Transfers of Property Arising from Family Relationships
49. Methods of transfer.—Property is transferred within a family by two methods: by assignment and transferal during the life of the owner; and by inheritance.
50. Assignment and transfer of property during the lifetime of the owner.—At some undefined time all the family property that one possesses is assigned to his children. By “assigned,” I mean “provisionally allotted,” subject to any legitimate charge or obligation against it. A family property is always subject to sale or pawn for the purpose of providing funeral feasts, sacrifices in time of sickness or other grave necessity, payments of fines, and indemnities, made on behalf of lineal ascendants and descendants and near collateral kin. The property is usually assigned when the children are quite small.
Property is transferred (that is to say, possession is given) to the children when they marry and separate from the household of the parents. By the time the youngest child has so separated, or even before, the parents have become a charge on their children. It is only sometimes, in the case of the very rich, that a portion of the property is reserved. Childless widowed aunts or uncles usually transfer their property to those who would otherwise inherit it, and so become a charge upon those persons.
51. Inheritance.—It is only in case of the death of the parents when the children are very small, or of the death of a more distant relative from whom it is inherited, that the Ifugao receives property by inheritance.
52. The passing of property between relatives because of relationship.—The same laws govern both the assignment and transfer of property while the possessor is yet living, and the inheritance of property. Of all Ifugao laws, they are the most definite and the most invariably followed.
53. The law of primogeniture.—By this law, the elder children inherit a greater portion of the property than the younger ones, the proportion being governed by the ordinal rank of the children as to birth. If there be but one rice field, the eldest takes it. Because of his greater wealth, the eldest is frequently the family leader, counselor, and advocate. He has no actual authority over his brothers and sisters, however—indeed no person in Ifugao society has authority over another.
54. The passing of property to legitimate sons and daughters by assignment or inheritance.
(a) No distinction is made because of sex.
(b) The greatest proportion of an estate goes to the eldest child.
(c) If the number of children be greater than the number of rice fields, the elder children take the fields. If there be but one field, the eldest takes it.
(d) If all the children inherit rice fields, the heirlooms and personal property are divided in accordance with the laws of primogeniture that apply to real estate.
(e) If there be children that inherit no rice fields, a slight compensation is made them by giving them a larger share of the heirlooms and personal property than would fall to their lot otherwise. This compensation by no means equals the value of the real estate they would inherit under our laws.
(f) In the event of the death of either spouse before the property of the spouses has been allotted to the children, the living spouse allots the property to the children at the proper time. In this allotment, the brothers of the dead spouse are usually called in consultation. The living spouse may not deviate from custom in allotting the property of the deceased. All the property of both the spouses must be allotted at this time. None may be held back.
55. The passing of property to other relatives.—In the apportionment or inheritance of property in which blood relatives other than sons and daughters benefit, two general principles hold:
(a) Property received from the father goes to the father’s family; property received from the mother goes to the mother’s family. The families of the two parents coalesce in, and are identical in, their children and their childrens’ descendants.
(b) So near as may be, those persons inherit who would have inherited the property had the deceased never lived. It is only in the case of the childless that others than sons and daughters have rights in the property left.
If the deceased were unmarried, his property goes to his relatives in the following order:
(1) To his brothers and sisters, if living. To the brothers and sisters descended from one parent, passes that portion of the property received from that parent; to the brothers and sisters descended from the other parent, that portion of the property received from that parent.
(2) To the nephews and nieces, the offspring of the brothers and sisters, or to their descendants.
(3) To the cousins in order, first of degree, and second of primogeniture.
If the deceased were married, in the the inheritance of his property there are the following rules:
(1) The living spouse inherits the sole right in, and possession of, half the property jointly acquired by the spouses subsequent to their marriage. It is not, properly speaking, the property that is inherited: it is the sole right in what was a joint possession before.
(2) That half of the property jointly acquired by the spouses which is the share of the deceased, goes to his heirs, being divided (if his heirs be not his brothers and sisters or their descendants) equally between the heirs on the father’s side, and those on the mother’s side.
(3) The property that the deceased brought to the marriage and that which he acquired subsequently owing to and by virtue of his relationship to his family, goes to the deceased’s family.
Personal property acquired by the deceased and his spouse is not, however, taken from the surviving spouse. The above applies only to family property.
56. Property rights of bastards.—Bastards usually inherit approximately half the property of a father who dies without legitimate children, the other half going to those who would be the sole heirs had the father died childless. But if there be only one field, the bastard takes it.
Should a parent have only one legitimate child, the bastard inherits usually as if he were a younger legitimate child.
