The Tribal War: A Headhunting Story Told by an Artist’s Art at Melvin Jones, Burnham Park

I found this story told in a series of images made by an artist as a decoration on the sides of an old stage found at the Melvin Jones at Burnham Park, Baguio city, Philippines. The carved images are already old and one can see the images are not being taken care of as grasses, dirt and dusts covered them. People seem do not know the significance of such art in the history of the Igorot people of my place of origin – Kaigorotan country, or locally known as the Cordillera region. If that’s in Israel, I believe everyday tourists are there gathered around listening to their guides, or students listening to the lectures of their teachers.

The first scene of the story, showed a man found without a head. On the scene, one man is raising his hands which show he must be shouting for revenge. While two people bowed their head which could signify they are grieving for the loss of a brother or member of a family or a friend.

Fig.  1. A headless body is found. The right side shows a clearer picture of the body

The scene followed by a picture of two men carrying the headless body that was positioned like a fetus. The hands and legs are bent and tied, so that, a long pole made up of wood or probably a hard bamboo pole was inserted between the legs and between the tied hands; the two men carried the body by putting the ends of the pole on their shoulders while a man is walking ahead and third man was following them; the others might have walked ahead already to warn the village about a dead member being brought home. In this case, a ritual is done before any corpse is entered inside the village.

Figure  2.  The headless body is now brought home

The next picture shows the men of the village, lead by their elders, had a meeting with all their men to decide what they have to do. In this case, they decided to take revenge as proven by the next image.

Figure 3.  The men decide what to do

The next scene is showing the men marching to war.

Figure  4.  Going to war

The next image is showing them to have reached the entrance of the village of the culprits. In the image, we can see the people presenting peace offerings as shown by two people on their knees while bowing their heads; one is doing the negotiations. The invading party tried to listen as demonstrated by the others sitting on their knees.

Figure  5.  Negotiations

However, it is clear the invading party did not accept the peace offerings, as a gruesome image of killings shown by the next scene.

Figure 6.  The negotiations failed, so, war errupted

As a result of every war, the children and women are the parties most affected by it. Here we can see mothers with their children fleeing away from the fight, while one woman in the picture is probably helping her wounded son or husband.

Children and women fleeing the for their lives

Related stories: Art of Traditions, Culture and Life of the Igorots Found at Burnham Park(Part 1)

Art of Traditions, Culture and Life of the Igorots Found at Burnham Park (Part 2)

This story is true. I heard the same stories, since I was a kid, from my father and old men from Mountain Province. My father always told us about how the people of the old days were living in war. And how head hunting was rampant because it was part of some tribes culture and tradition. Men who reached the age of manhood go hunting for head and bring it home to their village to show they were real men or had already reached manhood. Others do it for the joy of doing it.

Burnham Park’s Update (Part 2)

I love Burnham Park, that’s why I always frequently walk by to view the beautiful flowers and get some fresh air, and of course, be the first to see what’s happening and what are the changes being done to improve its look.

And when there are new things installed or changed I always make sure to snap a picture of it to review it again when I get home and uploaded in my computer.

So, let me share it here for the benefits of those who haven’t seen the area for a long time, especially, those who are working abroad missing the beautiful park as one of their destinations to relax and do their exercises after doing some rounds of jogging around the lake.

The gate being constructed and when finished

The Gate of Burnham Park - located next to Rizal Park

 Visitors are greeted by the sculpture of Mr. Burnham's head  when gets inside the park through the gate

The fences around Burnham Park

The fence construction is through the foundation of Bishop Carlito J. Cenzon

The fountains

The fountains when not working and when working

The Relief Map of CAR

As I was walking towards the Melvin Jones  ground, I saw men busy working at the side, so, I went close and saw what they were doing - The relief Map of CAR(Cordilleara Administrative Region)

Visual view of the Map

The different provinces and cities of the region are seen on the map.

This is found at back of the comfort room next to the main road to hire bicycles

Vandalism at Melvin Jones Grandstand

While  improvements in the city's surroundings is crucial I believe discipline must also be given a focus to not make those expensive improvements to waste when those undisciplined mammals get a hands on them.

The Crown Legacy Hotel

At Kisad road, probably the biggest and most elegant hotel of Baguio city was just finished and is very accessible to Burnham Park.

The two arts of historyfound at Burnham Park

I discovered two structures where  tradition, culture, and history of the Igorots have been carved.  One is next to the lake, and the other one is used as design for one of the stages in Melvin Jones ground.

Baguio Public Market is Clean

I went to the public market this afternoon to buy some vegetables for supper and got amazed how the streets were cleaned of the stalls that were lined up at the sides and even overtaking some spaces of the sidewalks making it hard to walk faster because of the overcrowding.


The feeling was like the cleaned spaces give you a fresh air to breath. I went around and saw that all of the streets were free of sidewalk and ambulant vendors.


It was only yesterday when I walked by the area and every one of the vendors with stalls and ambulant vendors were very calm and relax doing their business; today is an opposite story, it is like a calamity just struck them and took away their source of income – I just hope they were warned first, or had heard of the plan a few days ago by the Mayor of seriously cleaning the area because of many infractions of agreement by the vendors.


It’s sad to think about that many people today just lost their little source of income, but on the other hand, it is good because the place is now really clean and the businesses behind them are now more accessible for buyers and they no longer have competitions.

This is a comparison of the place last week and today

Now that the city hall successfully cleaned the area, they should then stay firm and no longer allowed anyone to start selling on those places.


What happened was one or two vendors tried to sell in one corner, and when no one is telling the vendors to get away from the place, the vendors now starts to put up some umbrella. And since no one was complaining, the umbrella becomes now a more permanent roof. Other vendors see what’s happening and since the vendors are established without hassles the others then put up their own stall next to it until their number multiplied. Now, since their number was large, the city hall cannot easily remove them. And since the city also wanted to show it has some heart with the vendors it into an agreement with the vendors that they pay tax and has to make their place clean. But customers know what the real picture was, the streets were fall of garbage, and sidewalks were not passable.

Those beach umbrellas are all gone now, giving a real view of the places occupied by the vendors days ago.

The places where it used to be crowded with ambulant vendors and stalls.