Mandaya hierarchy and rules of precedence takes a number of forms, some of which are embedded and expressed in social structural features which give rise to social activity, while others occur primarily at the conceptual level of cultural categories which embrace the idea of origin and the contrast between the centre and the periphery. Within the kinship system, terminological contrasts are made between the first born child and the last born, also elder siblings are contrasted to those who are younger. Relative age, by contrastive position, dominates within each generation as well as among kinsmen of preceding generations though it does not occur in generations younger than ego. Furthermore, relative age is the critical measure of precedence which is given social recognition through terms of address and reference as well as behavioural features such as respect and honour. Just as age is the dominant feature which establishes the critical contrastive categories in social life, gender differences are seldom if ever utilized as contrastive markers within each generation. Like other cases within the Austronesian cultural world as expressed in many insular southeast Asian societies, gender is seldom a primary differentiating feature in establishing contrasts between groups and individuals.
Mandaya principles of precedence as cultural categories are primarily linked to the idea of place which has a number of implications based on conceptions of origin, place, encompassment as well as political action. A sense of place means that certain particular locales, which are primary with regard to the origin of myths, are the focus and have precedence over other places and events. Traditionally, the Mandaya have also viewed their neighbours in this scheme of things.
Before the final breakdown of the warrior/chief complex (bagani) in the 1930s, Mandaya lands occupied most of what is now eastern Davao as well as the southern parts of Surigao. In the widest sense of place, this broad geographic region embraced all coastal lands westward to the cordillera and into the Maragosan valley. Some of the Mandaya in the Maragosan area called themselves Mansaka, but again this term implies a particular place. The land was divided by riverine valleys which emptied into the Pacific Ocean on the east and by interior valleys encompassed by high mountains which divided one valley from another. It is difficult to assess just how much knowledge individuals possessed regarding the whole of Mandayaland; however, it does appear that groups had a strong sense of place as it related to the domains which were the ancestral lands of particular bagani as a warrior class. These domains embraced individual households, small hamlets and nondiscrete communities composed of hamlets which had spatial proximity to one another. Each domain was circumscribed by a mountain ridge or rivers which were natural barriers setting one domain off from another. Furthermore, most of these domains were primarily endogamous in that individuals would marry within the domains. Endogamy was not simply an expression of geographic confines, for in most cases the domains as named localities were genealogically and ancestrally linked to a famous bagani from past generations.
Garvan (1931:203) describes the Manobo bagani as a priest of war and blood, whose main role is the sacrifice of captives in war. The Mandaya bagani appears not to have religious or supernatural functions and can not be described as a warrior priest. Although captives taken during the head-hunting raids were sacrificed by the bagani, such behaviour did not deal with any supernatural phenomena or interpretation since the sacrifice was made to avenge the death of a cohort or to obtain powers, courage and ability of a brave opponent warrior whose heart was removed and eaten by the bagani and his warriors (maniklad). Although a bagani might be assisted by certain spirits, the primary aim in taking captives was not to fulfil the dictums of his supernatural guides.
The requirements in becoming a bagani consisted of personal valour, fortitude, physical strength, and being the son of a former bagani, but above all a certain amount of charisma, the ability to gain the respect of your following in terms of leadership and the possessing of personal qualities which one’s constituency values in personality behaviour. Each bagani, before assuming the title and role, had to kill seven to nine men in battle or through surprise raids upon neighbouring areas. The number of required killings varied from locality to locality since Garvan (1931:142) notes that five lives were the necessary amount among the Manobo while Cole (1913:180-181) state, that the Mayo Bay Mandaya bagani took ten or twelve lives while among the Mansaka near Piso, King-king one needed thirty killings before being acclaimed a bagani. Furthermore, in upper Manay only adult males were accredited to the bagani killing record while the Mayo Bay Mandaya and the Mansaka attributed no attention to sex and age. Each bagani had his domain of political authority where his rule was law; however, the exact dimensions of one’s domain were not always the same during his lifetime or that of his successor. The acquiring and possessing of suitable primary forest for a bagani following was important, thus borders gradually shifted; however, the territory which a bagani extended his authority over was usually recognized as the collective historical area of its inhabitants.
The bagani were distinguished from other warriors and commoners by their clothing which was a tight-fitting two-piece abaca-woven suit of dark red, maroon and black colours with embroidered designs. A turban-like headpiece was also worn. Although each bagani had autonomous rule, his behaviour and actions were occasionally curtailed by the sanctions of public opinion as manifested through his advisory council. The advisory council (in some localities in upper Manay this council was referred to as the angtutukay; however, this term was not familiar in all areas) was composed of a few old men of the bagani domain whose judgment and integrity were respected by the commoners and the people.
