Title: Negritos of Zambales
Author: William Allan Reed
Release date: January 10, 2007 [eBook #20329]
Most recently updated: January 1, 2021
Language: English
Credits: Produced by Jeroen Hellingman
Department of the Interior,
The Ethnological Survey,
Manila, March 3, 1904.
Sir: I have the honor to transmit a study of the Negritos of Zambales Province made by Mr. William Allan Reed, of The Ethnological Survey, during the year 1903. It is transmitted with the recommendation that it be published as Part I of Volume II of a series of scientific studies to be published by this Survey.
Respectfully,
Chief of the Ethnological Survey.
Hon. Dean C. Worcester,
Secretary of the Interior, Manila, P. I.
Department of the Interior,
The Ethnological Survey,
Manila, March 1, 1904.
SIR: I have the honor to submit herewith my report on the Negritos of Zambales.
Very respectfully,
William Allan Reed.
Dr. Albert Ernest Jenks,
Chief of The Ethnological Survey, Manila, P. I.
This report is based on two months’ field work pursued during May and June, 1903. Accompanied by Mr. J. Diamond, a photographer, the writer went in the latter part of April to Iba, Zambales, where a few days were spent in investigating the dialects of the Zambal people and in preparation for a trip to the interior.
After a journey of 25 miles inland a camp was established near Tagiltil. During the three weeks we were there the camp was visited by about 700 Negritos, who came in from outlying settlements, often far back in the mountains; but, owing to the fact that most of them would remain only as long as they were fed, extended investigations had to be conducted largely among the residents of Tagiltil and the neighboring rancheria of Villar.
From Tagiltil a trip was made southward behind the low mountain chain, which marks the limit of the plain, and through a hitherto unexplored territory, very broken and next to impassable except in the dry season. The trail, known only to Negritos and but little used, followed for the most part the beds of mountain streams. Four little rancherias were passed, the people of two of which had already visited us. A hard two-day trip brought us to Santa Fé, a barrio of San Marcelino. After a week with the Negritos at this place a trip was made toward the Pampanga boundary to Cabayan and Aglao, the former locality inhabited by several small groups of Negritos, the latter an isolated Ilokano barrio in and near which the Negritos live. A visit to the rancherias near Subig and Olongapo concluded the investigation. In all, more than a thousand Negritos were seen.
With only a short time at a place it is evident that an exhaustive study of the people of any particular locality could not be made. But the culture plane of the entire area is practically the same, and the facts as here presented should give a good idea of the customs and the general condition of the Negritos of Zambales Province. The short time at my disposal for the investigation is my only excuse for the meager treatment given some lines of study—as, for example, physical anthropology and language.
Inasmuch as nothing has yet been published by The Ethnological Survey on the Negritos of the Philippines, I have thought it not out of place to preface my report with an introductory chapter on their distribution. The data contained therein have been compiled by me from information gathered by the Survey during the past two years and are sufficiently authentic for the present purpose.
The photographs of the Zambales Negritos were made by Mr. J. Diamond and those of the Bataan Negritos are from the collection of Hon. Dean C. Worcester, Secretary of the Interior. Credit for each photograph is given on the plate as it appears.