Ivatan people
An old Ivatan woman
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| Regions with significant populations | |
|---|---|
 Philippines(Batanes Islands) |
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| Languages | |
| Philippine languages (Ivatan, Ilocano, Tagalog), English | |
| Religion | |
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Christianity (Predominantly Roman Catholicism), minority also, Ancestral worship |
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| Related ethnic groups | |
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Filipinos Austronesian peoples |
The Ivatans are a Filipino ethnolinguistic group predominant in the Batanes Islands of the Philippines. The origins of the Ivatans remained untraced among scholars. Ivatans were free before they were colonized by the Spaniards.
The culture of the Ivatans is partly influenced by the environmental condition of Batanes. Unlike the old-type nipa huts common in the Philippines, Ivatans have adopted their now-famous stone houses made of limestone, designed to protect against the hostile climate.
Documents do not show much about the history of the Ivatans and at present, scholars who study their origins are still unsure as to their exact origin. They question whether the pre-historic Ivatans came from the northern part of Luzon or southern portions of China and Taiwan. There is evidence that they might be a surviving Christianized remnant of a people that once resided on all the islands between Luzon and Taiwan. However, they have considered the close racial resemblance of the Ivatans to the Malays and the structure of their language could mean they came from other parts of the Philippines. Tracing their roots through Batanes' folklores, genetic studies of Omoto, a Japanese anthropologist, of the Yami of Orchid Island (Lanyu) show closer genetic affinity of the Yami to the Tagalog and Visayan and linguistically to the Batanic (Bashiic) sub-branch of the Malayo-Polynesian branch.
Ivatans already lived in Batanes before the Spaniards arrived in the Philippines in the 16th century, and lived autonomously long thereafter. On June 26, 1783 Batanes was incorporated to the Spanish East Indies. In 1571 the capital of the Spanish colony in the Philippines was established in Manila. In 1686, Ivatans were "forced" to settle in the lowlands of Batanes . The Ivatans were under Spanish rule for 115 years, and gained their independence on September 18, 1898. Ironically, June 6 is celebrated in Batanes as its founding day.
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Wikipedia