KIHAROA THE GIANT.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 23, 28 January 1922, Page 17

KIHAROA THE GIANT.

I (By JAMES COWAN.). 1

A TALE OF THE OLD KING COUNTRY.

(Writen for the "Star.") Xo part of the one-time Maori country is richer in legend and folk-story than tbe district through which the old i Aukati line ran, the boundary made in | 1884 between the confiscated lands of; Waikato and the territory of the King-, ites. The Puniu River wa3 the border j line for many miles. (To-day it is a; frontier of a different kind; south of it for more than, a hundred miles the Rohepotae continues nominally "dry") B*ughly parallel with the historic .Team and on its south side there is a series of remarkable landscape ealiente, ■ the boldly shaped volcanic conee of I Kakepuku, Te Kawa, Tokanui, and: other heights of similar origin, seeming to mount guard over the old Kingite pule. Midway in this series of ancient flTcmountains are the three small volcanic hills called Tokanui; the old frontier eettlers called them the "Three! Sisters." They are greatly tattooed and: carven in the "lines of immemorial forts. On the crown of the land at Whenuahou, immediately north of the triple mounds, where the rich land lies beautifully to the eun, is a spot called Kiharoa," famous in the so-far unwritten tactions of the King Country border. Here it was proposed by some of the Kingite chiefs in 1864, after the British occupation of the Waipa basin, that a fort ehould be built for a final stand : against the Queen's soldiers. The position commanded a wide view over the I valley of the Puniu and the conquered J lands" north of that river, but it would have been useless without a sufficient garrison to hold also the hill-forts _ in rear of and above it. The euggestion wa-s not favoured by Rewi and the other leaders, and" the warriors the Puniu to the north side I and built Orakau Pa. Long ago, riding along the old horse track to Otorohanga past Hopa te Rangianini's little village at Whenuahou, we used to see the Giant's (irave. ae it was called. This locally famous land-mark was a shallow excavation on a ferny mound; it was twelve or fourteen feet in length and about four feet '< in width, and vague traditions had I grown up around it, but none of the European settlers of the frontier kn«w ; anything definite of its history. Lately, however, I gathered the story of this semi-mythic giant of old from two yen- ' crable warriors of the Ngati-Maniapoto tribe. There certainly seems to have been a veritable giant, a man of unUoUal stature and length of reach with the hand-weapons of those days, six generations ago, and hi? heroic -size has grown with the lapse of time. This Kiharor. rfir 'The Long Oaeping Breath,"' was a chief of the Xgati-Raukawa and Xgati Whakatere tribes, who in those timeowned the Tokanui hills and the sur ! rounding .slope*. The strong terrocec ■ j and trenched pa on Tokanui, the middle j conical hill of the "Three Sisters,'' war built by the two tribes named undei ■ Kiharoa, about one hundred and fiftj ■ years ago. The same people fortifiec land occupied the other two hills; the eastern one is Puke-rimu ("Red Pint Hill") and the western Whiti-U----j Marama ("The Shining of the Moon.") There were many good fighting mer I imong the people of these hill forU. hut their tower of strength was Kiharoa who stood hugely over his fellow.*: hi was twice the height of an ordinary man—so declare the Maoris —and he wielded a taiaha of unusual length and weight, a hardwood weapon called by ! the name of "Rangihaeata ("The First j Ray* of Morning Lig-ht.") Many a I battle he had fought successfully with this great blade-and-tongue broad sword, sweeping every opponent out oi his path. Kiharoa was tattooed or body as well as face, and when he leaned into battle, whirling "'Rangi haeata"' from side to side in guard anc leint and cut. his blue tattooed skir glistening with oil and red ochre, Jiu glaring eyes darting tlame, hia moko scrolled features distorted with fury , few there were brave enough to face him. But there came a day ivhel i Kiharoa met his better. The Xgati-Maniapoto tribe, wlioei great fortress was Totorewa, an im pregnable cliff-walled pa on the Waipi , River, raised a feud against the Ngati Raukawa and Ngati-'Whakatire, and '< : war-party set out under the chic Wahanui, who himself was a man o • large frame, though no giant l"k' i Kiharoa. The army took a circuitou route, coming upon the Takanui hill ! from the souta via Manga-o-Rongo, an' - then making a detour to the east t> • avoid the deep moras-s which defende. the southern side of the Three Sisters- ? the present main road from KiliikiM t Otorohauga traverses this now partly f drained swamp. I Meanwhile the garrisons in the hi . forts had prepared for war, and thei 1 sentinels stood on the alert on the til j or citadel of the terraced stronghold i keeping keen watch for the expect* , ; enemy. Harua. one of the chiefs of th - forte, had descended to the plain wit ; a smaJl party before the approach c , the foe was detected, and although th ,- people on the hill called repeatedly t I him to warn him to return, no heed wa ; given to the shouts. At length a sentr a saw the glisten of a weapon in til 3 westering- sun: the direction was we s to the east of the pa, and by that toke -. it was plain that the enemy army wa c lying in ambush waiting t<s advam i silently in the night. It was imperjuix i, I that Harua and his men outside the r 31 should be warned, and so in the at] t [ watches of the night a strong-lungf I j warrior on the battlements of Tokan' r ' lilted up his voice in a Whakaaraara j i ' or sentinel chant. I The cry of warning was heard an o ! understood 'by Harua, and he and hi c ' scouts swiftly rejoined their friends o n J the 'lull-tops. i- I AVhen day came the war-party < t ' Ngati-Maniapoto appeared, workin n round to the north-east side of th II i Tokanui -chain of forts. Kiharoa th l, :giant, stripped for the battle, took v s his taiaha, "The First. Kays of Mornin >f Light," and led his warriors down to th t ' open slopes of Wh-enuahow to giv ,t battie. As he dashed down the hill h y ran through a grove of karaka tree; n Here there wa* a pool where the kerne j. of the karaka berries were prepared fo .c :food by being steeped in water. I tier '• i were some dead leaves of the kara.Ri ;»hvina on the track, and Kiharoa .lippe. t on these leaves as -he ran and fellj j ar [rowly escaping hift taxaha I

