Alphabitos and the Filipino Alphabet

At maelstrom, the training over the last few months has included the challenging “Alphabitos” – slashing and thrusting combinations that trace each of the 26 letters of the alphabet.  Letters can be further combined to generate “words” that are the basis for specific techniques.  There are even special “power words” that have particular effectiveness.

Some questions have arisen about the Latin script used for the Filipino alphabet, and what the original Filipino alphabet before the arrival of the Spanish might have looked like.  And it also raises questions about what an original set of Alphabitos might have been like (if they ever existed).

During the Pre-Hispanic Era, most of the languages of the Philippines were written in abugida, an ancient segmental writing system. Examples of this ancient Philippine writing system which descended from the Brāhmī script are the Kawi, Baybayin, Buhid, Hanunó’o, Tagbanwa, Butuan, Kapampangan and other Brahmic family of scripts known to antiquity. A controversial and debatable script of the Philippines is the Eskayan script.

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Baybayin script began to decline in the 17th century and became obsolete in the 18th century. The scripts that are still in use today by the indigenous Mangyan groups of the Philippines are the Buhid and the Hanunó’o script.

When the Spaniards arrived in 1521 and began to colonize the islands of the Philippines in 1565, they introduced the Latin script to the Catholicized Filipinos. When most of the Philippine languages were first written in the Latin script, they used the Spanish alphabet. This alphabet was called the Abecedario, the original alphabet of the Catholicized Filipinos, which variously had either 28, 29, 31, or 32 letters.

In 1959, the Institute of National Language renamed the Tagalog-Based National Language into Pilipino. On October 4, 1971, the Abakada alphabet was revised and expanded in order to accommodate words of Spanish and English origin. In 1987, the official language called Pilipino was renamed to Filipino.

For more information on Filipino Orthography, check out the links below-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filipino_orthography.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Philippine_scripts

(Re-produced under fair-use and with credit)

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