edium. Her home is at
Nagbotobotan, where the rivers empty their waters into the hole at
the edge of the world.
IX. Gawigawen [male]. A giant who owns the orange trees of Adasin.
X. Giambolan [male]. A ten-headed giant.
XI. Gaygayoma. A star maiden who marries Aponitolau. The daughter of
Bagbagak [male], a big star,--and Sinag [female], the moon--.
XII. Tabyayen. Son of Aponitolau and Gaygayoma. Half brother of Kanag.
XIII. Kabkabaga-an. A powerful female spirit who falls in love with
Aponitolau.
XIV. Asibowan. The maiden of Gegenawan, who is related to the spirit
Kaboniyan. The mistress of Aponitolau.
In consequence of modern rationalism there is a tendency on the
part of a considerable number of the Tinguian to consider these
tales purely as stories and the characters as fictitious, but the
mass of the people hold them to be true and speak of the actors as
"the people who lived in the first times." For the present we shall
take their point of view and shall try to reconstruct the life in
"the first times" as it appears in the tales.
The principal actors live in Kadalayapan and Kaodanan, [6] towns
which our chief story teller--when trying to explain the desire of
Kanag to go down and get fruit--assures us were somewhere in the air,
above the earth (p. 141). [7] At other times these places are referred
to as Sudipan--the term by which spirits are supposed to call the
present earth--while the actors are referred to as Ipogau--the spirit
name for Tinguian. Whatever its location it was a place much like the
present home of this people. The sky, the chief abode of spirits and
celestial bodies, was above the land, and the heroes of the tales
are pictured as ascending to visit the upper realms. The trees,
plants, and animals were for the most part those known to-day. The
ocean appears to have been well known, while mention is made of some
places in Luzon, such as Dagopan and San Fernando in Pangasinan with
which the people of to-day are not at all familiar (p. 89, 168).
We learn that each village is situated near to a river or waterway
by the banks of which shallow wells are dug, and there we find the
women gathering under the shade of the trees, dipping up water to be
carried to their homes, washing and combing their hair, and taking
their baths (p. 48). They seldom go singly, for enemies are apt to
be near, and unless several are in the company it will be impossible
to spread the alarm and secure help in
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