1 Appendix 3 Why “D” is “R”: Understanding the Filipino Language and Society by Tracing the History of Its Letters Filipino language learners and even native speakers get confused: when do we use din, and when do we use rin? Or for that matter, dito and rito, doon and roon? What is the difference between d and r? To understand this, we need to know that in the ancient Tagalog script, the baybayin, there was only one symbol for d and r. But studying the baybayin and the path that Filipino orthography has taken tells us more than the history of d and r. It also tells us about the history of colonialism and the nationalist movement for independence. The Baybayin The baybayin1 had seventeen basic symbols. Fourteen of these were consonant symbols with the inherent “a” sound (see the chart below): ka, ga, nga, ta, da, na pa, ba, ma, ya, la, wa, sa, and ha. Three symbols represented vowel sounds. To change the sound of the consonant symbols, diacritical marks called kudlit (or corlit) were used. With one of these marks placed above a consonant symbol, the sound became an “i” vowel sound; placed below the symbol, it became a “u” vowel sound. For example, the syllable for ba without diacritical marks, became bi with a kudlit above, and bu with a kudlit below. Here is how these syllables looked: ba bi/be bo/bu Each symbol, shown in the chart (see page 3), signifies a syllable that has a consonant and a vowel. In writing a syllable, however, that has for its components, a consonant, a vowel and a consonant (CVC), the final consonant is simply dropped. According to William Henry Scott, the baybayin of the Philippines is among the indigenous Southeast Asian alphabets that are derived from India. Thus, they share the Sanskrit characteristic mentioned above—the unmarked symbol is pronounced with the vowel a while the addition of diacritical marks changes the vowel. For the past four centuries, this is consistent in documents categorized by Scott as follows: early 1. The word baybayin may have come from the Tagalog word baybay, which has two meanings: to spell, and to coast along. Some Filipinos erroneously believe that the ancient Tagalog script was called alibata. Alibata, however, was a term coined in 1914 by Dean Paul Versoza of the University of Manila. In his book Pambansang Titik nang Pilipinas (Philippine National Writing), 1939, he explains that he coined the word in 1914, in the New York Public Library Research Division. He based the term on three Maguindanao arrangements of letters from Arabic, alif, ba and ta. Coining a new term with no historical basis seems to have been inspired by the coining of the word “Abakada” as the Tagalog equivalent of “Alphabet.” This was done by two writers’ groups, the Samahang Mananagalog (Society of Tagalog Writers) and Aklatang Bayan (Association of Prose and Verse Writers) about twenty years before the coining of “alibata.” © 2011 Joi Barrios. All rights reserved; distribution prohibited. To be used only in conjunction with Tagalog for Beginners: An Introduction to Filipino, the National Language of the Philippines. www.tuttlepublishing.com 2 Spanish works published in a formalized type; Spanish descriptions; old documents and signatures; and contemporary specimens. The direction of the writing is from left to right, meaning the next letter is written on the right, after a kudlit. Although this has been questioned, Scott’s study offers evidence by saying that “Tagalog signatures appear in documents as early as 1603, even among a pageful of Chinese signatures written vertically, often showing a penmanship with a graceful, Spencerian script. The confusion, however, occurs when the writer uses materials which offer more resistance such a bamboo and a knife (as used by the Tagbanua), and the writer holds the bamboo pointing away from the body, to engrave the letters toward or away from himself/herself. Thus, he/she appears to be writing “up” or “down” the bamboo.2 The earliest studies of the Tagalog language and its script were done by the Spanish missionaries of the Philippines during the Spanish colonial rule (1521–1898). Among these studies are the following: Father Francisco Blancas de san Jose’s Arte y reglas de la lengua tagala, 1610; Gaspar de San Agustin’s Compendio de la lengua tagala, 1703; Tomas Ortiz’s Arte de la lengua-tagala, 1740; Juan Jose Noceda and Pedro Sanlucar’s Vocabolario de la lengua tagala, 1754; Manuel Buzeta’s Gramatica de la lengua tagala dispuesta para la mas facil ineligencia de los religiosos principiantes, 1850; Jose Hevia y Campomanes’s Lecciones de gramatica hispano-tagala, 1872; Cipriano Martin Marcilla’s Estudio de los antiguos alfabetos Filipinos, 1895; and Agustin Mara de Castro’s Ortografia y reglas de la lengua tagala (written in the 18th century but published in 1930 using his pseudonym Pedro Andres de Castro); and Toribio Minguella y Asernedo’s Ensayo de gramatica hispano-tagala and Estudios comparatives entre el tagalo y el sanscrito, 1888. The first book published in the Philippines, the Doctrina Christiana en la lengua española y tagala, 1593, contained examples of the baybayin script. The baybayin texts in the book followed both the original text written in Spanish and its Tagalog translation written in Roman letters. Thus, although historical documents such as 16th-century letters signed in baybayin could also be found in the archives of religious congregations, it is the Vocabolario that provides historians and linguists with unrevised baybayin symbols. 