d by Ilokano
men with Igorot or half-breed wives. There also were the Spanish
Government buildings, reduced to a church, a convent, and another
building used now as headquarters for the Government Constabulary.
The pueblo, now 2,000 or 2,500 people, was probably at one time
larger. There is a tradition common in both Bontoc and Samoki that
in former years the ancestors of this latter pueblo lived northeast
of Bontoc toward the northern corner of the pocket. They say they
moved to the opposite side of the river because there they would
have more room. There they have grown to 1,200 or 1,500 souls. Still
later, but yet before the Spanish came, a large section of people
from northeastern Bontoc moved bodily to Lias, about two days to the
east. They tell that a Bontoc woman named Fank'-a was the wife of a
Lias man, and when a drought and famine visited Bontoc the section
of the pueblo from which she came moved as a whole to Lias, then a
small collection of people. Still later, La'-nao, a detached section
of Bontoc on the lowland near the river, was suddenly wiped out by
a disease.
The Igorot is given to naming even small areas of the earth within
his well-known habitat, and there are four areas in Bontoc pueblo
having distinct names. These names in no way refer to political or
social divisions -- they are not the "barrio" of the coast pueblos of
the Islands, neither are they in any way like a "ward" in an American
city, nor are they "additions" to an original part of the pueblo --
they are names of geographic areas over which the pueblo was built
or has spread. From south to north these areas are A-fu', Mag-e'-o,
Dao'-wi, and Um-feg'.
Ato
Bontoc is composed of seventeen political divisions, called
"a'-to." The geographic area of A-fu' contains four a'-to, namely,
Fa-tay'-yan, Po-lup-o', Am-ka'-wa, and Bu-yay'-yeng; Mag-e'-o contains
three, namely, Fi'-lig, Mag-e'-o, and Cha-kong'; Dao'-wi has six,
namely, Lo-wing'-an, Pud-pud-chog', Si-pa'-at, Si-gi-chan', So-mo-wan',
and Long-foy'; Um-feg' has four, Po-ki'-san, Lu-wa'-kan, Ung-kan',
and Cho'-ko. Each a'-to is a separate political division. It has
its public buildings; has a separate governing council which makes
peace, challenges to war, and accepts or rejects war challenges,
and it formally releases and adopts men who change residence from
one a'-to to another.
Border a'-to Fa-tay'-yan seems to be developing an offspring -- a
new a'-to; a part of it, the so
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