AI illustration
Pugot
In Ilocano belief, the pugot is a spirit whose name means "decapitated one". It can look like a pig, a dog or a person. Most often it appears as a big black headless being. It likes dark places and duhat trees.
Folklore is retold; versions differ.
Sources: Wikipedia: Pugot (CC BY-SA 4.0) · Wikidata (CC0)
The story
The pugot is a spirit of the Ilocos region. Its name means "decapitated one." It can take the form of a pig, a dog or a person, but most tellers describe a big, black being with no head. It lives in dark places, such as empty houses, and in trees. Its favorites are the duhat, santol and tamarind.
The pugot is said to move very fast and to eat snakes and insects. With no head, it feeds by pushing food into its neck stump. People call it frightening but mostly harmless. One odd habit is told with a smile: it steals women's underwear that hang on the clothesline to dry.
A related being appears in an Ifugao story, "Tulud Nimputul" ("The Self-Beheaded"). In that tale, the hero meets the headless figure and feeds it chopped chicken mixed with blood. The Ifugao story and the Ilocano belief may not be the same tradition, so no single origin is claimed.
Sources on the pugot are short and modern, and no old Spanish-era record is known. People say the creature is not a threat.