Bontoc

Bontoc (Ilokano: Ili ti Bontoc), officially the Municipality of Bontoc, is a 2nd class municipality and capital of the province of Mountain Province, Philippines. According to the 2015 census, it has a population of 24,643 people.^[3]

Bontoc is the historical capital of the entire Cordillera region since the inception of governance in the Cordillera. The municipality celebrates the annual Lang-ay Festival.

Bontoc is home to the Bontoc tribe, a feared war-like group of indigenous people who actively indulged in tribal wars with its neighbours until the 1930s. Every Bontoc male had to undergo a rites of passage into manhood, which may include head hunting, where the male has to journey (sometimes with companions) and hunt for a human head. The Bontocs also used the jaw of the hunted head as a handle for gongs, and as late as the early 1990s, evidence of this practice can be seen from one of the gongs in Pukisan, Bontoc. The town also hosts the UNESCO tentatively-listed Alab petroglyphs.

However, the original language is kankana-ey, as more of the younger generations speak a mixture of Ilocano, Tagalog, and Kankanaey native terms. This is partly due to the frequent contact of the younger generations with other regions of the Philippine nation. Some words are not in use anymore. Within Bontoc proper, only 40% of the local population can communicate using this language without diluting their daily language with other languages/dialects.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bontoc,_Mountain_Province