author
C. R. (Claude Russell) Moss
b. 1876
Best known for detailed studies of the Nabaloi and Kankanay peoples of Benguet in the Philippines, this early 20th-century writer left a small but valuable record of local law, ritual, songs, and stories. His work still stands out for its close attention to oral tradition and everyday cultural life.
1 Audiobook
Kankanay Ceremonies (American Archaeology and Ethnology)
by C. R. (Claude Russell) Moss
About the author
Claude Russell Moss was an American writer and researcher born in 1876 who published several studies on the peoples of Benguet in the Philippine Islands. His books include Nabaloi Songs (1919), Kankanay Ceremonies (1920), Nabaloi Law and Ritual (1920), and Nabaloi Tales (1924).
In the preface to Nabaloi Tales, Moss wrote that the myths in the book were recorded during his thirteen years of residence among the Nabaloi Igorot, especially in the township of Kabayan and nearby barrios. That long stay helps explain why his work feels grounded in spoken tradition, ceremony, and local custom rather than distant observation.
Today, Moss is remembered mainly through these ethnographic writings, which preserve songs, stories, and ceremonial practices that might otherwise have been lost to print history. Even in brief form, his books offer a vivid window into the cultural world of Benguet in the early 1900s.