MAORI WEAPONS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 29, 3 February 1934, Page 7

MAORI WEAPONS.

FOR WAITANGI HUI.

MANUFACTURE IN AUCKLAND.

"RUSH" ORDER COMPLETED.

The Maori of prc-pakcha days prized his weapons above everything. Many, many weeks with the rude stone took at his disposal went to their making and ornamentation on tribal pattern. With such laboriously made weapons remained many an association of a foray or a stubborn defcnce of a pa. The acquisition of skill in the use of these weapons was the most important feature of .a Maori's education, until he was supplied with the musket of the pakelia, when the taiaha, the tewliatewlia and the koikoi became heirlooms, objects for ceremonial occasions, and all too frequently useful media for gifts or barter.' It is idle to speculate how many now displayed in museums or homes went in exchange for beer or tobacco.

Were the old days of tribal wars and raids to recur there would have to be many months of hard toil before any party- could be equipped with the weapons of olden time. Ail American producer of films found this out when, not i long ago, he endeavoured to photograph for the screen Maoris at war. So have those in charge of the Waitangi hui discovered. Ceremonial war dances have I been rehearsed, the ancient garb of the [ warriors has been made by the Maoris themselves, but the weapons essential to liakas cannot be collected. So there came on Thursday afternoon to the Kauri Timber Company a rush order for 300 taiaha, 100 300 koikoi and 100 paddles, and modern machinery in less than two days had moulded to make a Maori holiday rough and nady imitations to a total of Bpo. These were dispatched to Sir Apirana Ngata by train yesterday. They will suffice for the occasion, after the joinery shop appearance of new unstained wood-Las

received attention, but with these manufactured toys in their hands can the Maoris feel the real spirit that animated their forefathers and 1 roused them to a pitch of frenzy in their ceremonies of war or welcome? More, perhaps, than all the time that has been devoted to training for these dying functions, the fact that it was necessary to call upon pakclia machinery to copy ,weapons loaned from a museum emphasises the remarka'blc change in the native race that has occurred through less than a century of close association with the white man. - ' • .