If the claims which one demanded were justifiable or if a bagani desired to lead a raid, the warriors (maniklad) were called together to initiate preparations for the raid. A commoner of extraordinary valour and strength could become a maniklad by taking three lives. Maniklad uniforms were similar to a bagani though only one-half of the body was covered by the red maroon and black suit. The average size of an attacking force was composed of forty to forty-five men, with the range extending from twenty-five to sixty. However, in all cases, size of a potential warrior group varied with the number of people under the bagani jurisdiction. The raiding party was not always composed of bagani and maniklad since able-bodied commoners were temporarily enlisted if the object of the raid required a large force of men. Warriors were only armed with spears, shields (kasag) and daggers; however, in special cases and in limited areas slat armour of iron or highly polished hardwood such as Narra or Kamagong were used. If the individual sought lived within the bagani domain, he was taken alive, charged with his crime and if judged guilty was killed and beheaded. The bagani would take the victim’s wife or wives’ children, concubines and slaves for himself along with agongs and any piece of pinggan (Chinese trade ware), while the warriors and the accuser would divide the remainder of the belongings which in most cases were quite limited and provided little for each warrior. Raids were conducted at dawn when the warrior group surrounded the house of the one sought as part of the vendetta. If the dwelling was not accessible by ladder, the nipa or anahaw roof was set afire thus driving the inhabitants out of the burning dwelling. Children and women were taken captive while the men were beheaded. If the person sought was captured alive, he was taken to the bagani settlement and ritually sacrificed.
Unlike the longhouses of Borneo or the elaborate datu dwellings found in the eastern Bisayan Islands during the seventeenth century, the bagani quarters were not much larger than any other ordinary dwelling. The only diagnostic mark of a bagani settlement was the number of compartments in each house which were divided by split bamboo walls. Each apartment was the living quarters of a wife or concubine of the bagani, which usually ranged from nine to twelve women per warrior chief. Bagani settlements were usually in the centre of the domain or in a location in which followers and warriors could easily gather for raiding preparation.
Each bagani had his lands cultivated by slaves or labour-service from his followers who furnished the subsistence needs for the bagani and his families. In turn the bagani protected his followers from inter- and extra-territorial raids as well as administering law, justice and order within his domain. When harvests failed or labour-service was not adequate to cultivate all bagani lands, tribute in the form of food staples was collected from each household head in accordance with the amount of land one had cultivated and the number of dependents each cultivator had.
The inheritance of the bagani title was not automatic in the sense that a successor gained the position solely by his genealogical relationship, nor is it possible to describe the succession as “no heredity chieftainship” which Garvan (1931:140) denotes for the Manobo. Bagani succession among the Mandaya was semi-structured on a genealogical basis, though one was required to fulfil the conditions before acquiring the title. If a bagani died of natural causes or was killed in battle, his council of advisers selected the cleverest of his sons from his first wife. After selection, the bagani “protem” had to kill the required number of men as well as learn the use of authority and leadership among his followers. If the requirements were not fulfilled or if the advisers recognized that the one selected was unable to wield authority and/or lacked personality, features which were a necessity for effective leadership, another son of the first wife was chosen. Upon selection of the new bagani candidate, the angtutukay pressured the first nominee to withdraw by renouncing his claim to the title; however, cases have occurred where two brothers claiming the title would gather their supporters and fight for the position or for the creation of two domains within the original one. If warfare came about between competing siblings and the one who was forced to vacate his earlier claim by the angtutukay won the battle, the victor imprisoned the angtutukay until order was again restored within the domain. Upon selection of a new council, the bagani and his advisers held a “mock” trial in which the former angtutukay were killed or severely tortured for their disloyalty.
Upon the death of a bagani, the successor inherited all secondary wives and concubines while the deceased bagani’s first wife took all other possessions. If the transformation from the deceased bagani to his successor was smooth and without sibling rivalry, the succeeding son usually retained his father’s angtutukay. When an adviser died the bagani chose his successor from the sons of the deceased or another person who possessed the necessary qualifications.
The angtutukay was composed of two to five men depending on the size of the bagani domain and the number of inhabitants; however, three advisers per bagani was the average. Advisers could not request tribute to labour-service nor did they partake in the partitioning of material gains acquired through interterritorial raids. Within an area, each angtutukay was highly respected for his wisdom and sense of reason, but above all for their age since advisory councils usually consisted of older men within the bagani jurisdiction. The angtutukay functioned as middle men who transmitted grievances of the commoners to the bagani, thus they also provided the only effective internal means of checking the authority and actions of the warrior chief since decision-making and political power were vested in the bagani. The most effective check on bagani authority came from external sources such as the power, size and mobility of the neighbouring bagani forces since seldom would a bagani risk an attack on a stronger neighbour if his motives had no justification.
Although the roles and functions of the bagani may appear quite structured, in actuality the acquiring of the position required strong personal qualities and charisma. All bagani were claimed to be immune to death by killing due to the powerful anting-anting (charm) they possessed to escape death in battle. Informants have noted cases where a bagani was stabbed in the back, but returned to his settlement without a trace of blood. It is claimed that anyone who became bagani had strong anting-anting, but if a bagani was killed in battle his anting-anting was weak and he deserved to die.