A bastard is entitled to a rice field from his father if the father has a rice field that is unassigned to a legitimate child. He is not entitled to any special value of fields, and as a rule, receives less than his legitimate brothers and sisters if there be such.
The above paragraphs apply equally to the bastard’s right in the property of his mother. He has, however, no kin to enforce his rights against his mother. Since he is of illegitimate birth, the kin of the father are not in a position to enforce his rights against her; while his mother’s kin would not take issue in any matter for him against their nearer kin, his mother. If the mother marries after the birth of the bastard, she usually makes a settlement on her bastard child before marrying. Not infrequently he who marries a woman having a bastard child recognizes that child as his own, and even assigns him a portion of his property. The following are examples:
Dulnuan and Ngahiu of Tupplak carried on a courtship, after the Ifugao fashion, in the agamang (dormitory). Ngahiu became pregnant; but Dulnuan refused to marry her. However, and notwithstanding the fact that he knew her to be pregnant, a third party, Baliu, married Ngahiu. From what motive he did this does not appear: it was probable that he gained financially, since Ngahiu was wealthier than he; and being pregnant as she was, she was in no position to stipulate too closely as to the property of the one who might become her husband. The bastard child, notwithstanding the fact that there were legitimate half brothers and sisters, was given fields by (a) his mother; (b) his natural father, Dulnuan; (c) Baliu, who recognized him as his son.
R, a Christianized Ifugao woman, and a wife who had borne five legitimate children to B, her husband, was indiscreet in her relations with a Spaniard. She bore a mestizo child. B, her husband, did not proceed against his wife and her paramour according to Ifugao law and recognized the child as his own. The legitimate children except one having died, the bastard child inherited from his mother and his mother’s husband as if he had been of legitimate birth.
There is a Malay proverb which is used to describe the attitude of the husband in such cases as the above: “Although I did not plant the tree, yet it grew in my garden.”
The amount of property that parents settle on a bastard is to a great extent a matter of caprice. His rights to any property whatever, except a single field from his father, are decidedly weaker than those of children of legitimate birth, added to which he has not the right in any case to so great a portion of property.
57. Transfers of property to adopted children.—Customs relating to these transfers are as follows:
(a) An adopted child related to only one of the spouses may inherit from that spouse only.
(b) If the adopted child be a niece or nephew, he inherits or has assigned him all the property of the related parent; provided that there be no brothers or sisters of the related parent except the adopted child’s own blood parents. If there be other brothers and sisters, and if these brothers and sisters agree to help stand the funeral expenses of the adopting brother or sister, a small part of the property is given them. But the adopted child inherits the greater part of the property.
(c) If the adopted child be the son or daughter of a cousin, there is assigned him, or he inherits all the property that his parents would inherit in case of the death of the related parent, and a portion in addition. Should the parents not be in the position of being likely to become heirs to the related adopting parent, the adopted child inherits, or has assigned him, only a minor portion of the estate. If there be no brothers and sisters of the parent by adoption, he may have assigned him the greater portion of the estate, however.
(d) If the adopted child be not related by blood to either of the parents by adoption, he inherits, or has assigned him, a small portion of the estate of both adopting parents. The kin of these parents take the lion’s share of the estate.
(e) If the adopted child marry a kinsman of the unrelated adopting parent, the unrelated parent usually settles on the spouse of the adopted child, an amount of property about equal to that settled on the adopted child by his kinsman, his other adopting parent, subject, however, to the four rules above.
(f) It is optional with the blood parents of an adopted child to settle no property on him, in case the parents by adoption provide for him in this respect.
The above settlements are customary. They can hardly be said to be rights, however. Often when a child is adopted, his blood parents stipulate with those who adopt as to the property settlement that will be made on the child.
58. Servants and slaves as inheritors.—Retainers have no rights whatever as to the property of their masters. Frequently, however, a small field is settled on them.
59. Wills and testaments.—There are no wills or testaments among the Ifugaos. If a man desires to make a settlement of his property that is out of the ordinary, he must do it before he dies. Even then he would have to get the family’s consent to the unusual features. Ifugao parents are singularly impartial in the allotment of the family property to their children. That some children are not loved more than others is unbelievable; but it is exceedingly rare that any child is favored above another in property settlements, except by the law of primogeniture. There is always a lot of talk in connection with the assignment or inheritance of family property—in the matter of talk the Ifugao is not different from other Malays. But it is not often that permanent ill feeling is engendered in such settlements. The laws of the descent of property are, as has been said, the clearest and most concise of all Ifugao laws.