The siling, or funeral ceremony, is celebrated in all Benguet Kankanay
towns, and, indeed, under various names, by the majority if not all
of the Igorot tribes.
Except in the case of infants or very small children the dead are not
buried immediately, but are put into a death chair around which funeral
rites are held. In the meantime animals belonging to the dead person
or his relatives are killed and eaten, while the burial is delayed.
The interval between the death and the burial varies according to the
wealth of the deceased, sometimes lasting for months in the case of
the very wealthy. Even when the health authorities force immediate
burial on account of danger from infectious diseases, the siling
continues just the same with a dummy corpse in the death chair.
Before anything is killed, the mambunong prays, asking that the food
eaten at the siling may not cause sickness. A female relative then
leans on the death chair and says the following:
"You are dead, ----. We are giving everything we can for your
siling. Do not come back for us, but let us live long."
After the siling ends the corpse is put into the coffin and buried
in the ground, or placed in a natural cave. The burial takes place
either in the afternoon, between sunset and dark, or in the morning
before the sun rises.