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Originally Posted by Dimasalang
I guess basically what I am trying to say is, everyone has a preference on how and what they want to learn. Me personally, I wanted to learn a traditional FMA...aside from just pure self defense on the street; I wanted to learn for the cultural heritage part. So obviously, a FMA school that changes with the times by adding this and that and does what every other martial art school is doing; that really is not for me. Hope that all made sense.  |
Yup, to each his own, and what you said makes a lot of sense. Thanks also for the summary of that book you mentioned.
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Originally Posted by Rick
We also remember that when the Spanish first took Manila there was a Moro Datu or Sultan there at the time. They might have been more than occasional raiders .
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Hello Rick. Yes, there were several Moro rajahs ruling Manila and environs then, when the Spaniards came during the mid- to late-1500s.
Islam was not as widespread then in northern Philippines (i.e., Luzon), like it was in the southern Phils. then (i.e., Sulu and Mindanao). And central Phils. (i.e., the Visayas) were the least influenced by Islam at that time.
Just to clarify the terms describing Phil. precolonial form of government --
Datu - the head of a barangay (pronounced buh-rung-GUY), which population consisted from just a few families, to several hundred persons; a barangay is run fairly independently vs. other barangays; thus a barangay is the basic political unit, and all of the Philippines' peoples then were organized in this manner.
Raja - a datu who was designated by his peers as the head of an alliance of several barangays; thus
Raja Sulaiman was one of the three rajas who ruled precolonial greater Manila then which consisted of many barangays.
Sultan - a sultan is the leader of a much larger geographical area, and there would be rajas and datus under the sultan (like in the sultanates of Sulu and Maguindanao, respectively).
Now on the Moro raids of old, they were done by southern Philippine Moros for two things -- (a) as an act of retribution against the incursion of Spaniards against their homeland (Sulu/Mindanao), and (b) as a means of boosting their rising local economy via the procurement of more manpower.
There were plenty of good and arable land everywhere. Thus conquest of territory did not make sense. It was the people who were the precious "commodities" -- thus, slave raiding was the sensible political and economic move.
As for the 16th century Luzon Moros, they were not engaged in raiding, as there were no Christians then to get irritated at
And perhaps the local population was able to support the Manila economy.
On a related matter, historians also say that the reason Luzon and Visayas fell easily to the colonizers was precisely because of the loose alliance amongst the barangays.
In the case of Sulu and Mindanao however, their higher level of political cohesiveness (via the sultanate) allowed them to resist the colonizers more effectively.