traditionCordilleran whatok
whatok · Kalinga
The best-kept of the Philippine traditions, because the mountains were never taken
| Where it goes | arms, chest, hands, back |
|---|---|
| Notes | Chest work for a man who had taken a head; arm work for everyone else. |
| Tool | Gisi and pat-ik |
| Ink | Soot and water |
about 1,200 – 2,026 · Mummies from the 13th century carry it; Whang-od still taps it
17.3800, 121.1000 · OpenStreetMap
What it is
The Cordillera mountains of northern Luzon, where Spanish rule never reached and the tattooing was never interrupted.
The long version
Cordilleran mummies in cave and hanging-coffin burials carry tattoos going back to the thirteenth century, individualised, covering an adult woman's arms and an adult man's whole body — and the coffins carry the patterns carved on the outside.
Headhunting chest work went first, when headhunting stopped. Arm and decorative work lasted longer. Elders among the Bontoc and Kalinga still carry it; among the Kankanaey, Apayao and Ibaloi it is believed gone.
Connected to
- Batok The wider Philippine family this sits inside.
- Whang-od Oggay The practitioner everyone has heard of.
Named here by
- The painted ones The mountains, where it did not happen.
- The Cordilleran mummies The tradition.
- Whose designs Where the rule is stated plainly.
Where each claim comes from
| Field | Tier | Source | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| default | cited | Batok — Wikipedia (en) | |
| text_th | inference | written in Thai by this project, not machine-translated |
Sources
- Batok — Wikipedia (en)
- Kalinga people — Wikipedia (en)
- Bontoc people — Wikipedia (en)
cited Cited — a named source, linked · harvested Harvested — fetched from an open dataset, with its licence · tradition Tradition — general knowledge of the tradition, hedged · inference Inference — this project's own reasoning from the above · field Field — someone stood there