Teduray women in traditional clothing. (Photo from Dean C. Worcester (1913) National Geographic Creative)

Near the close of the 19th century, three indigenous Teduray sisters, Juana, Servanda, and Nicolasa, surnamed Borromeo, abandoned their home village of Tamontaka along the banks of the Tamontaka River southwest of the town of Cotabato. They then braved what was then a long and perilous 407-kilometer journey to the town of Zamboanga on the southwestern coast of Mindanao. 

[Author’s note: The term “Teduray” is of relatively recent usage and, based on their spoken language, is deemed by Mindanao historian Rudy Rodil to be a correction of the previously mistaken term “Tiruray,” a change earlier made by Stuart A. Schlegel.]

In the new town, the sisters established residences in three separate places, Juana in Sta. Maria, Servanda (Lola Banday) in Buenavista, and Nicolasa (Lola Culasa) in Tetuan. Juana Borromeo married a Chinese immigrant named Lu Utih, who later converted to Christianity and changed his name to Jose Climaco. They were my maternal great-grandparents, making me one-eight Teduray and one-eight Chinese.

The Teduray people are one of about 26 non-Islamized ethnic groups in Mindanao who originated in what became the old unified Cotabato province but now live mainly in the towns of Upi, South Upi, and Datu Blah Sinsuat in southwestern Maguindanao province and in Lebak town in northwestern Sultan Kudarat province. There are also scattered populations in Agusan, Bukidnon, Davao and Lanao. They have their own distinct and unique traditions, language, art and culture, belief systems, social mores, and political systems. The Tedurays number approximately 350,000, or about 17.2 percent of Mindanao’s total Lumad population of 2.04 million. The term “Lumad” has come to refer to all non-Muslim indigenous peoples of Mindanao.

Tamontaka as a Spanish-Jesuit garrison

I have often wondered what made the Borromeo sisters risk leaving Tamontaka for an unknown and strange destination. If they were Tedurays, why did they have Christian names? Some of these questions were addressed by Jesuit historian Miguel A. Bernad’s “The Tamontaca Experiment in Southern Mindanao: 1861-1899” (2004), Nicholas P. Cushner’s “The Abandonment of the Tamontaca Reduction” (1964) and Jose S. Arcilla’s “The Return of the Jesuits to Mindanao” (1978). Other accounts point to alternative historical interpretations, such as Reynaldo C. Ileto’s Magindanao 1860-1888 (2007) and Stuart A. Schlegel’s “Teduray-Maguindanaon Ethnic Relations: An Ethnohistorical Puzzle” (1972).

Tamontaka was one of five Spanish forts established by the Manila government in the Maguindanao area as part of a decision to permanently occupy strategic areas in Southern Philippines. Later a group of intrepid Jesuits arrived and started converting the Teduray natives who lived on the outskirts. That explains the Borromeo appelation and the sisters’ given names as well.

A farming community of several hundred people soon arose around the Jesuit mission that came to own “a large tract of land planted to various crops like rice, corn, coffee, cacao, coconut, and fruit trees and had a herd of carabao.” How the Jesuits came to occupy and control the “large tract of land” is not documented by Bernad. Neither does he disclose the relations of production that defined the economic mode in Tamontaka, only that it was definitely “not a commune.” In all likelihood, however, it was similar to the semi-feudal socio-economic pattern of share tenancy in Luzon. Bernad notes that the “revenue from the produce,” i.e., the surplus, supported the mission and its activities. Rey Ileto adds that the Jesuits also established an educational system -- teaching the Tamontaka residents the rudiments of reading, writing, medicine, and agriculture, all of which caught the attention of neighboring villages and hilly areas -- inducing “defections” to the Tamontaka settlement.

“Whatever may be the real reasons for the Teduray sisters’ departure from Tamontaka, it is extremely valuable to know and understand the society in which they lived and struggled.”

