The Mamanwa language is a Central Philippine language spoken by the Mamanwa people. It is spoken in the provinces of Agusan del Norte and Surigao del Norte in the Lake Mainit area of Mindanao, Philippines. It had about 5,000 speakers in 1990.
Mamanwa is a grammatically conservative language, retaining a three-way deictic distinction in its articles which elsewhere is only preserved in some of the Batanic languages.[2][3]
Before the arrival of Mamanwa speakers in central Samar Island, there had been an earlier group of Negritos on the island.[4] According to Lobel (2013), the Samar Agta may have switched to Waray or Northern Samarenyo, or possibly even Mamanwa.
In addition to this, Francisco Combes, a Spanish friar, had observed the presence of Negritos in the Zamboanga Peninsula "in the Misamis strip" in 1645, although no linguistic data had ever been collected.[5] The traditional Mamanwas believe in Tahaw as their supreme deity who is given prayers of supplications and petitions, as well as True, a deity of the forest and herder of hunting animals.[6]