his fall. The spot is at tihe foot of Toka- ' nui Hill, where thickets of prickly j acacia now clothe the silent old fortress I with a mat of green. This accident was in the belief of the Maori a tohua aitua, or evil omen for Kihavoa. The kjvowI lodge of this fact may ha.ye unnerved tlhe giant, or "Rangiha<?ata's" mana may hare suffered by the mishap. He rushed jto meet his foes, but he was outfought for all his phenomenal reach of arm. He fell pierced with spear fchruste and battered with blows or stone clubs, and he lay dead on, the battlefield of Whenuahou. The Tokanui people were defeated; they fled in panic when their gisrantie I chieftain fell, and m&ny were killed on j the field. The survivors, 'however, held [ I their forts successfully. Xgati-Mania-!poto contented themselves with the dead, which would provide many ovens .'of prime man meat, and most of all they j were rejoiced to rind they had van- ' quished the giant Kiharoa. They gathered round in amazement to measure : his height and his giant limbs; and on the spot where he lay marks were cut , at head and feet to indicate hie length. His enormous tattooed head was cut off • and preserved by being dried over a fire ,' made with ma-hoe and other woods : I which Rave forth a pungent smoke, and j; presently was carried home to Totorewa jto decorate the palir.ade at the gateway 1j uf the fort. His body was cut up and Mcooked and eaten where he fell, and ; there the excavation remained to mark his great stature. He was two fathoms long and a foot over—such is the native account! This is about the length of ' J the place we used to call "The Giant's [ (jrave," on the crown of the hill below , I'uke-rimu, the eastern hill of the . Sisters. And the battlefield was divided . among the victors and later became the . home of a section of the Ngati-Matakore . tribe, of whom my old warrior acquain- , tances Hauawu and Hopa, te Kangianini were the chiefs in the days of my . boyhood within sight of the terrace- , carved "Three Sisters." i Such is the story of the giant's grave—• 1 a misnomer assuredly, seeing that Kiha« - roa's tomb was the stomachs of hia ; slayers. The Tokanui village hall stands 1 within revolver shot of the place where 1 Kiharoa came to his end, and the comt munity creamery stands at the crossi roads where once Wahanui's c&nnibal i army plied spear and mere and taiaha : on the defenders of the triple hill forts. 3 Two miles to the east is the Waikeria : prison farm. It was In that direction, at TuTiaroa, that Wahanui and his army. , lay in the fern the night before th# i battle. There was another giant of these parts in the day Vbefore the white man 5 1 came. This was Matau ; he was, like j Kiharoa, a man of the Xgati-Raukawa . tribe. He was eleven feet high, aecordt ing to the legend; the narrators abate 1 not a single inch. He was a dreaded f . warrior, and—like Kiharoa again—his r favourite weapon was the taiaha. Hl3 . home was a palisaded hold on a cliff 5 above the cave c-aIW Te Ana-Kaitangata ("The Cannibal's Cave"), which you may 0 see in a rocky face in the gorge towards the head of the stream Wairaka, which a joins the Funiu Jtiver a few mile* j beyond Orakau. The entrance to this c cave is still marked with the paint kokowai or red ochre: that is how you n will know it today. It is an excellent place (my Maori friends assure mc) in which to lie iii- wait for-- irrcaru+ioue • travellers in thq days of old.