FILIPINO EPIC AND HOLE STORY WRite IN ENGLISH?

2 Comments

1. Maia Bo says:

   June 28, 2010 at 12:11 am

   LAM-ANG

   DEMIGOD

   The Iloko people still tell stories of their hero Lam-Ang, a symbol of strength and perseverance so pure that he was elevated into the ranks of godhood. Below is a short version of Ti Biag ni Lam-Ang, the epic story of this most unusual hero.

   Nine months before he was born to a noble family his father left for the mountains to defeat an evil tribe of Igorots. Unfortunately, he was beheaded, and his head was displayed at the center of the village as a prize. When the mother gave birth, she was surprised when the baby grew up instantly. Lam-Ang, as he was named, promised to find out what happened to his father by going up the mountains himself. There, helped by a good tribe of Igorots, he encountered the evil tribe and killed every last one of them as vengeance, just by using a single spear.

   When he returned home, he was so tired that he wanted to bathe. He dipped into the Amburayan river, which was instantly drenched in mud and blood. So filthy was the flow that the animals in the river crawled out and died on its shores.

   The following day he told his mother that he wanted to marry; using his supernatural abilities he predicted he would wed a woman named Ines who lived north in a small town named Kandon. On the way he encountered a stone giant who was burning the rice and tobacco plants. Using a silver shield he inherited he beheaded the giant and burned the body.

   Ines had a multitude of suitors, and they crowded her house in Kandon. So many were they that Lam-Ang had to step on their heads and walk through a window just to enter the house. Ines was immediately stricken by his strength that she agreed to marry him. But her parents were still skeptical: they needed a dowry from his parents in return for Ines’ hand. Lam-Ang agreed to return in a week, bringing his mother, as well as wealth and goods. Back in his town Lam-Ang prepared a gold gilded with gold, filled with fruit, jewels, statues and other amenities. When he sailed back to Kandon Ines’ family was stunned. The wedding was done on the spot.

   Three years later, Lam-Ang and Ines finally settled and gained a son. One day, Lam-Ang was stricken by a terrible nightmare: for the sake of his son, and the ancestors before him, he had to pass through an ancient ritual where he had to fish deep into the depths of the ocean for a golden shell. He would die for sure, but he prayed to the gods, and they gave him a sign of hope. He told Ines his predicament, as well as the omens of his death, and the rituals of his resurrection.

   The dreaded day finally came, and people gathered from all over to witness Lam-Ang dive for the golden shell. As soon as he dived, however, the Berkakan, the gargantuan dragon shark, emerged from the waters and gruesomely ate Lam-Ang. Back home, Ines witnessed the clay stove collapse, the ladder dance and their baby convulse: Lam-Ang was dead. Ines wept for three days before she had the courage to gather Lam-Ang’s bones, which were by then scattered along the shore. As per the rituals given to her by Lam-Ang before his death, she was to wrap them in red silk while she recited a few incantations. Returning home she ripped off a red silk curtain and wrapped the bones in them. Turning her back and whispering the incantations, she could here the bones reforming into a new body; in a few moments Lam-Ang returned back from the land of the dead. He, Ines and his baby were granted immortality, spending an eternal bliss in the rice fields of Elysium.
2. Pearl Fontilla says:

   January 20, 2011 at 4:00 pm

   Will somebody please guide me where to find a text of the tagalogs from Central Luzon, Quezon and Laguna? Don’t they have an oral folk tradition about epic exploits like those of the people of the North, Visayas, Bicol and Mindanao?

   At one time, there was this claim that Kumintang was an epic story but I have not seen a transcribed or annotated version of this KUMINTANG. Please help me. Thanks.