The Tamontaka Jesuit mission had both Tedurays and "ransomed" slave children bought from Muslim families. There apparently was a lucrative trade in children of slave parents who had been kidnapped by Muslim “pirates” from other islands, other provinces in Mindanao or even from non-Muslim tribes in adjoining areas. Rey Ileto reveals that some slave children were Tedurays and Subanons (an ethnic group from Zamboanga). It is thus possible that some of the children ransomed by the Jesuits were also Tedurays. The Jesuit missionaries, though appalled by the practice of slavery, thought it best that to pay ransom (“rescate”) for the children and bring them under their fold and remove them from the slave market. For this purpose, they conducted a fund-raising campaign among Manila’s well-heeled and raised the then princely sum of 16,500 pesos to ransom the slave children who were then put up in an orphanage in Tamontaka.

Given the above, it is not clear whether the Borromeo sisters were simply converted Christian Tedurays or ransomed Teduray slave children who were later Christianized. Bernad writes that as early as 1866, or the fourth year of the Jesuits’ arrival, there were already 667 Tedurays in the mission while as late as 1879, there were only 160 slave children. He does not indicate the ethnic or tribal origins of the ransomed slave children some of whom could have been Tedurays. It is not difficult to imagine, therefore, that the Borromeo sisters could have been Teduray slave children themselves.

Why the flight?

In any case, it was unfortunate that the Tedurays were made to abandon their native names because this now makes it extremely daunting if not impossible for us, the descendants of the Borromeo sisters, from tracing our indigenous Lumad lineage and linking with relatives who may still be living in Teduray areas in the Cotabato provinces. Why was there a need for the Jesuit friars to change the names of the converted Tedurays? Muslim converts are not required to do so. Wasn’t it enough that the natives were successfully cajoled into embracing an alien belief system?

As for the mystery of the Borromeo sisters’ departure from Tamontaka, I had initially thought that Bernad and Cushner solved this when they narrated the Jesuits’ abandonment of Tamontaka in 1899 to escape increasing harassment by Muslims emboldened by the transfer of Philippine sovereignty from Spain to the United States. Carabaos and coconuts were being stolen and sugar fields burned. An obvious reason not stated by the historians was that the Spanish colonizers were aware that the American southward expansion would first target the occupation of Cotabato, as this was the Mindanao headquarters of the Spanish military command.

“Whatever may be the real reasons for the Teduray sisters’ departure from Tamontaka, it is extremely valuable to know and understand the society in which they lived and struggled.”

The deteriorating situation, coupled with the impending dismantling of the Spanish garrisons, convinced the friars to immediately evacuate Tamontaka. Thirty-seven girls, accompanied by nuns and friars, were the first to leave; first walking to Cotabato in the dead of the night and then boarding the steamer Churruca for Zamboanga. From the accounts of Bernad and Cushner, I jumped to the conclusion that the Borromeo sisters must have been with the first evacuees. The rest followed in the next days. The question remains, however, whether the Tedurays left their homes freely or were given no choice by the Jesuits. The girls must have felt fear and trepidation as they were hurriedly and surreptitiously ushered out of their dwellings and brought to a strange faraway land.

At this point, a question may be raised as to whether the Tedurays would have chosen to remain in Tamontaka and continue to farm their productive lands. Would the Muslims have left them alone to do so since the targets of their hostility, the Spanish soldiers and friars, would no longer be around? Arcilla does recount that the converted Tedurays complained to the Spanish of harassment and oppression from the Muslims in the area. But this could be because they were seen as being under the tutelage of the Spanish intruders.

Muslims and Lumads

Abhoud Syed Lingga of the Institute of Bangsamoro Studies (IBS) says that the relationship between Muslims and Lumads can be framed within the 16th Century traditional story of the brothers Tabunaway and Mamalu who went their separate ways, the former embracing Islam and the latter remaining true to his indigenous beliefs. Despite this separation, a treaty was drawn up between the two, respecting each other’s choices while remaining brothers who would protect each other and live in peace. The coming of Spanish colonialism upset this peace as the invaders started converting the Lumads as well as some Muslims to Christianity and thereby driving a wedge between the descendants of the two brothers.

