philippine studies

Origins of the Philippine Languages

Philippine Studies

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Origins of the Philippine
Languages
CEClLlO LOPEZ

1. Introduction. In the Philippines there are about 70

languages and in Malayo-Polynesia about 500. To say some-
thing about unity and diversity among these many languages
and about our evidence for their Malayo-Polynesian source is
not an easy task, particularly when it must be done briefly and
for readers without the requisite linguistic sophistication. For
the purposes of this paper, therefore, the best I can do is to
explain some representative phenomena, making the presenta-
tion as simple as I possibly can.
In determining similarities and diversitiea between lan-
guages, comparison based on any one of four levels may be
used: phonology, morphology, syntax, or vocabulary. The ap-
proach using all the four levels is undoubtedly the mast re-
liable, particularly if it fulfills the following conditions: exhaus-
tiveness of coverage, simplicity of exposition, and elegance of
form. So far as I know, no comparative study of a group of
cognate languages has ever been written which fulfills all these
conditions.
The favorite hunting ground of linguists is phonology-
which includes vocabulary-because vocabulary items are com-
paratively easy t o collect and are subject to rigorous treat-
ment. In MP languages quite extensive studies have been
carried out in phonology, but those in morphology and syn-
 LOPEZ: PHILIPPINE LANGUAGES 131
tax have been rather scanty.' It is not surprising, therefore,
that in this paper my discussion of phonology is more detailed
than that of morphology and syntax. Most of the materials
I use will be those of my own collection, supplemented by other
sourc~~.~
To trace the Philippine languages back to MP and other
sources is to get involved in the problems of origin, a subject
clouded in the mists of prehistory. The discovery of origins is
not easy, as one knows who has made the attempt. Because
of the pressures of technology and progress, the modem man
tends to think in terms of patterns and processes and not con-
cern himself with origins. Yet since man is the only member
of creation who can concern himself with the ideas and events
of the past, I shall run the risk of being labeled old-fashioned
if thereby I am also more properly human.
The MP world, according to the older school of anthropol-
ogists, was peopled by migration(s) from west to east, from
the Asian mainland into the Pacific. One theory asserts that
the river regions of western China and the borders of Tibet
were the original home of Indonesian (Proto-Malay and Deu-
tero-Malay) culture, and also the home of early Indian cul-
ture. In migrating southward from this homeland, the streams
of migration bifurcated, one branching westward into India
and the other into Indo-China and Indonesia. The latter
branch then spread northward to the Philippines and Formosa
and eastward across the Pacific, where it formed an essential
part of the Polynesian population. These migrations were not
to be interpreted in the strict meaning of the word. They
were quite probably slow, long and drawn-out movements, ac-
companied by some assimilation along the way, with the earlier
migrants pushed by the later, by mixture of languages and
cultures, or even by imperfect adoption of ;the language of
one group by the other. According to another theory, there
are evidences of waves and periods of migration originating
1 Abbreviations and symbols used in this paper are listed after
the text.
2 I have not attempted detailed documentation; however, the most
important sources are listed in the bibliography.
132 PHILIPPINE STUDIES
from somewhat different locations in southeastern Asia. In
the Philippines, the diversity of the peoplea indicates that most
of the groups have been occupying the same regions for some
time, with limited intercourse with the outside world, inter-
rupted occasionally by sporadic movements.
Like many anthropologists, linguists of the older school
point to Indonesia as the original home of the Polynesians,
and hold that in a series of eastward migrations the early Indo-
nesians left traces of their languages among the Melanesian-
speaking peoples through whose regions they passed.
Some younger linguists, and some ethnologists and archeol-
ogists consulting the linguistic evidence, entertain different
views. One view holds that the original speakers of MP were
the remote ancestors of the present Polynesians, that the first
great movement of this sea-faring people was into Indo-
nesia. (This calls to mind Bowring's mention of Father Zuiliga's
observation "that the peoples of the Philippines were originally
colonized by the inhabitants of America.") Another claims
that the place of origin of the MP peoples is rather to be
sought between Formosa and Hainan. The assumption is ques-
tioned that everything in the Pacific region came out of South-
east Asia (or south China) with nothing going back. New
Guinea, Australia, and the larger islands of Melanesia, to be
sure, were originally peopled from Southeast Asia, but initial
settlement occurred long before the emergence of the MP lan-
guages as a distinct family. Once these areas were settled,
there is no reason why they could not have become centers of
cultural development or a source of movement westward into
Indonesia and Southeast Asia. The great diversity of languages
in Melanesia is an argument advanced in favor of that area
as the springboard of MP languages; this proceeds on the as-
sumption that the whole of a large number of groups of peo-
ple is not likely to migrate as a collection of distinct groups.
On the other hand, the languages of western Indonesia and
most, if not all, of the languages of the Philippines, constitute
a single group. I t is in the framework of these conflicting theo-
ries that I will present some linguistic evidence.
2. Similarities and diversities among Philippine languages.