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[av_heading heading=’Animism enmeshed in Ati-Atihan and Dinagyang’ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=” av-medium-font-size-title=” av-small-font-size-title=” av-mini-font-size-title=” av-medium-font-size=” av-small-font-size=” av-mini-font-size=” admin_preview_bg=”]
BY HERBERT VEGO
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January 21, 2018
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TODAY, all roads lead to Kalibo, Aklan for the Ati-Atihan Festival. Ati-atihan literally means “to be like Ati,” referring to our black ancestors. Sooted natives and visitors alike – some holding the image of the Santo Niño – are welcome to walk around in peculiar foot-dragging steps called sadsad while shouting “Hala bira! Puera pasma!”
Next Sunday, it will be Iloilo City’s turn to host its improved version, the Dinagyang Festival, showcasing choreographed dances among competing Ati tribes (more or less a dozen).
The age of Ati-Atihan is lost to history. Even the old Aklanons could not recall how it began. Some believe that Kalibo was not the first venue of the festival but another Aklan town, Ibajay.
The image of the Santo Niño has substituted the original anito image that symbolized the spirit of the dead in pre-Christian Philippines. Our ancestors believed in animism, a belief that a soul or spirit exists even in inanimate objects.
Legend has it that the upland Atis of yore were struggling with famine due to bad harvest. They were forced to descend into lowland to ask for food from the datu. Grateful, they danced and sang for the chieftain and his family.
Both the Ati-Atihan and Dinagyang harken back to an Ilonggo history book, the Maragtas, as written by Pedro Monteclaro in 1929. It chronicles the journey of 10 Bornean datus – Puti, Sumakwel, Paiburong, Bangkaya, Parohinog, Lubay, Dumangsil, Dumangsol, Dumalugdog, and Balensuela – who sailed on boats all the way from Borneo to Panay (exact location contested) to escape the tyranny of Sultan Makatunaw in 1212.
Upon the arrival of the datus, the local inhabitants grew terrified but Datu Puti assured Marikudo, the chief of the natives, that they had peaceful intentions. Later, both parties entered into what is now known as the “barter of Panay” – the lowland in exchange for a golden salakot and a gold necklace.
The “tribal wars” dramatized in Dinagyang, therefore, could not have happened. And the Atis at that time could not have shouted “Viva Señor Santo Niño!” because they were still 300 years ahead of the arrival of the first Christian in the Philippines, Portuguese sailor Ferdinand Magellan, on March 16, 1521.
Magellan himself failed to “sell” his faith and ended up killed by Lapu-lapu, the hero ignored by Cebu’s Sinulog, Aklan’s Ati-atihan and Iloilo’s Dinagyang.
Worse, the Aetas of today – wrongly depicted as war freaks – are not even beneficiaries of the festival that exploits their culture. To this day, we rarely see an Ati in church. If we find one or two of them standing by the church door, it’s to beg for alms.
According to the late Aklan historian Roman dela Cruz, those who were converted into Christianity were not the Ati warriors but latter-day Aklanons; and that the name of Aklan’s capital town is short for “isa ka libo” in remembrance of 1,000 native “Indios” who were herded by the Spanish friars to undergo mass baptism on the third Sunday of January 1569.
“Hala bira!” The same historian believed that the shout associated with the Ati-Atihan actually sprang from the 17th century when Moro raiders from the south were attacking Panay. The defenders of the island fought back with artillery while shouting “Hala bira!” – meaning “Hit them!” The gunpowder having blackened their faces, they looked like the black-skinned Atis.
To sum it up, since Ati-Atihan and Dinagyang perpetuate the myth that there had been tribal wars among the Aetas which ended with their conversion to Christianity, why don’t we shed it of religiosity and preserve its entertainment value? (hvego31@gmail.com/PN)
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