I.THE EARLY PHILIPPINES
The Laguna Copperplate Inscription and its context (c. 900AD) Laguna Copperplate Inscription (circa 900 AD) Main article: Laguna Copperplate Inscription In 1989, Anton Posma
deciphered the text of the Laguna Copperplate Inscription at the National Museum of the Philippines and discovered that it identified the date of its creation as the "Year of Syaka 822, month of Vaisakha." According to Jyotisha (Hindu astronomy), this corresponded with the year 900 A.D. Prior to the deciphering of the LCI, Philippine history was traditionally considered to begin at 1521, with the arrival of Magellan and his chronicler, Antonio Pigafetta. History could not be derived from pre-colonial records because such records typically did not survive: most of the writing was done on perishable bamboo or leaves. Because the deciphering of the LCI made it out to be the earliest written record of the islands that would later become the Philippines, the LCI reset the traditional boundaries between Philippine history and prehistory, placing the demarcation line 600 years earlier.[1]
The inscription forgives the descendants of Namwaran from a debt of 926.4 grams of gold, and is granted by the chief of Tondo (an area in Manila) and the authorities of Paila, Binwangan and Pulilan, which are all locations in Luzon. The words are a mixture of Sanskrit, Old Malay, Old Javanese and Old Tagalog. The subject matter proves that a developed society existed in the Philippines prior to the Spanish colonization, as well as refuting earlier claims of the Philippines being a cultural isolate in Asia; the references to the Chief of Medang Kingdom in Indonesia imply that there were cultural and trade links with empires and territories in other parts of Maritime Southeast Asia, particularly Srivijaya. Thus, aside from clearly indicating the presence of writing and of written records at the time, the LCI effectively links the cultural developments in the Philippines at the time with the growth of a thalassocratic civilization in Southeast Asia.
Early Filipinos were good agriculturists. A report during the time of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi noted of the great abundance of rice, fowls, wine as well as great numbers of carabaos, deer, wild boar and goats in Luzon. In addition, there were also great quantities of cotton and colored clothes, wax, honey and date palms produced by the natives. In the Visayas, according to another early report, rice, cotton, swine, fowls, wax and honey abound. Leyte was said to produce two rice crops a year, and Pedro Chirino commented on the great rice and cotton harvests that were sufficient to feed and cloth the people
Duck culture was also practiced by the natives, particularly those around Pateros and Taguig City. This resembled the Chinese methods of artificial incubation of eggs and the knowledge of every phase of a duck's life. This tradition is carried on until modern times.
The Ifugaos of the mountainous region of the Cordilleras built irrigations, dams and hydraulic works and the famous Banaue Rice Terraces as a way for assisting in growing crops around 100
Source: wikipediainternalforum/PhilippineCulture.
deciphered the text of the Laguna Copperplate Inscription at the National Museum of the Philippines and discovered that it identified the date of its creation as the "Year of Syaka 822, month of Vaisakha." According to Jyotisha (Hindu astronomy), this corresponded with the year 900 A.D. Prior to the deciphering of the LCI, Philippine history was traditionally considered to begin at 1521, with the arrival of Magellan and his chronicler, Antonio Pigafetta. History could not be derived from pre-colonial records because such records typically did not survive: most of the writing was done on perishable bamboo or leaves. Because the deciphering of the LCI made it out to be the earliest written record of the islands that would later become the Philippines, the LCI reset the traditional boundaries between Philippine history and prehistory, placing the demarcation line 600 years earlier.[1]
The inscription forgives the descendants of Namwaran from a debt of 926.4 grams of gold, and is granted by the chief of Tondo (an area in Manila) and the authorities of Paila, Binwangan and Pulilan, which are all locations in Luzon. The words are a mixture of Sanskrit, Old Malay, Old Javanese and Old Tagalog. The subject matter proves that a developed society existed in the Philippines prior to the Spanish colonization, as well as refuting earlier claims of the Philippines being a cultural isolate in Asia; the references to the Chief of Medang Kingdom in Indonesia imply that there were cultural and trade links with empires and territories in other parts of Maritime Southeast Asia, particularly Srivijaya. Thus, aside from clearly indicating the presence of writing and of written records at the time, the LCI effectively links the cultural developments in the Philippines at the time with the growth of a thalassocratic civilization in Southeast Asia.
Early Filipinos were good agriculturists. A report during the time of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi noted of the great abundance of rice, fowls, wine as well as great numbers of carabaos, deer, wild boar and goats in Luzon. In addition, there were also great quantities of cotton and colored clothes, wax, honey and date palms produced by the natives. In the Visayas, according to another early report, rice, cotton, swine, fowls, wax and honey abound. Leyte was said to produce two rice crops a year, and Pedro Chirino commented on the great rice and cotton harvests that were sufficient to feed and cloth the people
Duck culture was also practiced by the natives, particularly those around Pateros and Taguig City. This resembled the Chinese methods of artificial incubation of eggs and the knowledge of every phase of a duck's life. This tradition is carried on until modern times.
The Ifugaos of the mountainous region of the Cordilleras built irrigations, dams and hydraulic works and the famous Banaue Rice Terraces as a way for assisting in growing crops around 100
Source: wikipediainternalforum/PhilippineCulture.