Balangay

Balangay, also referred to as Balanghai, is a long- boat, which was used in the Philippines during the Middle Ages as war, trade and passenger boat. Eleven oceangoing ships were recovered during excavations in the city of Butuan City on the island of Mindanao. These have become known as the Butuan boats and are considered archaeologically and historically particularly valuable because the Balangay is the only known type of boat that was used only in Southeast Asia over a period of 1,300 years. The word comes from the Balangay Austronesian language family, meaning sailboat.

Balangay - boat types

The known Balangaybootstypen include both rowing, as well as pure sailing ships. The Yami tribe in the south of Taiwan Balangays used to this day as rowing boats for short trips at sea. A similar boat shape also use the residents in the Malay Archipelago, Indonesia and Malaysia.

The ships funded during the archaeological excavations in Butuan City for days, however, were pure ocean-going sailing ships. They were about 15 meters long, four meters wide and could carry up to 90 people. The planking of vessels similar to the European designed Kraweelbauweise. The boats did not have high superstructures, but was a flat, home -like shelter, which corresponded to one third of the boat length, are detected. The type of sail corresponded to that of a lateen sail, which allowed the ships to cruise against the wind. The construction of the oldest Balangay was around the year 320 AD to specify the other ten ships date from the 10th to 12th century AD An excavated boat is in Balangay - Shrine Museum, Butuan City, a else in the National Museum of the Philippines in Manila. Three replicas of Balangays are back on the high seas since 2009 and has already put back several thousand nautical miles. These boats were baptized in the name Masawa Hong Butuan, Diwata ng Lahi and Sama Tawi Tawi.

Historical significance of Balangays

The findings in Butuan Chinese were able to confirm reports that merchants in the China of the Song Dynasty sailed from the Philippines to trade. Typical commercial products of the Filipinos were among other beeswax, betel nuts, fabrics and beads. The oldest of these reports are from a chronicler and are dated to the year 982 AD from Canton. The merchants came from the island of Ma -i, which, according to the sources corresponds to Mindoro. Other reports of Philippine merchants come from chroniclers of the Yuan Dynasty and Ming Dynasty. In unison, the Chinese sources that the Philippine merchants with their own ships arrived in China, the Balangays. Two other ships of this type were found in Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula. This suggests that this type of boat was on trade routes in Southeast Asia in use.

Historical reports of Balangays

The first historical accounts of the ship type of Balangay originate exclusively from the Spanish chroniclers. The first dates from the year 1521 by the chronicler Antonio Pigafetta, who belonged to the expedition of Ferdinand Magellan. He wrote: " We met on two Balanghai called vessels which were filled with men. On one of the two lived a king and his entourage. " Another was built in 1542 by Ruy Lopez de Villalobos. More Spanish documents suggest that in the 16th century Balangays sailed from the Philippines and to Borneo, Thailand and Japan. In the 17th century the boot type then died out, however, since Filipinos could not possess a suitable oceangoing ships more. The Spanish caravels were more efficient and could hold more charge.

Sociological significance

In precolonial times the word Balangay was not just a name for boats and sailing ships in the Philippines. The word also referred to a village or a family clan, who settled on the coast and could account for some 30 to 100 families. This stood in front of a Datu. From the concept of term Cabeza de Barangay was derived from the Spanish, before the short form Barangay use today evolved from this.