Talk:Ancient Filipino diet and health

Context for the discussion of "Ethnolinguistic groups" is urgently needed.
It's a bit disconcerting that this article on Ancient Filipino diet goes into a discussion about contemporary indigenous peoples' diets without bothering to explain why that section is there. I understand that the article presumes the idea of preserved folkways. But that idea has its limitations, and at the very least, it should be given context. Otherwise the article risks making it sound like "Ethnolinguistic groups" are "Ancient Filipinos." You can see how that can easily be construed as offensive. So. Context is needed. The sooner, the better. - Chieharumachi (talk) 15:57, 19 August 2021 (UTC)


 * The indigenous in the Philippines are heavy consumers of maize and sweet potato. By definition, maize, cassava, and sweet potato are all not ancient because they can't have been consumed in the Philippines prior to the Columbian exchange. Just even listing maize in an "Ancient Filipino diet" is disconcerting. 124.104.199.92 (talk) 11:45, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

The whole article is glaringly inaccurate
For the staple crops:

1. Rice is popular and ancient, but rice grows best in places with a distinct dry season, and prior to modern aagricultural technology, production was low in the more equatorial climates in Visayas and Mindanao. As Spanish contact era accounts say, only in Luzon was there a developed irrigated rice economy taking advantage of the much more seasonal climates in the north, and thus, only in Luzon was rice consumed as the dominant staple in the anncient diet, being just a prestige crop in the rest of the country.

2. Maize is a Spanish colonial era introduction, and it would have been impossible to have been introduced to the country prior to the Columbian exchange. In fact, historical documents show that maize, particularly white maize, only became prominent in the diets of especially the Central and Eastern Visayas and Mindanao, after the Americans promoted their cultivation, the 20th century in other words.

3. Among the root crops, it was mostly yams and taro, including giant taro. Spanish contact era accounts extensively discuss taro and yam as the dominant staple in the more equatorial Philippines. Sweet potato and manioc are also both products of the Columbian exchange.

4. "Kitchen gardens mostly contained herbs and vines while seasoning has not been significant to native Filipino cookery, however this is up to debate as trading with Asian neighbors such India and Indonesia may have introduced certain spices to the Filipino diet especially in areas such as Mindanao, which was most likely lost due to Spanish colonization." The Philippines has a long tradition of backyard vegetable gardens called bakuran, which function inn the same way ass the pekarangan of Indonesia. Filipinos both gather vegetables in the wild (paggugulay), cultivate in their backyards (bakuran), and have community gardens where everyone in the village are assigned plots in the land best for vegetables, usually the nutrient rich alluvial soil next to rivers (tumana). Also, if we're talking about ancient diets, the spices and seasonings used in Thai and Indonesian cuisine is only recently being used by the common people, because, as in the rest of the world, they were exceedingly expensive.

5. "Though coconut has been considered a commercial crop due to its wide variety of uses, it is still only a complementary or specialty item just as the other crops in this category." This is belied by Spanish contact era accounts discussing the extent of coconut plantations in the preHispanic Philippines. Coconuts were used for coconut oil and in the production of both liquor and vinegar, one of the two main sources for both (the other is sugarcane). But for food, it is most prominently used for coconut milk, which is one of the most common additives in Filipino cuisine both in ancient times up to today. The earliest known archaeological dish in the Philippines is kinilaw, which uses both coconut vinegar and coconut milk.

6. "Coffee and cacao have also been introduced by the Spaniards and although both plants spread widely and Philippine conditions are suitable for it but neither caught on sufficiently to be promoted as a strong agricultural product." The Philippines used to be the among the biggest producers of coffee in the world, and continues to be attaached to the traditional liberica coffee grown. Cacao prepared as hot chocolate is a prominent part of early modern Filipino cuisine.

Everything about that section is wrong. Plus, since we're talking about ancient food, here's what's left undiscussed:

1. Sago starch was a prominent staple in Mindanao, both locally produced and important enough to be imported from further south.

2. Starchy bananas are also prominently used as a staple starch, in addition to the root crops. This is why up to today, the saba banana is still the most important banana cultivar regularly eaten in the Philippines.

For the fauna part:

1. "presence of ducks and geese as these are also present in southeast Asian mainland and therefore also the Philippines." There were ducks, but there is no evidence for the preHispanic presence of geese.

2. "The Spaniards added mutton to the traditional rice-fish-pork-chicken-beef dietary and the American further strengthened this influence so that lamb or mutton consumption increased steadily." Current mutton consumption in the Philippines is nearly negligible. Sheep simply do not do well in the tropics. The most prominent Spanish and American colonial eraa introduction is cattle, and yet beef is still an insignificant part of the Philippine diet, at most 3kg per capita.

3. Undiscussed in the seafood section was the presence of brackishwater fishponds growing milkfish and tiger prawns. In fact, the traditional preHispanic method of growing milkfish and prawns is still common among the poorer fish farmers: wild caught fry, fertilizing the pond to grow slime (lablab) as fish food, taking advantage of the tides for water exchange.

For the health section, it is bad showing to universalize ethnologies of particular ethnic groups to the whole of the Philippines, especially when we have extensive ethnologies based on Spanish contact era accounts of the ancient medical practices of the various ethnic groups, discussing the use of massage, fumigation, the extensive pharmacopeia of medicinal plants, the prominent use of water and washing as health tools.

Who wrote this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.104.199.92 (talk) 12:23, 7 April 2024 (UTC)