Stuart A. Schlegel has a different take on the Teduray-Maguindanaon relations. Despite other accounts which speak of a natural animosity between the two groups, Schlegel instead recounts two types of friendly relations that were important to both. One was military alliances between Tedurays, specifically those in the lower valleys (Awang) and Maguindanaos against common enemies, e.g., other tribal groups.

The second relationship was a vibrant trade that took place between the two ethnic groups and which was beneficial “and of critical importance” to both. The Teduray products were rattan, beeswax, gutta percha, tobacco, and other forest items while the Maguindanaons traded in iron tools, clothing, pots and salt. Based on this, Schlegel speculates that the legendary separation between Mamalu and Tabunawa on religious grounds was fiction. He says that the more plausible story was that Mamalu was Teduray from the start but was considered a “brother” to Tabunawa as a result of a trade agreement (or pact) between the two involving a ritual oath “swearing to be as brothers ... as being of one father and one mother.”

Reynaldo C. Ileto (2007), however, while acknowledging the mutually beneficial trade ties between the Maguindanaos and the Tedurays, a connection that the establishment of the Jesuit Mission aimed to subvert, wrote that the relationship eventually became “purely exploitative:”

A Maguindanao chief selected the leaders of the Tirurays within an area he could control and gave them titles, making them responsible for their followers who were to bring him a share of the agricultural and forest products. In return, the Magindano chief provided manufactured goods, coastal products, and perhaps, protection from raids of other chiefs. Seeds and goods we also loaned, captives being seized if the debt were not paid.

In the case of the situation of the Tedurays of Tamontaka in 1899, one can never be certain about the impact of a decision to stay put and not join the move to Zamboanga. What is clear though is that the decision of the Jesuits to uproot the Tedurays from Tamontaka was meant to preserve the gains of their evangelizing mission. Zamboanga had a strong Spanish garrison (Fort Pilar), which had existed since the 16th century, and a Jesuit presence that would ensure that the conversion of the “pagan” Tedurays would not be reversed. Bernad says the friars had hoped that “they could remain and continue their mission” despite the transfer of colonial ownership. They failed to do so in Tamontaka, but succeeded in Zamboanga which, to this day, remains largely a Christian-dominated enclave that proudly calls itself, rightly or wrongly, the “Latin City of the South.”

The mystery deepens

Fascinating though the account of the Jesuit-managed flight from Tamontaka to Zamboanga may be, my initial conjecture that the Borromeo sisters were part of the 1899 evacuation fell apart and was disproved when a cousin, Greg Climaco Alvarez, informed me that Juana’s son and our grandfather, Gregorio Borromeo Climaco, was born on March 8, 1890. This was documented by his gravemarker at the Zamboanga Baliwasan cemetery. Since our grandfather was the second of seven children, this means that the three Teduray sisters left Tamontaka at least 12 years before the 1899 exodus, or in 1887 at the latest. In contrast with the more organized and planned withdrawal backed by Spanish troops in 1899, the sisters’ intrepid journey was made even more perilous and fraught with untold hazards.

Deprived of the resources of the Jesuit friars and protection from the Spanish military, how was the journey then undertaken? Historian Rudy Rodil surmises that such a trek from Cotabato to Zamboanga in the 1880s could have been made on a steamship (four of which were plying the Philippine waters in the late 19th century) or on the usual sailing boats. Given the circumstances of the sisters’ solo flight, however, the latter means of transport seems more likely. In either case, given the lack of means and resources, the sisters could have been stow-aways on the ship that took them to Zamboanga or had special arrangements with the boat’s officers, e.g., serving as cooks or cleaning boat crew.

The choice of Zamboanga as a destination may have also been unintended and simply fortuitous. The Cotabato-Zamboanga line was a major trade route in the 19th century and ships (both steamers and sailing ships) regularly plied this sea passage. Sailing ships, however were obviously more common. The Teduray sisters may have simply disembarked at the first port of call, i.e., Zamboanga, and, with no other prospects in sight, stayed on.

