Monstrum

(female narrator) It has a long, thin tongue, the wings of a bat, and a taste for the bloody insides of sleeping victims.

So gross.

It's a self-segmenting vampiric female monster with dangling intestines.

This thing is insane.

Thank you, PBS Digital Studios.

I'm finally making a show about manananggal.

[intro music] I'm Dr. Emily's Zarka, and this is "Monstrum."

I've been dying to do this episode since I first pitched this series.

There's something so odd and obviously disturbing about this particular monster.

The manananggal is one of many types of aswang , a Filipino word meaning demon, ghoul, or witch.

These demonic creatures have appeared in literature as early as 1582 in Spanish missionary text.

But before the Spanish arrived, it's very likely that the indigenous peoples of the Philippines already had oral folklore about this monster.

The vicious organ-sucking manananggal is sort of like an aswang subspecies.

There are many different types of monsters in the Philippines that are labeled as aswang, but their appearance and habits divide them into subcategories.

There is the blood-sucking vampire, the man-eating weredog, the vindictive evil-eye witch, the carrion-eating ghoul, and the subject of this video, the self-segmenting viscera sucker.

The name manananggal comes from the Filipino word meaning "to remove or to separate."

This is what makes this aswang particularly unique because she detaches her upper body from her lower torso.

She then soars across the skies at night with bat-like wings.

But during the day, the manananggal is said to look like a beautiful woman.

She has adapted successfully, concealing her monstrous form and maintaining normal relationships.

They can even be married.

Her true nature is revealed at night when her arms convert to wings, her torso divides, and she flies under the cover of darkness looking for human victims.

She's known to use her long, thread-like tubular tongue to reach through an opening in a window or roof, entering into the victim's body through the ears, nose, mouth, or abdomen to feed on some pretty disgusting stuff like the discarded phlegm from sick people or entire livers, lungs, intestines, and hearts of adult victims, and even fetuses.

Pregnant women are rumored to be their ideal prey.

Like I said, they are really gross.

To prevent the monster from going back to her normal human form, one can sprinkle ashes, vinegar, spices, garlic, or salt onto her lower body stump, which will prevent her from becoming whole again.

So to conceal her identity and seamlessly return to that of a normal woman in the morning, the manananggal hides the lower half of her body while she hunts.

This is very important for her to do because she will die if her upper torso cannot reattach before daybreak.

Banana groves are reportedly good hiding spots, maybe because banana trunks can look like human legs.

Their creation story is just as bizarre.

A woman is transformed into a manananggal if she eats a baby black chicken that has been produced from the throat of an older existing manananggal.

But there is one way to cure a newly transformed manananggal by removing the baby chick from her stomach before it matures.

Supposedly, this can be done by hanging the woman upside down from a tree and beating and fumigating her, or by swinging her violently until she pukes up the bird, which both, to be honest, also seem pretty horrifying.

If it's too late for all that and you need to kill the manananggal but you can't find its lower torso to season, there's always a good old sharp bamboo spear in the back.

Some of the reasoning behind these attributes is a mystery.

But I do have a few guesses.

By naming pregnant women and unborn children the ideal prey, unexpected complications of pregnancy, even miscarriage, could be blamed on a monster.

And the tubular tongue thing might have taken some inspiration from the large mosquito population in the Philippines.

But those are only small parts of all this weirdness.

We can speculate as to why this violent female viscera sucker became more prevalent after Spanish colonization of the Philippines in 1521.

Before the Spanish influence, kinship and inheritance were bilateral, with both male and female familial lines recognized.

Divorce was socially acceptable and could be initiated by either party.

Some women in ancient Filipino cultures also held important roles, serving as shaman priestesses, mediums, and healers.

They had important duties and were involved in many ceremonies and rituals, including presiding over ancestral offerings of food and drink.

As mediums, they could predict the future by reading signs in nature, and also interpret dreams.

Considered the keepers of historical knowledge, they would retell the myths that influenced cultural morals.

Women also served as herbalist and midwives, which are valuable roles in society.

But Spanish colonialism had a dramatic effect on indigenous religious practices and the roles of women and sexuality.

The pre-colonial Filipino cultures didn't put a particular value on chastity for any gender.

Although, extramarital relationships were seen as improper only for women.

When the Spanish came and promoted, even enforced Christianity, non-marital sexual relationships were increasingly discouraged and procreation was promoted as the primary purpose for sexuality.

Removing sexual, social, and religious power from the female population in indigenous communities changed how women were perceived.

The midwives, herbalists, and shamans were recast as witches to discredit their influence.

Enter the manananggal.

Think about it.

It's a female monster who threatens to eat fetuses among other things.

It's literally an exact reversal of the work associated with midwifery.

You could even argue that the reason these creatures detach their upper bodies is to separate them from their sexual organs.

Some scholars argue that the lingering effects of the manananggal include architectural elements.

A fear of these monsters in rural areas may have led to changes in how homes were constructed, including the addition of steep pitches on the roof and strategically placed windows to discourage perching.

Social habits may have been affected too.

Children slept in the center of the room or between parents to protect them from the long tongue of the manananggal.

Another cultural practice could have been influenced by fear this creature: how balute is consumed.

Balute is the Filipino term for fertilized duck egg that is boiled and eaten directly from the shell.

No one is really sure how long balute has been consumed in the Philippines because part of Spanish conquest included burning the writings of indigenous people.

Nevertheless, there are some particular ways of eating balute that might be explained by the manananggal.

A 2002 study of balute eaters revealed that although many of the respondents enjoyed eating it, they were disgusted with the idea of eating the embryo, especially if they saw the chick.

Could this be why the manananggal is the ultimate taboo, because it not only eats children, but the unborn?

Some said that eating balute, quote, "makes a person like an aswang, also known as a manananggal."

Remember, the manananggal and other aswang are said to be driven away by salt and spices.

Balute is commonly eaten with pepper, vinegar and chilies, salt, or other spices, perhaps in order to unconsciously ward off the negativity they associate with the monsters that prey on the unborn.

I can't help but think this connects back to how these monsters are said to be created, by swallowing a young bird.

Which came first?

The balute or the manananggal?

Filipino horror movies featuring traditional monsters contributed to a national identity by revitalizing traditional folklore, like manananggals.

She's been a staple in Filipino cinema since pioneer filmmaker Jose Nepomuceno made "Ang Manananggal" 1927.

We'll never know what this first manananggal on film looked like since that movie did not survive.

But she does appear alongside other aswang in the 1932 film "Ang Aswang" and more recently in a 2016 film.

A few of the female self-segmenting viscera suckers have appeared in Filipino popular culture... [shrieking] ...but very few globally.

These monsters are relatively unknown outside of Southeast Asia.

But that might be changing.

Netflix is reportedly developing an animated series based on the Filipino comic, "Trese."

The award-winning series follows a female detective who solves supernatural crimes.

There's even a gang war between an aswang clan and a manananggal clan.

The manananggal's evolution is rooted in the indigenous history of the Philippines.

It reveals how Spanish colonialization forever changed their culture.

She is one of the more physically unique monsters I've come across.

I think we should be seeing more of this stomach-churning creature.

So who wants to make a horror movie?