14/10/2025
Ito ang patunay na Ang mga Muslim at Ang mga subanen tribe at Ang mga manubo tribe at Ang mga maguinaon tribe at Ang mga maranao tribe ay magkadugo kami in the history.
Panganay raja tabunaway. panalawa raja mamalo.pangatlo putri tunina. Pang apat Raja Merileriled. pang lima Raja Homalandalan.pang anim bunso si raja Homabon or Gumabongabon bunso.
Si raja tabunaway ay. Pinuno Ng mga Maguindanaon at raja maguinda.
Si raja mamalo pinuno Ng mga manubo, tiruray tiboli,mandaya mamanoa,higaonon.
Si putri tunina Kasi napangasawa ni si Shariff kabunsuan pinuno Sila Ng mga tausog.
Si Raja merileriled ninuno Ng mga mamanoa mandaya.bagobo
Si raja homalan dalan pinuno Ng mga maranao.
Si raja homabon.or Gumabon Gabon pinuno Ng mga subanen or subanon.
Ang Mindanao ay nahati sa tatlo central Mindanao, southern Mindanao, northern Mindanao.
The Ancestral Journey of the Four Brothers
Chapter 1 โ The River of Beginnings (ca. 1200โ1400 CE)
Long before the names of foreign kings reached the shores of Mindanao, life in the Pulangi River Valley flourished. The great river, later called the Rio Grande de Cotabato, was a lifeline for thousands. Along its winding banks rose fishing villages, farming clearings, and wooden boats that carried goods to the seas.
From this fertile homeland came four brothers: Tabunaway, Dumalandalan, Gumabonabon, and Mamulo. Their family belonged to the early rulers of the Cotabato plain, a people bound to the river and the forests, guided by shamans and ancestral spirits.
Archaeological evidence uncovered in Cotabato โ fragments of pottery, glass beads, and tools from as early as the 10th century โ shows how their ancestors already traded with merchants from Borneo, the Malay Peninsula, and even China. This was the world the brothers were born into: rich in culture, yet about to face change.
Chapter 2 โ The Arrival of a New Faith (1450โ1500 CE)
By the middle of the 15th century, sails from faraway lands appeared on Mindanaoโs southern coasts. Arab and Malay Muslim traders had begun to settle, bringing not only goods but also a new faith. Around 1475โ1500, history records the arrival of Sharif Kabungsuan, a nobleman of Johore, who came to Cotabato bearing the banner of Islam.
Kabungsuan married into the ruling families of Cotabato and began shaping a new political and religious order: the Sultanate of Maguindanao. With his rise came the choice that would divide the four brothers.
Tabunaway, eldest among them, saw in Islam a path to unity and power. He embraced Kabungsuanโs teachings, accepted the faith, and was granted leadership as a datu allied with the Sultanate.
Dumalandalan, Gumabonabon, and Mamulo refused to give up the traditions of their ancestors. To them, the spirits of the forests, rivers, and mountains were life itself. They chose not conversion, but migration.
Chapter 3 โ The Departure (1500โ1600 CE)
The decision to part ways was not taken lightly. Yet the three brothers knew they could not remain under the growing rule of Islam in Cotabato. Thus began their exodus, a journey that would give birth to the Subanen people.
Dumalandalan led his followers westward through forests and mountains, settling in the uplands of Lapuyan, Kumalarang, and Lakewood. There, the sacred buklog ritual was preserved, a thanksgiving to the spirits who watched over the land.
Gumabonabon moved southward, establishing new settlements in Pagadian, Tukuran, and Sibugay. His people became guardians of rivers and fertile lowlands, carrying with them the chants and stories of their ancestors.
Mamulo, the youngest, traveled north to Sindangan, Dipolog, and Katipunan. In these valleys, his descendants multiplied, becoming one of the largest Subanen communities in the peninsula.
From that time forward, the three brothers and their people were called Suba-nen โ the people of the river. Wherever they settled, they built their lives near rivers, believing that flowing water carried the breath of the ancestors.
Chapter 4 โ The Path of Tabunaway (1500โ1600 CE)
While his brothers dispersed into the mountains, Tabunaway remained in Cotabato. He stood beside Sharif Kabungsuan, who became the first Sultan of Maguindanao. Through marriage and alliance, Tabunawayโs descendants entered the noble families of Cotabato and Lanao.
In the genealogical scrolls known as tarsilas, Tabunawayโs name is remembered as one of the earliest rulers who joined with Kabungsuan. His bloodline flowed into the royal clans that shaped Maguindanaoโs destiny.
Thus, the river valley that had once united four brothers now became a crossroads of two legacies: one Islamic and royal, the other indigenous and free.
Chapter 5 โ Struggles and Survival (1600โ1900 CE)
For centuries, the Subanen lived apart from the sultanates and from the colonizers who came after. When the Spanish arrived in 1565 and built forts in Zamboanga by the early 17th century, they encountered Subanen groups in the mountains. Spanish records called them โpagan mountain dwellers,โ people who resisted both Islam and Christianity.
The Subanen retreated deeper into the uplands, where they farmed, hunted, and kept their rituals alive. They preserved their oral epics, dances, and rituals, passing down the memory of the four brothers who once stood at the Pulangi River.
Chapter 6 โ The Legacy of the Four Brothers (1900โPresent)
By the 20th century, the Subanen were spread across the Zamboanga Peninsula, from Misamis Occidental in the north, to Zamboanga del Sur, Zamboanga del Norte, and Sibugay.
The descendants of Dumalandalan are remembered in Lapuyan and Lakewood, where the buklog ritual continues as a symbol of unity.
The line of Gumabonabon thrives in Pagadian and Sibugay, where traditional chants are still recited in ritual gatherings.
The family of Mamulo is strongest in Sindangan, Dipolog, and Katipunan, remembered in genealogies recited by elders.
The bloodline of Tabunaway endures in the noble houses of Maguindanao, tied to the sultanates of Cotabato and Lanao.
To this day, Subanen elders recount the story of the brothers โ a story that explains both their kinship with Muslim Mindanao and their difference. It is a tale of division, of survival, and of fidelity to the spirits of the earth and water.
Epilogue
The rivers of Cotabato gave birth to four brothers, but history divided them. One embraced Islam and entered the chronicles of sultans. Three walked away, choosing to remain loyal to the unseen spirits of nature. In their exile, they created a new people โ the Subanen โ whose songs and rituals continue to echo the voices of their ancestors.
Their story is not only legend but memory, written in both oral tradition and historical record, binding the past to the present.
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