Mythologies of the Ilocano People

The Ilocanos (Ilocano: Tattao nga Iloko/Ilokano), Ilokanos, or Iloko people are the third largest Filipino ethnolinguistic group. They mostly reside within the Ilocos Region, in the northwestern seaboard of Luzon, Philippines. The native language of the Ilocano people is the Ilocano (or Ilokano) language. Historically, Ilocanos have an elaborate network of beliefs and social practices. The Ilocano diaspora spans nearly all parts of the Philippines, as well as places in the Western world, particularly Hawaii and California. Emigration was caused by dense population pressures in a region with limited agricultural potential. The Ilocos Region is one of the most densely populated regions in the Philippines. Agricultural production is not sufficient to meet local needs, thus, much of the population historically went into the labor market and interregional trade. Tobacco is the leading cash crop of the Ilocano people. The textile industry in the area has a long tradition, while fishing is second only to agricultural production.

Ilocano, third largest ethnolinguistic group in the Philippines. When discovered by the Spanish in the 16th century, they occupied the narrow coastal plain of northwestern Luzon, known as the Ilocos region. The growth of their population later led to much migration to neighbouring provinces, to the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, and to Hawaii. Their language is closely related to others of northern Luzon, all of which belong to the Austronesian (Malayo-Polynesian) family of languages. In the early 21st century the Ilocano (Iloko) language was spoken by roughly 10 million people. The major Ilocano provinces, Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, and La Union, are among the most densely populated areas in the Philippines. Rice is the staple crop, grown on small fields and irrigated by rainfall during the rainy season. Vegetables and pigs, goats, and chickens are also raised. Tobacco is an important cash crop. Many Ilocano supplement their incomes by wage work or handicrafts. The wealthier families generally reside in the cities and towns. Marriages are usually arranged so as to maintain class lines, the husband’s family providing the sabong, or dowry of land. Most of the people are Roman Catholic.

The narrow northwestern coast of Luzon directly facing the West Philippine Sea is the native domain of the Ilocano. Prior to the coming of the Spaniards, the coastal inhabitants were called Iloko, which derives from the prefix i, meaning “people of,” and lokong, referring to the low-lying terrain (Alvarez 1969, 143-149). The Iloko, therefore, are “people who dwell in the lowland,” as opposed to the Igolot who are people of the gulot or mountains, specifically the Cordillera mountain range. Ilocano is the Hispanized adaptation of the original name. Iluko refers to the language of the Ilocano. The geographic depression of the Ilocos region is largely due to the hilly feature of the landscape hemmed in by the peaks of the Malaya range that merges with the higher ridges of the Gran Cordillera Central. The topography of Ilocos projects the appearance of a series of salad bowls rimmed by rolling hills on a cramped table. Being contained in a relatively bare coast, the region is vulnerable to extreme climatic changes. During the dry spell, the land is particularly parched because the eastern ridges prevent the inflow of wind and precipitation from the eastern valleys and uplands. This coastal region combines starkly contrasting terrains. At its southern sprawl in Pangasinan are fertile alluvial flats that extend from the coast of Lingayen Gulf to the foothills of the Cordillera and the Caraballo Sur mountains. La Union and Ilocos Sur towns alternate between hilly and flatland. Ilocos Norte landscape interweaves alluvial plains, hillocks, and deserts; but toward the northern tip, in Pagudpud, the wooded mountains tower directly over the large area situated in the hinterlands occupied by other cultural minorities who have been, to a large extent, acculturated to the Ilocano lifeways.

