On
Continuing Traditional Scripts in the Philippines

Two syllabic writing systems exist in Mindoro: the Northern Script of the Hanunuo-Mangyan, or Latag, and the Southern Script of the Northern Buhid. In Palawan, the Tagbanua is one of the remaining groups who still employ the ancient syllabic script. When Tagbanua workers were taken to Brooke’s Point before the Second World War, they introduced the writing to the Pala’wan/ Palawanin or Palawano.


The scripts from Mindoro are either 7- or 8-syllable line poetic expressions. Verses, Love letters, correspondence, request letters, notifications of ceremonials, and even prayers are often inscribed on bamboo and wooden objects such as tobacco containers, lime containers, musical instruments, bows, and even house beams.


The Tagbanua and Pala’wan have preserved the script more as a cultural relic than a practical tool of communication. Tagbanua males were taught how to write, while the females were relegated to doing household chores.


All four groups write on banana leaves, wooden slabs, tree bark, and bamboo splits using hard, pointed objects, thorns, and coconut leaves’ midrib when writing on banana leaves. The Tagbanua use a small knife called pisaw for writing the script on wooden slabs and bamboo.


The National Museum declared the Hanunuo, Buhid, Tagbanua, and Pala’wan scripts as National Cultural Treasures in 1997, and these were inscribed in the Memory of the World Registry of UNESCO in 1999. This declaration led to projects that would initiate the preservation and propagation of these amazing traditional scripts.


Reference: National Museum of the Philippines


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