Traditions of the Tinguian: a Study in Philippine Folk-Lore by Fay-Cooper Cole
page 6 of 359 (01%)
page 6 of 359 (01%)
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services, but the fact that he knows "the stories of the first times"
makes him a welcome addition to the company and gives him an enviable position in the estimation of his fellows. The purely ritualistic tales, called _diams_, are learned word by word by the mediums, [1] as a part of their training for their positions, and are only recited while an animal is being stroked with oil preparatory to its being sacrificed, or when some other gift is about to be presented to the superior beings. The writer has recorded these _diams_ from various mediums in widely separated towns and has found them quite uniform in text and content. The explanatory tales were likewise secured from the mediums, or from old men and women who "know the customs." The stories of the last division are the most frequently heard and, as already indicated, are told by all. It is evident even to the casual reader that these show much more evidence of outside influence than do the others; some, indeed, appear to have been recently borrowed from the neighboring christianized Ilocano. [2] Tales of the Mythical Period _Reconstruction of the Culture_.--In the first division certain actors occur with great frequency, while others always take the leading parts. These latter appear under a variety of names, two or more titles often being used for the same individual in a single tale. To avoid confusion a list of the fourteen principal actors and their relationships are given in the accompanying table. It will appear that there are some conflicts in the use of names, but when it is realized that the first twenty-six myths which make up the cycle proper were secured from six story tellers coming from four different |
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