2. Data from Luther Parker’s The Early Bisayans (typewritten manuscript, 1915) as quoted in Scott 1968. Although Parker talks about the Tagbanua, this could also be true for the Tagalogs using the baybayin. © 2011 Joi Barrios. All rights reserved; distribution prohibited. To be used only in conjunction with Tagalog for Beginners: An Introduction to Filipino, the National Language of the Philippines. www.tuttlepublishing.com 3 Here is the baybayin chart: Studies of the baybayin script reveal two characteristics of the Tagalog language that have passed down into the usage of the national language now known as Filipino. First, there is only one symbol for the letters “d” and “r.” The pronunciation depends on the location of the symbol. At the start of the word, it is pronounced “d.” Between two vowels, it is pronounced “r.” For example, the word dalita, meaning poverty, starts with the letter d. With the adjectival suffix ma, the word becomes maralita, meaning poor. Thus, in the contemporary use of the Roman alphabet in writing Tagalog, “d” is written as “r.” Second is the symbol for the syllable nga. Written in Roman script, “ng” remains as a single letter, albeit written with two characters.3 In 1620, Father Francisco Lopez attempted to revise the baybayin script by suggesting a new kudlit shaped like a cross. Placed below a symbol, the cross-shaped kudlit cancelled the inherent “a” sound. According to Verzosa, 1939, this suggestion was hence called the Belarmino style and was highly recommended by the authorities. This additional kudlit, however, was hardly used.4 The unpopularity of the cross- shaped kudlit was remarked upon by Pedro Andres de Castro in his book Ortografia y letras de la lengua tagala, 1783. Apparently, the Filipinos politely refused to use it (from Marcilla 1895: 93–94 as quoted in Scott 1968, 59): 3. This discussion comes from Paul Morrow’s article “Baybayin—The Ancient Script of the Philippines,” in www.mts.net. 4. The Belarmino style was highly recommended by Verzosa in his book. However, since the baybayin was hardly used, the suggestion hardly took off. Even internet websites which have either developed or have links to baybayin computer fonts for baybayin enthusiasts do not use the Belarmino style. © 2011 Joi Barrios. All rights reserved; distribution prohibited. To be used only in conjunction with Tagalog for Beginners: An Introduction to Filipino, the National Language of the Philippines. www.tuttlepublishing.com 4 They, after much praising of it and giving thanks for it, decided it could not be incorporated into their writing because it was contrary to the intrinsic character and nature which God had given it and that it would destroy the syntax, prosody, and spelling of the Tagalog language all in one blow, but that they did not mean to give offense to the Spanish lords and would be sure that special use would be made of it when writing words from the Spanish language in Tagalog script… There are several theories on why babayin ceased to be used by the Filipinos. First was the limitations of the indigenous script, as repeatedly pointed out by the Spanish linguists, in expressing Spanish sounds; and consequently, the new words introduced and used in Philippine colonial society. In Totanes’s Arte de la lengua y manual para la administración de los Santos Sacramentos, 1745, he remarked (Totanes 2 in Rafael 1993, 52): “They have no F but they supplement it with a P so they can say confesar, they say kumpisal. Nor Ll to say caballo, they say cabayo, because they substitute for it a Y. Nor do they have X, Z, or J…” The examples given by Totanes, such as confesar (to confess), show the difficulty in writing, through the baybayin, words associated with the religious culture imposed by the Spanish colonizers, or writing the new “imports” such as the caballo or horse, words which at that point became integrated into everyday Philippine life. Another reason for the decline in the use of babayin was the increasing number of Filipinos learning the caton, the system used by the friars in teaching the Roman alphabet.