Baybayin: The Ancient Script of the Philippines

Introduction

          For what we have known Filipino is our language, the way on how we communicate and connect with one another, but before this language became our way of communication there is a script called “Baybayin” or known as “Alibata” when it was introduced in the early 1900s. But what exactly is Baybayin? Is it same thing as Alibata? Is it like Chinese writing? Japanese? Arabic?

What is Baybayin?    

         Baybayin is alphasyllabry writing system known as an abugida. Consisting of symbols for consonants and vowels. The Baybayin writing system is comprised of 17 characters that express consonants and vowels found in old Tagalog.

Is Alibata and Baybayin the same?

          In regards to whether Alibata is the same thing as Baybayin; yes, it is the same thing as it refers to the same writing system, but Alibata is the wrong term to use as explained by Hector Santos.

      To compare it to Arabic or Chinese writing would not be a precise comparison. It could be closer to Japanese writing as they both syllable based.

Etymology of Baybayin

MABUHAY! Tagalog is the most widely spoken tongue in the Philippines today. Baybayin is a writing system native to the Philippines. It came from the word baybay means “to spell”. Baybayin was used to write short things such as poetry and announcements. It was carved in natural material such as leaves, palm fronds, tree bark and fruit rinds, but the most common material was bamboo. The writing tools or panulat were the points of daggers or small pieces of iron.

The Baybayin Method of Writing

       There were a total of 17 characters: three (3) vowels and fourteen (14) consonants, but when combined with the small vowel-modifying marks, called kudlíts, the number of characters increased to forty-five (45). This way of writing is called an abugida. When a person spelled a word orally or recited the baybayin, the individual letters were called babâ, kakâ, dadâ, etc., but the original sequence of the letters was different to what it is today. This “alphabetical” order was recorded in the Tagalog Doctrina Christiana.

Origin of the Baybayin

          The baybayin is more like a syllabary. This name for the old Filipino script came from one of the earliest Philippine language dictionaries ever published, the Vocabulario de Lengua Tagala of 1613. Early Spanish accounts usually called the baybayin “Tagalog letters” or “Tagalog writing” while the Visayans called it “Moro writing” because it was imported from Manila, which was one of the ports where many products from Muslim traders entered what are now known as the Philippine islands. The Bikolanos called the script "basahan" and the letters, "guhit."

          Bonifacio Comandante claims that the development of baybayin was influenced by the use of giant clams. The earliest document found in the Philippines is the Laguna Copperplate Inscription from 900, which was written in a version of the Javanese bawi script, also in the Brahmic family. Sometime between then and 1002, baybayin was developed in the Philippines from bawi or related Indic scripts, becoming more and more widely used through to the arrival of the Spanish in the 1500s. But then Baybayin ends up during the twentieth century that had survived only in limited time.

End of the Baybayin Alphabet

        The Spaniards of the Christian faith corresponding hatred for all the forms of belief that led them to regard the native writings and art as works of the Devil.

       The inability of the ancient script to record the new sounds introduced by the Spaniards, the rapid acquisition of literacy in the Latin script with its concomitant social and material benefits and the disruption of traditional family activities were the main culprits for the loss of the Tagalog script.

Direction of Baybayin Writing

          The baybayin was read from left to right in rows that progressed from top to bottom, just as we read in English today.