The bagani complex was not only a framework of warfare and political entourage, it also represented a statement of mythic existence. Throughout the various domains in upper Manay and Cateel, cosmological centres coexisted with the political structure as an expression in which mythic origin legends (which have their genesis in the sky) are established as part of a sacred and revered landscape (Yengoyan 1985). These centres of sacred power exist in the form of particular environmental features which possess darkness as a common feature. Thus, centres exist in deep dark standing pools of water or in bud-bud (banyan) trees which are known for their dark, almost mysterious properties.
Each of these various mythic and cosmological centres provide the essential linkages with the sky on one side and the underworld on the other. Although the Mandaya do not possess full-time spiritual custodians, the bagani and his entourage was responsible for maintaining the sacredness of these spiritual localities by performing necessary rituals at these sites, by protecting banyans from being destroyed, and by curtailing all sites from outsiders who were not part of their domain.
Thus the domains provided the widest discrete unit in which all political and ritual activities occurred within specified calendrical time sequences. In earlier times, the bagani would lead raids on neighbouring Mandaya populations from adjacent and extra-adjacent units. When the Spanish arrived on the coast in the 1850s, missions were established in small settlements such as Baganga, Cateel and Manay. From the Jesuit cartas after 1860, we are provided vivid accounts of raids by bagani warriors which appear to be larger in terms of what can be established as the normal pattern of raiding. The size and scope of the raiding parties indicates that a number of bagani joined together as a means of mobilizing powerful forces against the Spanish forts and churches. However, the raiding size of these parties (which in some cases are noted as over 400 warriors) might have been exaggerations, consciously created, by Spanish administrators and clergy as a means of securing more resources for their local endeavours which were always limited by logistical factors.
Besides the hamlet-community, pattern and the bagani domains, the broadest scope of encompassment embraced the interior Mangguangan who, as noted earlier, the Mandaya raided for “slaves”. Young female slaves eventually married within the Mandaya and within a generation the roots of one’s slave background virtually evaporated. The Mangguangan represented the third and last tier of encompassment from the various bagani domains. In the Mandaya sense of place, the Mangguangan had an existence and after the 1850s, the coastal Spanish were encompassed as a threat although the Spanish themselves seldom penetrated into the upper foothills or interiors. After 1900, the American colonial system established seats of local government in these towns and the Catholic missions no longer had a political structure to render assistance. Furthermore, the colonial administration through forcible means attempted to curtail the warring complex and by the 1930s, the days of the bagani were past.
However, the historical basis of the adventures of the bagani starts anew through the veneration of ancient activities of war, conflict and strength through a re-metaphorization of these deeds in oral tradition which becomes the major vehicle of the mythic past. The myth of each individual bagani is different, for each deed and venturesome behaviour of the bagani is codified in the landscape as markers and testimony to a glorious past in which history becomes living myth. Origins based on deeds of past warriors and nobles are always perpetuated through ritual, but the rituals can only take place in the exact location where the bagani maintained themselves as the centre of their activities. There are many different centres throughout time, but each of the centres can be characterized by a sense of scale in which external forces impinge on the traditional domain. Distinctions like interior/exterior are only meaningful when understood through a historical perspective which has permitted domains to expand and curtail their scope of influence.
Hierarchy as a cultural logic is premised on the idea of precedence which provides primacy to mythic places as expressed in local territories, bagani domains, and eventually extensions to other cultural groups such as the Mangguangan, coastal Spanish in the nineteenth century, and an insipid colonial administration after 1900. Precedence based on heroic and mythic centres establishes the broadest confines for signifying the role of place and locality within a scheme of social, political and economic forces. In the past two decades, the centrality of place(s) which are the foundations of origin, myth and the bagani complex, are now considered as the interior, the heartland which provides the emotional sustenance to what the Mandaya consider as their past in its present expression. As one moves from the centre(s) a sense of borderlands emerge, as areas and places which are divorced from cultural symbols and historical meaning, these are the areas which are now contested with the encroaching Bisayans from the coastal areas. The periphery is fuzzy and undefined, but the contestation means that Bisayans armed with legal documents and a political semi-state apparatus have little or no respect for traditional Mandaya lands and culture. The conflict situation peaked in the middle 1970s, but by the late 1970s, most areas in the foothills were controlled by the NPA (National People’s Army) who gradually forced the Philippine army to retreat which in turn forced out the commercial loggers and hemp interests who no longer had a military infrastructure to support their activities.
In summary, Mandaya hierarchy based on a scheme of places which have different roles in terms of myth, origin and centrality emerges both in the kinship structure in contrasting between first born/last born and through generational terms which are metaphorically linked to the body where the grandparental generation is combined with the sole of the foot while the parental generation is the heart. As a cultural logic, precedence provides the historical existence, but within the social/kinship framework hierarchical principles are always juxtaposed to a strong egalitarianism which pervades the interaction between individuals, households and hamlets.