Obsidian Bullets and Ancient Amulets

Surigao’s Tektite Secrets

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Obsidian Bullets and Ancient Amulets - Surigao’s Tektite Secrets

10 August 2025 Feature | Surigao Historical Society | Local History

Stones from Fire and Sky

Across the fields of Placer and the slopes of Bagasanon (also rendered in some accounts as Bagasinan), farmers and hunters once turned up curious, glassy-black stones, heavy for their size, smooth to the touch, and shaped like raindrops that hardened in midair. Villagers called them “bala ng kidlat” (lightning bullets) or kept them as anting‑anting (amulets). In the historical and scientific notes gathered in Chapter III of Surigao Across the Years, these objects are identified as tektites—ancient natural glass associated with violent geological events and, just as importantly, with the beliefs and practices of Surigao’s earliest inhabitants.

What makes these stones vital is not only how they formed, but what people did with them. In Surigao, the finds in Placer and Bagasanon sit at the crossroads of geology and human story: stones born of catastrophe, later turned into tools, charms, and symbols by communities who read meaning in every feature of the land.

What Tektites Are, and Why They Matter Here

Tektites are natural glass created when surface materials are melted and ejected by extraordinary forces, then cool rapidly as they fall back to earth. In the context of Surigao’s deep past, already shaped by subduction, volcanism, and seismic upheaval, tektites are the mineral echoes of a landscape in motion. Chapter III notes that Surigao’s finds belong to the same family of enigmatic stones known across Asia, but with a local story: here, they were picked up, kept, traded, and repurposed by people who walked these hills long before written chronicles.

The value of these stones is therefore double: they are geological witnesses to violent ancient processes, and they are cultural witnesses to how the first Surigaonons interpreted, used, and cherished their environment.

Obsidian Bullets, Sacred Charms

In oral memory recorded in local histories, the glassy stones of Placer and Bagasanon were often treated as protective objects, kept in pockets, sewn into waist wraps, or placed in small containers in the home. Their glossy black sheen, unusual shapes, and stubborn hardness fed the belief that they had a powerful origin: struck from lightning, dropped by the sky, or gifted by the mountains.

But utility sat beside belief. The same dense glass that made a tektite alluring also made it useful: edges could be sharpened for cutting or scraping, tips flaked for piercing or engraving. Chapter III frames this dual role clearly, Surigao’s tektites lived two lives at once: as implements and as amulets, bridging survival and spirituality in a world where no line separated the practical from the sacred.

Placer and Bagasanon: Windows to the Earliest Surigaonons

The pattern of finds in Placer and Bagasanon is more than a catalog of unusual stones; it is a clue to settlement and lifeways. Where people found, kept, or shaped tektites, they also camped, hunted, buried, and traded. Chapter III connects these localities to Surigao’s prehistoric horizon, the long era before Spanish contact when communities along rivers and ridges built knowledge from stone, bone, fiber, and shell.

Seen this way, each tektite is a small field note in a larger story:

Settlement: people were present, and attentive to their environment, where these stones turn up.
Technology: the hardness and glassy fracture of tektites made them candidates for simple tools.
Belief: their rarity and “sky‑fallen” aura made them objects of protection and status.

From Geology to Anthropology: Reading the Stones

The Surigao record in Chapter III shows how earth-science clues (eruption debris, natural glass, unusual mineral forms) feed directly into human-science questions (use, meaning, movement). The tektites of Placer and Bagasanon stand with other traces of Surigao’s deep past, shell middens, earthenware, and later, traded porcelain, forming a continuum from prehistoric adaptation to early exchange.

Crucially, Chapter III uses these stones to press a broader point: long before any colonizer drew maps of Caraga, communities here had already mapped their world through things they could hold, stones that cut, stones that healed, stones that protected. The tektite is evidence not only of impact and fire, but of choice, craft, and belief.

Meaning That Traveled

Small, portable, and striking to the eye, tektites were easily carried, gifted, or bartered. Chapter III situates Surigao’s finds within wider Austronesian patterns, where rare stones circulated as tokens of kinship, marriage gifts, or talismans worn at the waist or around the neck. Even if a stone began as an accident of heat and gravity, it could end its journey as a personal emblem, folded into songs, taboos, and stories told by firelight.

The Questions They Leave Us

The strength of Surigao’s tektite story is how open‑ended it remains. Chapter III treats these stones as prompts:

What specific contexts (habitation layers, burial jars, riverside sites) will future digs reveal around Placer and Bagasanon?
How do tool marks or edge wear distinguish a kept charm from a worked implement?
Which beliefs about “stones from the sky” survive in local memory, and how might these echo older Austronesian motifs?

In asking such questions, the chapter models a Surigao history that is patient, local, and material, written not only in chronicles, but in things the earth itself provides.

Legacy of Stone and Spirit

When we hold a tektite from Placer or Bagasanon, we hold two pasts at once: the geological past of Surigao’s fiery making, and the human past of people who read the land closely and folded its gifts into life. Chapter III’s core insight is simple and profound: the earliest Surigaonons were already scientists and storytellers, shaping their world with tools and meanings drawn from the ground beneath their feet.

The black glass that once cut hide or guarded a traveler’s path now cuts through time, reminding us that before colonization, before the balanghai, before porcelain and tribute, there was already a Surigao that observed, adapted, believed, and made.

Five Questions to Spark Your Curiosity

What distinctive forms and surface textures do Surigao tektites show (e.g., tear‑drops, ovals), and what might these imply about their formation and handling?
In Placer and Bagasanon, what associated finds (charcoal, shells, pottery sherds) could help date contexts where tektites occur?
How did local notions of anting‑anting and bala ng kidlat shape the circulation of tektites within and between communities?
What wear patterns would separate a kept charm from a worked tool in Surigao’s prehistoric toolkit?
How can careful community‑based surveys in Placer and Bagasanon expand the record without disturbing culturally sensitive sites?

Explore Further, Engage Deeper

This story is just one of many hidden within the pages of Surigao Across the Years. To explore more: Interact with the book through Artificial Intelligence (AI):
Visit the customized GPT by Open AI HERE and the Book Section of the Surigao Historical Society HERE

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