Informants relate that, initially, the Ifugaos lived on thatched huts built directly on the ground. Walls were either made of bamboo of planks of wood. Later, as they settled and began cultivating rice, they constructed elevated storage houses, now known as granary houses or alang. This building technique enabled them to safeguard the stacked rice, ritual paraphernalia, and implements from infestation of rats and other pests as well as from other hazards. From the granary houses, they patterned their elevated dwelling houses commonly called as bale(Scott:1966 and Sato:1991).