When the Spanish first encountered them in 1572, the inhabitants of Ilocos (then called "Samtoy") were living in large villages at sheltered coves or river mouths and were trading with the Chinese and Japanese. Although massive churches in a distinctive style give evidence of Spanish-Ilocano collaboration, the colonial period was marked by frequent revolts; the most famous of these was that led by Diego and Gabriela Silang during the British occupation of Manila in 1762–63. Ilocanos were prominent in the nationalist movement, and many have risen to high office in the central government. The greatest of these Ilocano success stories was President Ferdinand Marcos, who ruled for 20 years. During this time, development funds poured into the Ilocos region. The three provinces of the Ilocano homeland (Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, and La Union) stretch from Cape Bojeador at the northwestern tip of Luzon down to the Gulf of Lingayen. Most of the population is concentrated along a narrow coastal plain that has only a few good harbors. This environment yields sustenance only with difficulty, forcing Ilocanos to be hard working and thrifty and very often compelling them to seek employment outside from their homeland. According to the 2000 census, Ilocanos numbered 6.89 million (9% of the national population). Among all Filipino ethno-linguistic groups, the Ilocanos are the most famed as migrants, settling since the 19th century in sparsely populated expanses of the northern Central Plain of Luzon (provinces of Pangasinan, Tarlac, and Nueva Ecija) and of the Cagayan Valley in the northeast. In addition, many Ilocanos have established themselves in Manila and other major cities of the country, as well as in frontier lands on Mindanao. In 2000, Ilocanos were the majority group in the Ilocos region at 66.36%. They were the largest single ethnic group in the Cordillera Administrative Region, 39.83% of the population, twice the largest indigenous group, the Kankanay, and formed 11.48% of the population of Central Luzon, with 40.9% in Tarlac, almost as numerous there as Kapampangan, and 19.3% in Nueva Ecija. In Southern Mindanao, Ilocanos formed 11.48% of the population (as high as 17.7% in Sultan Kudarat).

The Ilocano (Ilokano) people who live in the northwestern region of Luzon have grown into several various communities, making them the third-largest ethnolinguistic group in the Philippines. As the ethnic population grew, they migrated to different parts of Luzon. Presently, there are Ilocano communities in Abra, Benguet, Cagayan, La Union, Nueva Vizcaya, Pangasinan, and Tarlac. Aside from nearby regions, Ilocanos have migrated south to various parts of the Philippines, even up to Mindanao. However, their people’s growth and migration did not stop there. The Ilocanos also became the first ethnic group from the Philippines that emigrated in large numbers to North America. Notably, they have communities in Alaska, California, the Pacific Northwest, and Hawaii. With the people’s growing population in various locations, it is no wonder that Ilocano culture and language have found new homes as they are shared continuously by the members of the communities.

Ilocano (also Ilokano; /iːloʊˈkɑːnoʊ/; Ilocano: Pagsasao nga Ilokano) is an Austronesian language spoken in the Philippines, primarily by Ilocano people and as a lingua franca by the Igorot people and also by the native settlers of Cagayan Valley. It is the third most-spoken native language in the country. As an Austronesian language, it is related to Malay (Indonesian and Malaysian), Tetum, Chamorro, Fijian, Māori, Hawaiian, Samoan, Tahitian, Paiwan, and Malagasy. It is closely related to some of the other Austronesian languages of Northern Luzon, and has slight mutual intelligibility with the Balangao language and the eastern dialects of the Bontoc language. The Ilokano people had their indigenous writing system and script known as kur-itan. There have been proposals to revive the kur-itan script by teaching it in Ilokano-majority public and private schools in Ilocos Norte and Ilocos Sur. Ilocano, like all Philippine languages, is an Austronesian language, a very expansive language family believed to originate in Taiwan. Ilocano comprises its own branch within the Philippine Cordilleran language subfamily. It is spoken as a first language by seven million people. A lingua franca of Northern Luzon and many parts of Central Luzon, it is spoken as a secondary language by more than two million people who are native speakers of Ibanag, Ivatan, Pangasinan, Sambal, and other local languages.

