Keeping my inner Marites at bay is a virtue.

Sorting through thousands of audio reels my uncle, the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos, recorded from 1965 to 1986, I would come across a great number of boxes of audio reels with the phrase “Off the record” written on them in capital letters. I needed to distract myself to prevent me from listening to every single audio reel I would encounter that had this label on it.

HIDDEN TREASURES A collection of audio reels from former President Ferdinand E. Marcos recorded from 1965 to 1986

“Eye on the prize,” I tell myself, which is “Rescue, Recovery, Conservation, Preservation” in a loop in my head! But a 1986 batch of “Off the record” audio reels, taped together as if to signify even more of its importance, was a real test! After all, these were my uncle’s thoughts that led to decisions during a period in our country’s history that greatly changed not only the course of my life but of the entire nation.

Seeing progress in my work, arranging these reels in chronological order, is very satisfying. If I had succumbed to my impulses, I’d still be in year 1965! Embarking on this segment of the recovery and conservation work on the belongings of my late uncle and aunt in their old home in San Juan, I knew this archival endeavor would take a long time, but having started has made it one day less of a long process.
Figuring out the past is long and laborious, especially if you have little material to work on. I am lucky since I have tangible forensic materials from which information can be extracted in bulk versus let’s say materials archaeologists have to go by at times.

WHAT ARE HIS THOUGHTS? The late President Marcos, as seen here writing at his desk at Malacanan Palace, has gone through much during his lifetime

One research article published June 2023—“The Invisible Plant Technology of Prehistoric Southeast Asia: Direct Evidence for Basket and Rope-Making at Tabon Cave, Philippines, 39-33,000 Years Ago” by our very own homegrown Filipino archaeologists Sheldon Jago-on, Timothy James Vitales, Dante Manipon Noel Amano, John Rey Callado, Danilo Tandang, Omar Choa, and French prehistorian and ethnoarcheaologist Hermine Xhauflair—illustrates how information can be gleaned from just a few materials. In the case of Tabon Cave in Palawan, a treasure trove of prehistoric zoological and archaeological materials, it was three stone tools. Based on the dates mentioned, the stone tools were used during the Ice Age or Pleistocene Epoch. The Ice Age started 2.4 million years and ended 11,500 years ago. In the study, the stone tools found were created during the last Glacial Period (LGP) from c. 115,000—c. 11,700 years ago. During the Pleistocene Epoch, the world experienced a number of glacial and interglacial periods that saw changes in the behavior of people, along with changes in their environment.

MEET THE ARCHAELOGISTS Filipino archaelogists Timothy Vitales and Dante Manipon with French archeobotanist Hermine Xhauflair show Tabon Cave stone tools with evidence of basket and rope making 39-33,000 years ago

A lot of materials in the past were made out of organic material—textile, baskets, cord, etc. Unfortunately, organic materials decompose rapidly, especially with the “combined effects of bacteria, fungi, and insects,” thus we have lost vast records of them through time. Some of the tools to make them, however, have survived. Archaeologists have recovered and analyzed them to figure out what they were used for and, if lucky, even “why.”

PREHISTORIC FIBER TECHNOLOGY An artist rendition of inhabitants of Tabon Cave (39-33,000 years ago) working on plant fiber to be used to make baskets and cords

This group of archaeologists experimented using flake tools, as people in the past, especially in the Stone Age, would have done. In fact, this technology is still used today, albeit with more modern equipment. The archaeologists discovered a distinct pattern of use or “use-wear” on the stone tools in their experiments. You see when you perform a task using a tool, that tool will bear signs of wear and tear, so these archaeologists, using very powerful microscopes, compared these use-wear patterns on the flake tools they created and those on the three stone tools recovered from Tabon Cave. Similar patterns were found and it was concluded that the stone tools from Tabon Cave show “clear evidence of how the earliest Homo sapiens in the Philippines used a technique to thin fiber to possibly make a variety of materials like cordage, baskets, and traps,” 39-33,000 years ago.

TRACES OF THE PAST Micro-traces of plant fiber processing on stone tool

Speaking of organic material culture in the Philippines and almost lost technologies, I came across a fantastic reference collection of callado embroidery found on the old ternos of my aunt, the former First Lady Imelda Romualdez Marcos. I soon discovered that the technology to create these intricate patterns on fabric is fast disappearing. Some designs, in fact, have disappeared. But because we still have samples of these different designs on vintage ternos, we are able to revisit, revive, and reinvent this almost forgotten art form.

BEAUTY OF EMBROIDERY Author's attempt at callado embroidery. From left clockwise: Tapak Manok design, cross stitch design, and a sample of callado diretso with no other heavy embroidery

When I began my master’s in archaeology, I took up a class on cave art. I learned that cave art functions as a library, where knowledge is encoded and retrieved. It also serves a religious or cosmic purpose. I have always believed tangible and intangible heritage tells us what people in the past deemed important and why. For instance, the use of cordage and boats helped in ensuring the community’s survival. The art of callado, said to have been introduced by foreign nuns during the Spanish colonial period, flourished because there was a demand for these intricate yet laborious embroideries by the women of Philippine high society who, in turn, provided income for women in the community. Both cases helped ensure the survival of the people who came before us.

As for my uncle’s audio reels, even the entries in his diaries, there is a wealth of knowledge we can gain from them, and the how-tos for dealing not only with political but also economic, social, and cultural challenges life can throw at us. In them, there is a survival manual of sorts for the worst possible scenarios. After all, no one in Philippine history can say he has gone through as much and for so long! Well, his wife may have, but that’s a topic for another article.

As Don R. Dickson has put it in his article, “The Importance of Archaeology,” cultural materials “unveil the path of progress physically, mentally, and otherwise, so that we today may see our approximate relationship to those persons who have walked before us.”

We don’t just simply jot down the “pattern of man’s inventiveness” or chronicle the dates when ancient cultures rise and fall. What we learn from the past can serve as an indicator of just how much we have progressed, just how much we have learned, and just how much farther we need to go.