anitos

Anitos are ancestral spirits and deities in the pre-colonial and early colonial religious systems of the Philippines. The term, rooted in Tagalog usage, refers both to the beings themselves and to the carved images or idols that represented them in households and shrines. In many communities, anitos were believed to mediate between the living and the spirit world, guiding daily life, harvests, health, and fate.

Ritual practices surrounding anitos typically involved home altars, offerings of food and drink, flowers, incense, and libations. Ritual specialists, often women known as babaylan or other designated leaders, conducted ceremonies, interpreted signs, and performed divination to seek guidance or protection from the spirits. Anitos could be associated with specific ancestors, local nature spirits, or household deities, and the pantheon varied by region and group. In some traditions, prominent deities such as Bathala Maykapal (the creator) or fertility figures like Lakapati were invoked alongside ancestral spirits and diwata, or benevolent nature spirits.

Regional variations were significant. Tagalogs, Visayans, Ilocanos, and other ethnic groups each maintained their own sets of spirits, shrines, and customary practices. The arrival of Spanish colonizers catalyzed Christianization and the suppression of indigenous idols, leading to syncretism where Christian saints and rituals absorbed aspects of anito worship.

Today, references to anitos persist in ethnographic literature and discussions of Philippine cultural heritage. Some communities maintain traditional altars or revivals of ancestral cult practices, while scholars use the concept to study early Filipino belief systems and their transformations under colonization and modernization.