The mystery of the reasons for the sisters’ flight, or escape as the case may be, however, remains unsolved and open to various conjectures. Ileto recounts several historical events and factors that could have motivated the sisters to leave. First was the famine and hunger of the 1880s and the critical depletion of rice stocks that jeopardized their food security. Second was the cholera epidemic in the area that started in 1882 and may have continued to wreak havoc and threatened their lives. Could this epidemic also have prematurely orphaned the sisters and left them to fend for themselves?

The third event described by Ileto was the state of war and the corresponding social disruptions that characterized the late 1880s between the Spanish colonizers and Maguindanao chieftains led by Datu Utto of Buayan, which resulted in the latter’s defeat. Lastly, the sisters could have felt a pressing need to be liberated from the presumed harsh exactions of the feudal system in the Mission. Ileto recounts that a number of escapes had actually been taking place from Tamontaka in the 1880s. What cannot be disputed though is that the three sisters’ abandonment of the Tamontaka “reservation” and their hazardous journey to a new place speak volumes of their remarkable, intrepid spirit and aspirations for a better life.

Cotabato resident and Zamboanga native Edita A. Tugbo wrote this about the three sisters in a Mindanao Cross column on November 24, 1984:

The Borromeo sisters were buyo-chewing, never saw a dental chair, were short and curly-haired, full of sage counsel for the children around them -- kids they smothered and spoiled with love and caresses. They could neither read nor write but insisted on everyone going to school. They had to scrimp to keep their loved ones in school. None of the sisters amassed material possessions, but all lived and died rich in the love and respect of children, grandchildren, and neighbors. The sisters never cast a vote. To them family not only came first -- only family mattered.

The Teduray sisters’ descendants

The Borromeo-Climaco marriage produced seven children, 19 grandchildren, 67 great-grandchildren, and 95 great great grandchildren. In Zamboanga City and elsewhere, 27 different surnames can be traced to Juana Borromeo. These include Climaco, Alvarez, Tadem, Miranda, Mendoza, Bernardo, Ko, Dandiego, Ramos, Canlas, Tamondong, Mariano, Garcia, Conti, Esperat, Fernando, Aberilla, Pioquito, Sanson, Nuño, Syquia, Angodung, Lopez, Cuaderno, Wright, Williams, and Mancao.

Within three generations, the Borromeo-Climaco union produced one of the country’s democracy icons – the popular and maverick Cesar C. Climaco, twice city mayor, former Macapagal cabinet member, and an uncompromising opponent of the Marcos martial law regime. His assassination and martyrdom in 1984, wrongly blamed by the regime on a Muslim rebel, remains unsolved to this day. Cesar’s father, Gregorio Borromeo Climaco, had been a municipal councilor while his mother, Isabel Dominguez Cortes, familiarly known throughout Zamboanga City as “Abuelita,” was named Mother of the Year in 1956 by the National Federation of Womens’ Clubs.[1]

Cesar’s older brother, Rafael (or Paely), was Ferdinand Marcos’ classmate at the University of the Philippines College of Law, placed fourth in the bar exams (Marcos was first) and later became a Court of Appeals Justice during the martial law period. He could have easily made it to the Supreme Court had he not been identified with the anti-Marcos opposition. A sister, Leticia Climaco Alvarez, became Principal of the prestigious Zamboanga City Chinese High School. Another brother, Benjamin, was a war hero who died in the infamous “Death March” during the Japanese occupation. A younger sister, Lydia Climaco Tadem (my own mother) was the Department of Health’s Regional Nursing Supervisor for Western Mindanao. Jose “Jolly” Climaco, the youngest sibling, was a multi-term city councilor and vice mayor.

Among the fourth generation, Cesar’s son, Julio (or Rini), also a UP law graduate, was appointed OIC city mayor by President Cory Aquino in 1986. Another son, Cesar, Jr (or Juni) is a UP College of Medicine graduate and practices traditional herbal medicine. Jolly’s daughter, Maria Isabelle “Beng” Climaco Salazar, is the current city mayor and former congresswoman and city councilor. In the 2019 elections, while campaigning on a shoestring budget, Beng won re-election as city mayor by decisively defeating her opponent who belonged to the moneyed Lobregat political dynasty. Other kin have been prominent in their chosen fields – civil society organizations, education, medicine, nursing, law, entrepreneurship, social services, international development work, local sports, and civic work. A Zamboanga landmark, the charming Hacienda de Palmeras hotel, was established and managed by Leticia’s son, Gregorio Climaco Alvarez, who was also Board Chair of the Zamboanga Doctors’ Hospital.

