1600–1609 Chirino, Pedro. S.J. [1604] 1969.
Translated by R. Echevarria. Manila: Historical Conservation Society.
In the island of Panay I saw all the people that were following a funeral, immediately upon leaving the church after the service, like Jews go straight to the river for a bath, although they had no knowledge whatever of this obsolete law of the lost tribes of Israel. The island of Panay, as I have said, is in the province of the Pintados, within the diocese of Sebú. It has a coastline of a little over 100 leagues and is very pleasant and fertile, populated by very many Bisayans, who are white people. Among them however there are also some negroes, ancient inhabitants of the island who occupied it before the Bisayans did. They are a little less black and ugly than those of Guinea, smaller and frailer but in the hair and the beard perfectly similar. They are much more barbarous and wilder than the Bisayans and the other Filipinos, for they have no homes like these, nor any permanent settlement.
There is more than one language in the Philippines, and there is no single language that is spoken throughout the islands. In the island of Manila alone there are six different tongues, in that of Panay there are two, and in the others only one.
Of all these languages the one that I have found most satisfying and admirable is Tagalog, for as I have told the first Bishop and other persons of authority both here and there I have found in it four qualities from the four finest languages in the world, namely Hebrew, Greek, Latin and Spanish. From Hebrew, the intricacies and subtleties; from Greek, the articles, and the distinctions applied not only to common but also to proper nouns; from Latin, the fullness and elegance; and from Spanish, the good breeding and courtesy.
It is noted here that “This is one of the frequently quoted passages in discussing the merits of Tagalog [in connection to the National Language Question”
It seems extraordinary in this prayer [Ave Maria as translated by Chirino into Tagalog] that the first word, ABA, signifies greeting, like AVE in Latin.
“Bucor”(?) also is an unusual word, for it signifies diversity, distinction and singularity or uniqueness. The article is “si “
The other two languages of the Visayans have none of these refinements, or at least very little, being as they are coarser and less polished.
But their [Tagalogs] best manners are in their speech for they never address one as you, nor in the second person singular or plural, but always in the third: the master, the gentleman, will want this or that. There are many examples to be found of this form of address in the Sacred Scriptures and in holy books, but especially in the psalms. Between women particularly, though they be of equal status and average rank, the form of address is never less than my lord, my lady, and this after every important word: as I was coming, my lord, up the river, I saw, my lord, etc…, a pleasant and affectionate use of title and pronoun that is known even in the most solemn languages, which are the three most sacred, namely Hebrew, Greek and Latin.
They [the Tagalogs] are punctiliously courteous and affectionate in social intercourse and are fond of writing to one another with the utmost propriety and most delicate refinement.
The Bisayans are more artless and unpolished, as their language is more uncultivated and coarser. They do not have so many terms expressive of good breeding, as they had no writing before they adopted that of the Tagalogs many years ago.
Los Bisayas son más rústicos y llanos, como su lengua más bronca, y grosera. Notienen tantos términos de crianza, como ni tenían letras; pués las tomaron de lostagalos, bien pocos años há.
So accustomed are all these islanders to writing and reading that there is scarcely a man, and much less a woman, who cannot read and write in letters proper to the island of Manila, very different from those of China, Japan and India […]
[Son tán dados todos esto isleños á escribir y leer, que no hay casi hombre y muchomenos muger, que no lea y escriba en letras propias de la isla de Manila, diversísimasde las de China, Japón, y de la India […]
In spite of this [deletion of syllable-final consonants in the writing system] they understand and make themselves understood wonderfully well and without ambiguities: the reader easily and skilfully supplies the omitted consonants. They have taken after us to writing horizontally from left to right, but formerly they used to write from top to bottom putting the first vertical line on the left-hand side (if I remember well) and continuing towards the right, quite differently from the Chinese and Japanese who though they write from top to bottom proceed from the right hand side towards the left.
They wrote on bamboos or on palm leaves, using an iron point for a pen. Now they write not only their own letters, but ours as well, with a very well-cut pen and on paper like ourselves. They have learned our language and pronunciation and write it as well as we do, and even better, because they are so clever that they learn anything very quickly. I have brought home letters written by their hand in a very fine, flowing script. In Tigbauan I had a small boy in school who in three months, by copying letters that I received written in good script, learned to write much better than I, and translated important papers for me most accurately, without errors or falsehoods. But enough now of languages and letters, and let us return to our business of souls.
Of What was Done in Manila in the Year of 1596 and 97 As we have mentioned, courses in Latin Grammar and in Moral Theology were introduced in this college, and as customary both were inaugurated with solemn acts and learned discourses.
The Church [of Saint Anne, dedicated in 1596] itself, just recently completed, looked so handsome and attractive that no additional beautification would have been necessary; nevertheless, it was well adorned with tapestries and with numerous scrolls that we had inscribed in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Castilian and the Tagalog language and had posted up in three tiers along the main nave and distributed in other parts of the church.
[In Manila] Two priests who knew their language [Tagalog] at the time were there forenot enought to minister to them [for confession], even if they did so mornings and afternoons. I learned from some of them that they had been coming for more than tenor even twelve days and still had not been able to come to the feet of the confessor, because of the multitude of people.
On Sundays and holydays (sic), in the afternoon, during the sermons given in their own language […]
Another one [Indio], who possessed a book of a certain kind of poem which they call “golo”(might be related to the chinese mythological figure Zhang Guolao??), very pernicious because it expresses a deliberate pact with the devil, voluntarily gave it up for burning, which was done.
Not for any of these three things [the false belief in the divinity of their idols, of their priests and priestesses, of their sacrifices and superstitions] – nor for government and public order – did they make use of their letters, for as we have said they never used these except to correspond with one another.
They deal with the creation of the world and the beginning of the human lineage, with the deluge and, and with glory and grief and other intangible things, telling a thousand absurd stories and even altering their stories a great deal so that some tell it in one way and others in another. To show more clearly that these are all falsehoods and fables, one of them is that the first man and the first woman came out of a bamboo reed which burst from its grove, and that they thereupon engaged in a dispute as to the propriety of their marrying one another (due to the obstacle posed by the first degree of consanguinity, which among them is inviolable, although it was permitted in this single instance because of the need for propagating the human species).