Philippine Prehistory

     While archeologists have unearthed artifacts to answer many questions about ancestors, more remain unanswered. What kinds of people roamed this land? How did the climatic changes affect them, and how did they cope? How have they progressed from being nomads to being a people of agriculture? Are they represented by the present tribal people who live in the mountains? Theories about the people who occupied this part of the earth vary. With a click at the heading, the site will transport you back to the different periods of ancient time--almost. This page contains some important theories about the origin of the people who occupied this land from the pleistoscene era up to the time when our ancestors decided to permanently inhabit the land.

     The Tabon Caves in Palawan yielded not only bones of human beings but also pottery, burial jars, jade ornaments, and glass beads that are thousands of years old and reflect our ancestors' way of living. How different are we from our ancestors? How different are they from the indigenous peoples of our country? How did they express themselves? Why do different regions in the Philippines have different languages? Is there only one origin of the languages we now have? This page is divided into three subheadings, namely, the arts, the practices, and the language. To know more about the arts and cultural practices and for theories about the language of the prehistorical people in the philippines, click this button.

     Generally, prehistoric people are said to be animistic. But what kind of animism existed in the Philippines during the prehistoric past? Our ancestors, it is said, have different religions. Jar burial chambers discovered in prehistoric caves mirror reverence to forefathers and the view that the jars are vessels to the afterlife. some authorities believe that the tribal communities in the country mirror the religious beliefs of the prehistoric people, but others argue that there are thousands of years between these indgenous people and the prehistoric man. There's bound to be changes. With only burial jars and some other artifacts to support them, some authorities in different fields dared to venture their theories regarding the prehistoric people.

TM