The widowed
If either party to a marriage dies the other does not remarry for
one year. There is no penalty enforced by the group for an earlier
marriage, but the custom is firmly fixed. Should the surviving person
marry within a year he would die, being killed by an anito whose
business it is to punish such sacrilege. The widowed frequently
remarry, as there are certain advantages in their married life. It
is quite impossible for a man or woman alone to perform the entire
round of Igorot labors. The hours of labor for the lone person must
usually be long and tiresome.
Most of the widowed live in the katyufong, the smaller dwelling
of the poor. The reason for this is that even if one has owned the
better class of dwelling, the fayu, it is generally given to a child
at marriage, the smaller house being sufficient and suitable for the
lone person, especially as the widowed very frequently take their
meals with some married child.
Orphans
Orphans without homes of their own become members of the household of
an uncle or aunt or other near relative. The property they received
from their parents is used by the family into whose home they go. Upon
marriage the children receive the property as it was left them,
the annual increase having gone to the family which cared for them.
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