Nicolasa Borromeo married Nicolas Perez and the two had five children, eight grandchildren, 18 great grandchildren, and 41 great great grandchildren. There are at least five surnames that can claim descent from Nicolasa including Perez, Bejerano, Enriquez, Lledo, and Aragon. Servanda Borromeo, on the other hand, married Martin Cruz and both had three children, seven grandchildren, 14 great grandchildren, and 23 great great grandchildren. Family names tracing descent from Servanda include Cruz, Suatomboc, Tan, Directo, Climaco, and Suarez.

Like Juana’s descendants, many of the progenies of Servanda and Nicolasa also acquitted themselves in the medical field, law, engineering, banking, entrepreneurship, politics, education, restaurants, and home economics. A good number among the second, third and fourth generations of the three sisters have also joined the Filipino diaspora and migrated to other countries, making it more difficult to track the whereabouts of each one. But on January 15, 1984, the Borromeos held a first and only clan reunion in Zamboanga City at the Sta. Maria residence of then-Mayor Cesar C. Climaco. It was undoubtedly a happy and unforgettable occasion for all clan members present.

Appreciating indigenous societies

The Teduray sisters’ descendants appear to have greatly benefited from a historical accident, making their marks in both the city and the national scenes. Sadly, however, they have remained incognizant of their Teduray Lumad heritage, an important link with an enduring and distinct pre-colonial culture that should be re-established and preserved.

Whatever may be the real reasons for the Teduray sisters’ departure from Tamontaka, it is extremely valuable to know and understand the society in which they lived and struggled. Even as most, if not all, of the sisters’ descendants now live in the comfort and conveniences of technologically-dependent and gadget-addicted modern societies, much could still be absorbed and inculcated in terms of basic human values of egalitarianism, peace, tolerance, cooperation, gender equality and respect for the environment and nature – core elements of traditional Teduray society.

Most misconceptions of indigenous peoples stem from superficial accounts such as that of Dean C. Worcester, who, in his 1913 work, The Non-Christian Peoples of the Philippine Islands, had this rather one-dimensional description of the Tedurays:

In the west of Mindanao is a small tribe called the Tiruray, who dwell between the Moros and the Bilaans. They do not understand the arts of spinning and weaving and so depend upon their Moro neighbors for their clothes. The women wear sarong or loose skirt with a very tight jacket. Around the waist are girdles of spinal brass pieces embellished with beads, and their ankles are loaded with brass rings. They blacken and file the teeth and frequently color their lips a vivid red. The tribe is poor, having no industries, and depend upon their crops of rice, corn and sweet potatoes, which they produce by the most primitive and laborious methods of husbandry.

Fortunately, Stuart A. Schlegel, a professor of anthropology and an Episcopal missionary, lived among a Teduray community for two years in the 1960s and wrote a riveting account of his experience in Wisdom from the Rainforest (2003). A blog from the book’s web site summarized Schlegel’s book thus:

In the 1960s, Stu Schlegel went into a remote rainforest on the Philippine island of Mindanao as an anthropologist (and) found a ... people whose tolerant, gentle way of life would transform his own values and beliefs profoundly. (His) ... account of Teduray society depicts a peaceful, noncompetitive society whose ideals contrast strikingly with Western values. The Teduray lived as hunter-gatherers and subsistence farmers, careful inhabitants of the forest and mindful cultivators of their fields (with) a deep respect for nature and for each other. (He) recounts... how their behavior and traditions revolved around kindness and compassion for each other and the spirits sharing their worlds. Schlegel describes the Teduray's remarkable legal system and their strong story-telling tradition, their elaborate cosmology and their ritual celebrations. ... Schlegel recounts his own personal transformation--how his own world view as a member of an advanced, civilized society was shaken to the core by a so-called primitive people. (He) begins to realize how culturally determined his own values are, and sees ... how much the Teduray can teach him about gender equality, tolerance for difference, including homosexuality, and generosity and cooperation.

