Oral and written accounts passed down from generation to generation indicate that Samal Island used to be known as Pu, and has been inhabited by the Sama since time immemorial.
The Sama indigenous group is mistakenly thought to have originated from Mandaya, Mansaka, and Muslim groups. Samas insist, though, that they are a separate entity with distinct forms of music, art expression, and tribal rituals. Individuals used to be named after the living things around them, and each name was complemented with the term Samal, which served as their family name. For this reason, it was easy to identify the members of the tribe among the other indigenous groups in neighboring islands.
The Samal People have reasons to say so.
based on my personal research, Samal, or Pu indeed had a very long history. In the ancient of times it had been said the island was once inhabited by giants caled Dinagats. These giants were abusive for they would raid villages (most likely along mainland Davao) and steal, vandalize (like defecating on their kitchen), and kidnap women and made sex slaves. Babies out of such abuse that were born giants were assimilated, those that remained human-size were rejected and separated with the kidnapped women to be their slaves.
The humans, fed up with the abusive giants, gathered together to device ways on how to get rid of them. They decided to deceive the giants by sending them delectable foods laden on a small boat. the giants upon seeing the boat, surmised it as offering of submission by the tiny humans and that the humans had finally conceded to their "superiority." The food however, was laced with poison.
The Dinagats only allowed all their fellow giants to partake of the food and prohibited human-sized slaves and the kinapped women to partake of the feast whom they treated as inferior class. All the giants were ultimately killed, except for the human-sized slaves, now Free. Thus the survivors called themselves "Samal," which said to be meant as dregs, or left-over.
For the Sama tribes, the biggest sin was the act of stealing another man’s wife.
this contempt for such offense must have been borne from that tragic chapter of their legendary history.
However, there were indeed accounts of first-hand witnesses (local inhabitants, construction workers, treasure hunters) who discovered skeletal remains in Samal. Most of these discovered remains were stolen and unaccounted for. Even foreign scientists investigated the phenomenon. but mediocre nartional historical authorities (as they had, until recently, ignored the role of Mindanao legacy in mainstream history lessons ) outrightly dismissed these priceless gems of local history that could otherwise spell the difference to the dysfunctional state of this oligarch-dominated state and society.
Even the Sama's creation myth is very old, and eerily similar with the myths of the ancient Sumerians (Abraham's father was a Sumerian priest) supposedly the oldest civilization in the World, according to western historians that is.It was also intriguing that the bible mentioned about such giants most probably borrowed from Sumerian accounts, known as Nephilims, borne of angel (read: extraterrestrial) and human parents.
the Samal creation myth, based on my personal research, may explain the phenomenon of Asteroid Belt far in the Solar system. On the other hand, my personal research also hinted that parts of the Bagobo People's creation myth may partly explain the phenomenon of water-less Mars.
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