BENEDICT, BAGOBO CEREMONIAL, MAGIC AND MYTH K>1 



the old times, a man hunt was inconvenient, a slave was sacrificed 

 as a substitute. From this point of view, we might look upon the 

 Bagobo custom of sacrificing a single individual at Ginum as a 

 mere vestige of a much more noteworthy outpouring of blood for 

 the satisfaction of Mandarangan and for that of the Tolus ka Balekat. 

 But this view is not altogether satisfactory, for there is no reason 

 to suppose that human sacrifice may not be a practice that has been 

 associated with the Ginum equally as long as head-hunting, if we 

 admit both as ceremonial elements. 



The situation in regard to head-hunting among the Bagobo offers 

 a question for investigation. For my part, I have never seen a 

 human head preserved as a trophy, nor have I seen a human skull 

 in any Bagobo house. Pig skulls are occasionally hung on the wall, 

 the number recording the skill of the hunter. 



The Bagobo seem to stand in great fear of the human skull, as 

 to them it is a representative of Buso. One old woman, a priest- 

 doctor, caught sight of a single skull among my ethnological ob- 

 jects, and suffered such a shock that she told me, weeks afterward, 

 that she had been sick ever since she saw the "bonga-bonga" at 

 my house. Her feeling was fairly representative of the general 

 sentiment. 



Yet the frequency in many other Malay groups of this practice 

 of taking heads, particularly in Borneo, in Celebes 222 and in several 

 parts of the Philippines, leads one to look for the custom in the 

 history of the Bagobo tribe. One definite statement is given 

 by Father Gisbert in a letter to the Superior of the mission, 

 written from Davao, July 26, 1886. The case is one of head- 

 hunting on a large scale and it occurred only two generations ago. 

 The father of Manip, who figures in the episode, was Panguilan, 

 the grandfather of the present datu of Sibulan, 223 so that these 

 heads were taken well within the last one hundred years. 



222 The Sarasin brothers write that the greatest pride of the natives of Minahas-a 

 was in head-hunting. The captured heads, they brought home in triumph, and this entry 

 was followed by banquet and dance. Small pieces of the slain foe were devoured. Cf. 

 Reisen in Celebes, vol. 1, p. 43. 1905. The natives on Kendari bay, in southeast Celebes, 

 say that if they did not take heads their crops would fail, and sickness would come. 

 Cf. ibid., vol. 1, p. 37'J. For head-hunting among the Tolokaki, see ibid., vol, 1, pp. 

 374—375. 



223 See also "The Wild Tribes of Davao District," p. Ill, where Cole gives a con- 

 tribution from Sibulan that throws light on this point. He says: "According to the 

 tales of the old men, it was formerly the custom to go on a raid before this ceremony 



11 