In addition to basic human values, there are more that can be learned from our Teduray indigenous ancestors and the society they lived in – their unique language, oral accounts, social protection formations, belief systems, social mores, weaving skills and rich traditions in music and song, art, dance, colorful attire, and the trials they endured and challenges they encountered. Who knows, perhaps a meeting and convergence of both modern and pre-modern cultures will go a long way towards addressing some of contemporary society’s persistent social, economic, and political problems.

Meanwhile the once harmonious relations between the Tedurays and Maguindanaos that had been presumably torn asunder by Spanish colonialism and the Christian conversions may finally be restored with the enactment of the 2019 law establishing a new region, the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM). It supercedes the old Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) that was viewed as disadvantageous to Lumad peoples. Rodil (2020) writes that, under BARMM, Lumad peoples have been granted freedom of choice to “retain their distinct indigenous identity, the retention of their native titles, political structures (and) justice systems,” an “equitable share in revenues from the use of natural resources in ancestral lands,” ... provision of basic services, “political participation in the Bangsamoro government (including) reserved seats in the regional Parliament,” and free prior and informed consent.

It is fervently hoped that the above BARMM provisions for the Lumads of Mindanao are implemented scrupulously and conscientiously. That way, the present day descendants of Mamalu and Tabunaway will finally get to live mutually beneficial and peaceful lives and fulfill the promise of their legendary treaty entered into by the brothers half a millennium ago.

References:

Miguel S. Bernad. 2004. “The Tamontaca Experiment in Southern Mindanao, 1861-1899,” in The Great Island: Studies in the Exploration and Evangelization of Mindanao. Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press.

Jose S. Arcilla. 1978. “The Return of the Jesuits to Mindanao.” Philippine Studies. 26:1 & 2.

Nicholas P. Cushner. 1964. “The Abandonment of the Tamontaca Reduction: 1898-1899.” Philippine Studies. 12:2.

Reynaldo C. Ileto. Maguindanao 1860-1888: The Career of Datu Utto of Buayan. 2007. (Pasig City, Philippines: Anvil Publishing.

Abhoud Syed Linga. 2015. “Bangsamoro and IPs: History and Context” manuscript.

Rudy Buhay Rodil. 2020. “Overview of the story of Mindanao-Sulu,” unpublished manuscript.

Rudy Buhay Rodil. 2020. Online interviews on various days in March and April.

Stuart A. Schlegel. 1972. “Teduray-Maguindanaon Ethnic Relations: An Ethnohistorical Puzzle.” Solidarity. April.

Stuart A. Schlegel. 1999. Wisdom from a Rainforest: The spiritual journey of an anthropologist. University of Georgia Press.

Jose Tenorio. 1970. “The Customs of the Tiruray People Translated and Annotated by Stuart Schlegel.” Philippine Studies. 18:2.

Edita A. Tugbo. 1984. “The Borromeos: A gathering of the clan.” Mindanao Cross. November 24. As reproduced in Rafael C. Climaco (ed.). 1985. Cesar: Champion of the underdog. (Zamboanga City: CCC Foundation).

Dean C. Worcester. 1913. The Non-Christian Peoples of the Philippine Islands. (National Geographic).

Additional Source of Information:

The Philippine National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA).

Map location of Tamontaka in the late 19th Century (courtesy of Rey Ileto)

Eduardo Climaco Tadem, Ph.D., is Convenor, Program on Alternative Development, University of the Philippines Center for Integrative and Development Studies (UPCIDS AltDev) and a retired Professor of Asian Studies at the University of the Philippines Diliman. An earlier and abridged version of this article appeared in the Philippine Daily Inquirer on 17 June 2016 on which major revisions have been made for this article. Thanks to Marisa Climaco Alvarez Williams for valuable information on family genealogy and Rudy B. Rodil for advise on historical matters.

The Magazine

The Saga of the Tamontaka Teduray Sisters