NOTES ON THE HAIRY MEN OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS AND ELSEWHERE

Abstract

THE people of the Philippine archipelago are for the greater part glabrous except for the hair of the head. The Negritos frequently have short, stubby beards, and a scant amount of hair on the face is not unusual with the other peoples. The hairiest men of the islands are found in the heart of Luzon and Mindanao, especially in the former. These are the largest islands of the group and have retained aboriginal populations longer than any of the other islands. The center of the group of hairy men is in the Ilongot Igorot country, in the eastern southern central part of northern Luzon. They border the purest Negritos of the archipelago on the east, the Igorots on the north and west, and on the south the Filipinos, who have penetrated the province of Nueva Viscaya. The inhabitants of the Philippines may be grouped roughly into three divisions: the coast people or Littoral Filipinos, the people of the interior or Inland Filipinos, and the Moros or Mohammedans of the Sulu archipelago and Mindanao. The largest portion of the Inland peoples is the Igorot, occupying the central mountainous part of northern Luzon. The Ilongot Igorots form the southeastern division of them, and it is among the Ilongots that the greater number of hairy men have been seen, although their northern neighbors, the Ifugao Igorots, have also a few hairy men. The Subanuns of central Mindanao have likewise a few bearded men. It is, however, the Ilongot Igorot hairy men that chiefly concern us, and an attempt will be made to illustrate the similarity that exists between these hairy men and the Ainos of Japan, the hairy men of Australia, the Todas of southern India, and the Europeans. When I was in the Philippines (1907-19Io) I was impressed with the occurrence of hairy men resembling Europeans among the 415