BENEDICT, BAGOBO CEREMONIAL, MAGIC AXD MYTH 9 



— women, young men, children ■ — are freely admitted as specta- 

 tors of almost all ceremonies, and as valued participants in many 

 of them. 



Of prime importance are those irregularly periodical assemblages 

 of neighboring groups of villages for the celebration of the festival 

 known as Ginum, 8 at which event sacrifices of human victims or 

 of fowls are presented to certain gods; sacred liquor is ceremonially 

 drunk; formal lustrations in the river for the expulsion of disease 

 take place; rites magically protective against ghosts and demons 

 are manipulated ; material wealth in garments, ornaments and 

 weapons is offered up with the primary intention of obtaining an 

 increase of riches; special types of chant and of percussion music 

 are performed; festival dances are in order, and social feasting is 

 shared in by all present. 



Other ceremonial occasions are incident upon the annual rice 

 sowing and the harvest; while still others are associated with in- 

 dividual events, such as marriage and burial. It is specially at 

 the night gatherings called Manganito' 3 that the Bagobo may come 

 into a more nearly direct and personal relation with the gods. 

 Here, various divinities collectively known as manganito speak to 

 the people; ask and answer questions, and issue oracles through 

 the mouth of some recognized individual — usually a woman — who, 

 in the capacity of medium, speaks or sings as she is prompted by 

 the spirit for the moment possessing her. 



"While group assemblages are of fundamental value in obtaining* 

 benefits for the participants and in averting from them all disease, 

 yet it is noteworthy that the parents of every family, at their own 

 house-altar, are accustomed to perform devotions and to make offerings 

 for the health and well-being of the members of the household. 



The priesthood is not closely organized, but there are recognized 

 several classes of official functionaries among whom ceremonial 

 activities are distributed with a fair degree of distinctness, (a) The 

 chieftain, called daiu, who is both civil and ecclesiastical head of 

 his village or group of villages. It is he who repeats the central 

 liturgies of the Ginum festival and offers the sacrifice, and who, 



8 The word inum means "to drink," or "a drinking;" g- is a particle used before 

 initial vowels, and appears to have a purely formal or a phonetic value. 



9 Manga-, a nominal element with a plural force ; anito, a god who communicates with 

 the people through a medium. 



