Resurrecting the “Pintado” Tattoo
Paper delivered at the “TATU” Symposium, Leyte Heritage
Festival 2008, Price Mansion, May 18, 2008, Tacloban City
Festival 2008, Price Mansion, May 18, 2008, Tacloban City
By: Dulce Cuna Anacion, M.A. Art History
There are many Ethno tribal motifs proliferating to this day because
There are many Ethno tribal motifs proliferating to this day because
the art of tattooing has became a popular, albeit lucrative endeavor.
Tribal motifs like those gathered by collector Lars Krutak and
“Indiana-Jones”-like researchers Vince Hemingson and Thomas Lockhart
have been discovered and recreated, but none has ever delved into
the mystery of the vanished Leyte Pintado tattoo. Of course,
since the local inhabitants’ practice of tattooing was abruptly stopped by the
Jesuits in the 1600s with religion, tattooing in the island of Leyte has extremely
vanished and all we could do now is merely speculate on the tattoo motifs and
designs which were recorded by the Jesuit priest and chronicler Francisco
Ignacio Alzina, who also avers that the tattoo phenomena is a universal experience.
He had great misgivings on the practice and considered it as a “work of the devil”: designs which were recorded by the Jesuit priest and chronicler Francisco
Ignacio Alzina, who also avers that the tattoo phenomena is a universal experience.
“I am inclined to think that these people imitated the custom
from newcomers to the Islands; or that one of their braggarts
started the practice himself to give an appearance of greater
ferocity; or that one of their ancient priestesses instigated it.
These devil-women, to whom the devil appeared in a tattooed
body might have started the custom in imitation of him. (I am
told these women practice their calling even before Faith
reached these Islands). Whether this custom was started by the
people themselves or whether their common enemy taught it
to them for his own ends (none of which was good), it is a fact
that all Bisayan men tattooed themselves with the exception of
those they callAsog.”1
It was Alzina, in his monograph “Historias de las Islas el Indios de Bisaias…
1668” who
1668” who
termed tattooing as “paint”. But it is only one chronicler’s word against t
he others:
he others:
"The Bisayans are called Pintados because they arein fact so,
not by nature although they are well-built,
well-featured and white, but by painting their entire
bodies from
head to foot as soon as they are young
men with strength and courage enough to endure the
torture
of painting. In the old days, they painted t
hemselves when they had performed some brave deed.
They paint themselves by first drawing blood
with pricks from a very sharp point, following the design
and lines previously marked by the craftsmen
in the art, and then over the fresh blood applying a
black powder that can never again be erased.
They do not paint the whole body at one time, but part by part, so that the
painting takes many days to
complete.
In the former times they had to perform a new feat of bravery for each
of the parts that were to
be painted. The paintings are very elegant, and well proportioned to the
members and parts where
they are located. I used to say there, captivated and astonished by
the appearance of one of these,
that if they brought it to Europe a great deal of money could be made
by displaying it.
Children are not painted. The women paint the whole of one hand and
a part of the other."2
1Alzina, Francisco S.J., “Historias de las Islas y Indios de Bisaias…1668”
