MAORI PLACE-NAMES

Evening Star, Issue 23727, 7 November 1940, Page 16

MAORI PLACE-NAMES

PLEA FOR PRESERVATION Mr Henry Stowell (Hare Hongi), who advocates naming the new city in the Hutt Valley Horo-Taunga, does so on the main ground that this beautiful Maori word is the Native name of the river which has throughout the ages given the valley the finest soil in the world. A secondary reason, and one perhaps of less importance, is that the name is already borne by a part of tlie district (says the ‘ Dominion ’).

Mr Stowell said that such a name, too, would be in accordance with Maori tradition, which dictated that the name of a settlement should be that of the river on which it was situated. Follow the east coast up from Wellington and what did one find? Towns all named after their own rivers—Waikanae, Otaki, Whanga-ehu, Whanganui, Opunake, Waitara, and so on. Was there anything objectionable in such names? Surely the change from Potre to Wbauganui was a happy one. “ One of my regrets is that the town of Palmerston North was not called Manawatu,” said Mr Stowell.

“ Hero-Taunga means ‘ moorings ' and ‘ settlement ’—here will we moor and settle. What could bo more appropriate, for did not the first immigrants find moorings off Petone and settle in the Hutt Valley?” Mr Stowell is an authority on Maori place names. Ho corrected a popular misconception about the Waikato River. He said that the river was only the Waikato up ns far as Ngaruawahia, because the word “ waikato ” meant tidal waters, and tidal influence ceased at that point. Thence on to Cambridge the Maoris called the river Horotin, and from Cambridge on to the Hnka Falls Arateatoa. winch might be interpreted as ' clear channel or clear rapids. , Mr Stowell said he regretted that, more attention was not given to the Maori language, which was not only beautiful in itself, but which conveyed a world of meaning, history, and even romance.