This was the writing system used by the natives of The Philippine Islands before Spanish colonization. Also known as Alibata, Baybayin is the proper term to describe such writing system. The former was coined by Paul RodrÃguez Verzosa after the arrangement of letters from the Arabic alphabet (Alif-ba-ta) with the "f" eliminated. Baybay means "to spell" in Tagalog, the main language used in Luzon Island especially Manila. The alphabet system was used during Spanish colonization but to a lesser extent to the introduction of The Latin Alphabet and Romanization of the inhabitant's language and writing system. Today, Filipinos used The Latin Alphabet in terms of writing and written communication. But Baybayin is still widely studied by scholars and is making a come-back especially in popular Filipino culture. On a personal note, the revival of this writing system and with a few modifications would be useful due to the fact The Philippines is an Asian country and in which many countries within this continent have their own writing systems such as Pinyin / Kanji / Hamja, Hangul or Katakana.
Thanks for sharing, Da and Ra are the same? I could see getting Ha and Ya confused as well depending on the penmenship of the writer.
It must be because The Pre Hispanic Filipino language has not fully developed during that time and most likely our language history is still derived from Malay. Today, many Filipino words especially Tagalog have Spanish words in it's vocabulary. That is why there are two type of Baybayin, the traditional and that with Spanish modifications.
