What Are The Theories Concerning The Peopling Of The Philippines?

The Philippines are a group of islands which were first discovered by Ruy López de Villalobos. The name Villalobos given to the islands was an homage to the then king of Spain, Philip II and the people there were called Pilipinos until they adopted a 28 letter alphabet which included the letter 'F' in 1987.

• Robert Lindsay has studied the peopling of the Philippines. He claims that the peopling of the country are better understood than that of neighboring Indonesia, and says that the islands were first settled by Negritos long ago. He goes on to comment that the Negritos in the Philippines are gradually becoming extinct in terms of both population and language/culture.

Lindsay notes how the languages spoken by people on the islands is changing from Negrito linguistics to Austronesian, and also comments on the genes of the Negrito and Filipino people. His brief article can be found at robertlindsay.wordpress.com/2009/03/16/the-peopling-of-the-p

• peoplingofthephilippines.blogspot.com/ is a web page dedicated to studying the peopling of the Philippines. It is a project in progress, and it discusses a number of the theories concerning the island's people. These theories range from Creationism, a Christian, biblical theory, to that of migration and the island origin hypotheses. The website gives evidence for each of its theories and is a valuable resource for those looking for secondary data when studying the Filipino people.

I've heard one theory that considers Filipino Contortionists, Manilla Folders.