The History of Sulu

The first object sought in the search for the Genealogy of Sulu was a knowledge of those significant historical events of Sulu which antedated the Spanish discovery and conquest of the Philippine Islands, the connection which those events might have had with the earlier history of the other islands and the light that they might throw upon the subject of prehistoric Malayan immigration to the Archipelago. The tarsila (genealogies)1 of Mindanao show that events of considerable importance had occurred in the Archipelago, especially in the south, long before the Portuguese or the Spaniards reached Malaysia. Some tribes, such as the Samals, we were told, had emigrated from western Malaysia to the Sulu Archipelago and Mindanao, and indications were not wanting that probably other tribes, now inhabiting the Philippine Islands, came from the same place. Further, information was desired relative to the mohammedanization of Sulu and the possible connection that such a movement might have had with the introduction of Islam into Sumatra and Malacca.