140 PEOPLES OF THE PHILIPPINES 
In Mindanao, the individual actually exercising 
sovereignty, no matter over how small a district, is the 
dato; whereas his sons, younger brothers, and collat- 
eral or lineal descendants of a former dato are timawa. 
Although not ruling, these are reckoned of the same 
nobility as the dato. The same system prevailed among 
the ancient Bisaya and Tagalog; except that here the 
term tumawa was applied to the common mass of free 
people as opposed to slaves. The Bisaya named their 
ruling class dato and the Tagalog maginoo. 
It is very evident from all this that one trait is and 
has been shared by all Filipinos, no matter what their 
general condition of civilization: society is classified 
into horizontal strata, differing in rank, honor, power, 
and due. The idea of lineage is very strongly developed, 
and even the most primitive native makes every effort 
to maintain the position in the world which his fathers 
occupied and to transmit it unimpaired to his descend- 
ants. This feeling is intensified by the preservation of 
genealogies. An Ifugao or Bontok that amounts to 
anything at all can always recount his ancestors on the 
mother’s as well as the father’s side for five or six genera- 
tions back. Among the Christians this faculty has 
perhaps become somewhat stunted, but before their 
conversion peoples like the Tagalog and Bisaya seem 
to have kept record of their family trees to an even 
greater extent. In fact, writing was employed by them 
chiefly for this purpose, the genealogies, after a few 
generations, being embroidered with fanciful legends 
and ultimately merged into more or less mythical ac- 
counts and tales of the origin of the world. The Span- 
iards who alluded to these traditions unfortunately have 
not preserved them, but their type is familiar from 
Malaysia and Polynesia generally. Among the Philip- 
pine Mohammedans the same tendency persists, 