Ilocano is a member of the Northern Luzon branch of the Malayo-Polynesian language family. It is spoken mainly in the Philippines, particularly in the Ilocos and Cagayan Valley regions of northern Luzon, and also in parts of central Luzon, Mindoro and southern Mindanao. It is officially recognized as a provincial language, along with Filipino and English, in La Union province in the Ilocos region of Luzon, and recognized as an auxiliary offical language in other regions where it is spoken. Ilocano is the third most spoken language in the Philippines with 11 million speakers in 2015, including 9.1 million native speakers [source]. There are also about 85,000 Ilocano speakers in the USA, mainly in Hawaii, and 26,000 in Canada. Ilocano has been used as a medium of instruction in Philippine schools since 1897. It is currently used as such in schools in the Ilocos and Cordilleras region until grade 3. The language is also known as Ilokano, Iloko, Iluko or Iloco. Native names for the language include Ilokano and Pagsasao nga Ilokano. The Ilocano people call themselves Samtoy, a contraction from the Ilocano phrase saö mi ditoy, meaning "our language here". Ilocano was first written with a version of the Baybayin script known as Kur-itan or Kurdita. This was gradually replaced by the Latin alphabet the Spanish arrived in the Philippines in the 16th century. One of the first publications in Iloko was the Doctrina Cristiana of 1621. Several ways to write Ilocano with the Latin alphabet were devised, based either on Spanish spelling or Tagalog spelling. The Spanish-based spelling is preferred by most of the older generation. Recently there have been proposals to teach the Kur-itan script in schools in the Ilocos region where Ilocano speakers are in the majority.

The Ilocanos (Ilocano: Tattao nga Iloko/Ilokano), Ilokanos, or Iloko people are the third largest Filipino ethnolinguistic group and mostly reside within the Ilocos Region in the northwestern seaboard of Luzon, Philippines. The native language of the Ilocano people is the Ilocano (or Ilokano) language. Historically, the Ilocano people have developed a near-stereotypical reputation among Filipinos of resourcefulness, frugality and industriousness, their resilience likely stemming from their geographical location and extreme weather patterns, and their high average savings rate in the Ilocos Region throughout the years. Ilocanos have an elaborate network of beliefs and social practices. The Ilocano diaspora has reached nearly all parts of the Philippines, as well as to places in the Western world, particularly Hawaii and California. Emigration was caused by dense population pressures in a land with limited agricultural potential. The Ilocos Region is one of the most densely populated regions in the country. Agricultural production is not sufficient to meet local needs, thus, much of the population historically went into the labor market and interregional trade. Tobacco is the leading cash crop of the Ilocano people. The textile industry in the area has a long tradition. Fishing is second only to agricultural production. Among the more dominant of the ethnic groups, Ilocanos have figured prominently in the political, educational, economic, religious, and other sectors of Philippine society. Intensely regionalistic like most of the other major groups, the Ilocano people generally take pride in their roots and language.

Ilocano, sometimes spelled Ilokano, is a language native to the Philippines. It is part of the Austronesian language family, which includes Hawaiian, Maori, Indonesian, Tahitian, and more. Ilocano is the third most common language spoken in the Philippines, and has some mutual intelligibility with a few other languages on the islands. It became an official provincial language of La Union in 2012, though the national language of the Republic of the Philippines is (and was) Filipino. The ethnic group that speaks Ilocano is known as the Ilocano people, and they originally lived in the north of Luzon, the largest island of the Philippines. Nowadays, Ilocano people can be found in Central Luzon as well, and all over the world due to immigration. Here are a few important facts about Ilocano and those who speak it. If you know a bit about the Philippines, you would probably know that Filipino is the national language, but that doesn’t mean it’s the only language spoken there. If you come across any Filipino immigrants who arrived any time in the past century, they probably speak Filipino or Tagalog, but that wasn’t always the case. The Ilocano people of northern Luzon were some of the first Filipinos to immigrate to the U.S., bringing their language and culture with them to Hawaii, California, and other parts of the western U.S. In fact, most of the immigrants in the first wave of immigration from the Philippines to the U.S. spoke Ilocano.

Biag ni Lam-ang ('The Life of Lam-ang') is an epic story of the Ilocano people from the Ilocos region of the Philippines. It is notable for being the first Philippine folk epic to be recorded in written form, and was one of only two folk epics documented during the Philippines' Spanish Colonial period, along with the Bicolano epic of Handiong. It is also noted for being a folk epic from a "Christianized" lowland people group (the Ilocano people), with elements incorporated into the storytelling. As oral literature, the poem is believed to have originated in pre-colonial times, evolving as it is passed on from poet to poet and generation to generation. The poem's first transcription is sometimes attributed to the blind Ilocano poet-preacher Pedro Bucaneg, but historian E. Arsenio Manuel instead attributes its first written documentation to Fr. Blanco of Narvacan, working with the publicist and folklorist Isabelo de los Reyes.