
34 PEOPLES OF THE PHILIPPINES 
We have then before us a thoroughly separate and 
apparently ancient type of man which cannot possibly 
be regarded as a variety or modification of the race that 
constitutes the bulk of Philippine population. 
The Negrito lives in scattered bands in a variety of 
localities, but always in the forested mountains. Four 
or five of these regions are in Luzon, one in Mindanao, 
and one in Palawan. These groups often bear diverse 
appellations: thus the two last-mentioned are known as 
Mamanua and Batak, respectively. The name Aeta 
has often been applied to the Negritos as a whole; it is 
the designation given the race in the language of the 
Tagalog; but the Tagalog were acquainted with only a 
small proportion of the stock. 
The number of undoubted Negritos in the Philippines 
is probably between thirty and forty thousand. They 
constitute a small fraction of one percent of the total 
population of the islands. There are more Chinese im- 
migrants than survivors of this, the most primitive of 
the native races. 
The generally accepted theory that the Negrito origi- 
nally held all or most of the Philippines, is borne out by 
the fact that at the time of discovery he was more 
widely diffused than at present. The Bisayan island of 
Negros derives its name from having harbored a dis- 
tinetly black people, who can scarcely have been any- 
thing but Negritos. In its interior, as well as in the 
central mountains of the two other large Bisayan islands 
of Panay and Samar, there live today uncivilized people 
who have sometimes been described as Negritos, while 
other observers have classified them as rude Malaysians. 
The islands of Gimaras off Panay, and Polillo to the 
east of Luzon, also contain people in whom a distinct 
Negrito strain is probable. There are moreover groups 
insouthern Luzon that may or may not contain a Negrito 
