed their idols,
and before them a small brasier with burning aromatics. But although
they had no temples, they did not lack priests or priestesses
for the sacrifices, which each one offered for his own purpose or
necessity. The Tagálogs called those cursed ministers catalonan,
and the Visayans babaylan. Some were priests by inheritance and
relationship; others by the dexterity with which they caused themselves
to be instructed and substituted in the office of famous priests by
gaining their good-will. Others were deceived by the devil with his
wonted wiles, and made a pact with him to assist them, and to hold
converse with him through their idols or anitos; and he appeared to
them in various forms. The method of making the sacrifices hinged
on the different purposes for which they were intended. If it were
for a feast of ostentation and vanity that was being made to some
chief, they called it "the feast of the great god." The method of
celebrating it was near the house of the chief, in a leafy bower
which they erected especially for that purpose, hung round about
with hangings in their fashion, namely, the Moorish, which were made
from odds and ends of pieces, of various colors. The guests assembled
there, and the sacrifice having been prepared (on those occasions of
a feast usually some good fat pig), the catalona ordered the girl of
the best appearance and who was best adorned, to give the spear-thrust
to the animal, amid the ceremony of certain dances of theirs. When the
animal was dead it was cut into bits and divided among all the people,
as is the blessed bread. Although other animals were killed and eaten,
and other viands and refreshments peculiar to those people were used,
that animal was the one esteemed and was reverently consumed. The
chief part of the feast was the drinking, accompanied, as ever,
with much music and dancing.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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