Silagan

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Silagan

From Catanduanes, Tagalog

The Spanish friar Plasencia wrote in 1589 about the silagan, listed among Tagalog beliefs. He placed it on Catanduanes, in Bicol. In his account, it tears out the liver of a person dressed in white. Written sources are few.

Folklore is retold; versions differ.

Sources: Blair and Robertson vol. 7, Plasencia, Customs of the Tagalogs (1589)

The story

The silagan is one of the sorcerers named in an old Spanish record. Fray Juan de Plasencia listed it in his 1589 account of Tagalog beliefs, which Blair and Robertson printed in 1903 (public domain). He placed it on the island of Catanduanes, in the Bicol region. He gave it a place in a list of seven priests and witches.

In his telling, a silagan would tear out the liver of a person seen in white clothes, and the person would die. Plasencia added a case of a Spanish notary who died this way. The same list names the hocloban, a witch who could kill by a greeting or a raised hand, and the magtatangal, who flies at night without head or entrails. Plasencia said he thought the last of these was a fable, though people swore they had seen it.

No later folk tale or local detail about the silagan is known. The record comes from one friar's list, so the stories may be partial.