Nuno sa punso
Nuno sa punso · Nuno · the old man of the mound · Lolo sa punso
The old man of the earth mound — a belief that survives mainly as a sentence people still say out loud before stepping off a path.
Basis: The punso of Philippine belief · AI-generated
| Tradition | Philippine |
|---|---|
| Type | nature guardian · household spirit |
| Habitat | field · forest |
| First attested | 1900s |
| Principal source | Maximo D. Ramos, Creatures of Philippine Lower Mythology (1971) |
Illustrations
A belief you can point at
Most of the creatures on this site live somewhere vague: the forest, the water, the night. The nuno lives in a thing you can walk up to and photograph — a punso, an earth mound, in practice a termite mound standing a metre or so out of the grass at the edge of a field or a path.
That concreteness explains almost everything about how the belief behaves. There is no question about where it is, no detection lore, no test to apply to a neighbour. There is an object, and there is a rule about the object.
The rule is a sentence
Tabi-tabi po. Excuse me, by your leave, said out loud before you step off the path, into long grass, or past a mound.
It is the most alive piece of folklore on this site. Filipinos say it today — in provinces, on hikes, in construction work, often with a laugh, often by people who would not claim to believe anything at all. It costs nothing, it takes a second, and the downside of skipping it is, in the belief, out of proportion to the effort.
Note what kind of sentence it is. Not a charm, not a formula in an archaic language, not a prayer. It is ordinary politeness, with the respectful particle po that a Filipino uses to an elder, addressed to someone who may be standing where you are about to walk.
The creature is called nuno — grandfather, ancestor, old one. You are being polite to an old man whose garden you are crossing.
The punishment is a swelling
Break the rule — step on the mound, kick it, urinate on it, build through it without asking — and what follows is specific: swelling. A foot or a leg that puffs up, a lump, a joint that will not bend, a fever that ordinary treatment does not touch.
The remedy matches the offence. Not medicine: an apology, an offering left at the mound — rice, tobacco, fruit, a little drink — and in serious cases the intervention of someone in the community who knows how to speak to such beings. Ramos's whole framing of Philippine lower mythology is this: the relationship is maintained, not concluded, and some people are better at the maintenance than others.
What the rule is protecting
It is worth being blunt about the practical layer, because it is unusually clean here.
A termite mound is a structure full of insects. Tall grass and field edges in the tropics hold snakes, biting ants, wasp nests and rats. A person who walks into undergrowth carelessly, barefoot or in sandals, has a real chance of coming out with a bite, a sting or a wound that swells, goes hot, and does not get better on its own.
The belief tells you to slow down, announce yourself, and step around rather than through. The punishment it predicts — localised swelling that resists treatment — is precisely what an infected bite looks like.
That does not make the belief a coded first-aid manual. It makes the rule worth keeping for anyone, which is one reason it has outlasted belief in the thing behind it.
Why this one is not frightening
Set the nuno beside the aswang and the difference is instructive.
The aswang belief is about people: which neighbour is not what they appear, what tests to apply, who to suspect. It produced accusations and it produced harm.
The nuno belief is about ground: where to step, what to walk around, what to say first. It cannot be aimed at anybody. The worst it can do is make someone apologise to a mound.
Two beliefs from the same islands, both about invisible beings, with opposite social consequences. The difference is not how scary the creature is. It is whether the creature can be located in a person or in a place.
Sources
Ramos (1971) for the classification and the framing of maintained relations; Eugenio (2002) for the collected legend texts and the regional disagreements among them. Where this page describes current practice — the phrase, said now, by people who do not believe the rest — that is observation about a living idiom rather than a claim from either book.
Regional names
| Tagalog areas | Nuno sa punso — Punso is the mound; nuno is a respectful word for an elder |
|---|---|
| Visayas | Local equivalents |
Tags
Type
Habitat
Role
Traits
Visual motifs
Similar creatures
Frequently asked
What does "tabi-tabi po" mean?
Roughly "excuse me, please" or "by your leave" — said aloud before stepping off a path, into tall grass, or past an earth mound. The "po" is the Tagalog particle of respect, the same one used to elders. You are speaking to someone, politely, whether or not you believe anyone is there.
What happens if you don't say it?
The reported consequence is physical and specific: swelling, a lump, a foot or leg that puffs up, illness that does not respond to ordinary treatment. The affliction is read as a punishment for trespass, and the remedy is an apology and an offering rather than medicine.
Is the nuno a dwarf?
It is usually described as a very small old man with a long beard, and it is often grouped with the duwende. The grouping is a convenience: what makes the nuno distinct is not its size but its address — it lives in a specific object in a specific place, and you can see the object.
Is this belief still alive?
The phrase certainly is. Saying "tabi-tabi po" before walking into undergrowth is current practice for many Filipinos, including people who would not describe themselves as believing in anything behind it. A politeness can outlive its subject.
What is a punso?
An earth mound, in practice a termite mound — the hard reddish structures that stand in fields and at the edges of paths across the islands. They are common, conspicuous, and dangerous to disturb for reasons that have nothing to do with spirits.
Sources
- Maximo D. Ramos, Creatures of Philippine Lower Mythology (1971). University of the Philippines Press
- Damiana L. Eugenio, Philippine Folk Literature: The Legends (2002). University of the Philippines Press