PASSING MAORI MEMORIES

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 111, 11 April 1936, Page 2

PASSING MAORI MEMORIES

(Recorded by J.H.S. for “The Manawatu Evening Standard.”)

Kite Taihi; First Sight. The first impressions of our early voyagers, all less than three hundred years ago, give us an idea _ of the habits of life among the Maoris before the introduction of firearms and firewater. An old-time Maori declared that these two things had made the body fearful and the soul cowardly (Tinana Mataku, wairua haua). Notwithstanding the savagery of the oldtime fighting with their primitive weapons and hand-to-hand encounters, the effect upon their numbers was as naught when compared with the slaughter of modern weapons. The earliest account of the race is taken from Abel Tasman’s visit in December, 1642, when he discovered “Staaten Land” or Land of the States, anchoring in Murderer’s, Bay, now known as Golden Bay. .The natives closely resembled the Japanese, with their long thick black hair fastened on top with a skewer of wood thicker in tho centre, exactly as the Japanese dressed tlicir hair. The natives were very shv at first, but some weie induced to hoard the Heemskirk, one of the ships. Three sailors of a boat s crew were killed by natives, who were panic-stricken at seeing the oarsmen “charging them back to front, with long flat spears.” The next account comes from Cook’s visit to wliat he called “Poverty Bay,” a handicap under which that fertile district still unjustly suffers. Cook failed to recognise Tasman’s Staaton Land, and believed for some time that he had touched a part of the great Australian continent. . The first fortified pa he saw with its high upright tree trunk fencing was thought to be an enclosure for deer, oxen or sheep. Having landed for water, he found it impossible to negotiate with these hostile people, who naturally resented the intrusion of the wairua kiri mu (white skinned ghosts). Cook saw that the men were artistically tattooed with symmetrical lines and the women adorned with red ochre. None were embarrnsed by the almost complete absence of clothes. It was surprising indeed that hair a dozen men in avfraii canoe armed only with stone axes should defy a ship s crew with cannon and musketry, even after they had seen its destructive effects. Te Heketanga; Decrease.

Possibly for a thousand years the many rival tribes had been at constant war; but with tlioir primitive weapons or bare firsts the deaths were nioie than compensated for by the increased activities and athletic exercises entailed. From 1820 to 1860 it is estimated that no less than 80,000 able bodied men were- slain since the introduction of firearms. Authorities agree as to the evidences of a vast population of Maoris, probably greater than that of both Pakelia and Maori of to-day. In every part of the North Island were numerous fortified strongholds on the hilltops, , many of them so large that with their primitive tools it must have entailed the labour of thousands to trench, terrace, and fence them with huge tree trunks. From one such commanding lull fortress alone Mr Mailing counted twenty others within a radius of fifteen miles. Many hundred kumara pits bear evidence of the numbers who \\eie supported in each enclosure. These people slept within their pallisades with closed gates, bridges over the trenches removed, mid ladders witlidiawn. Lands were cultivated near these forts, and such positions were selected for their safety rather than for mere fertility. , , „ , Every Maori house had its fireplace (tauahi) on the clay floor—four flat stones on edge in the ground in v Inch embers and ashes gave warmth on winter nights. The houses were in rows close together. As many as 500 of these tauahi within one fortress gave evidence of as many families grouped in each place. The kumara pits, dug in the stiff clay of the hill tops, retained their original shape, the sides being protected by a coating of moss which grew within their shade. In the centre of one pit there is now glowing a kauri tree over a hundred feet high, and in another a great totara, indicating the age of the pits to be from 000 to 1000 years. The first cause of the decrease in .the Native population was the musket. Then commenced a period of intertribal slaughter, unparalled m any country compared with the total numbers in conflict. Tawhakis Aka Tarewa.

Compared with the immortal legends of Greece, we have had nothing in modern attempts to * reproduce the ideal folklore of memorised Maori, until James Cowan and Maui Pomare rescued them from oblivion. A thousand place-names sprang from the fertile imagination ot the ancient Maori tohunga, who unfortunately had no other means than memory ‘by which to record their origin or the lesson they were intended to convey to each succeeding generation. One can never forget the eager anticipation of first I ‘oadmg oil George Grey’s “Maori Mythology, and the shock of finding its dull conventional literalness. We looked for a Maori Homer, and found a dull record of impossible automatoms. The explanation offered us is that the eloquent Sir George deliberately curbed his imagination in order to give a literal transcription of the old tohunga s memoiy. From the flat statement of beliefs, each generation made its own deductions and now two of Bernard Shaw s “Expert Liars” (men of imagination) have transformed each lesson into a thing of beauty for our benefit. As the immortal Jupiter took the form ot a swan in order to join the mortal maul Leda in the water, so Puliaouiangi (Gentle Breath of Heaven) came from the cloud in the form of Itupe (a dove) to Kura i monoa (Precious Treasure). Their son was named Oho mai llangi (Heavenly Awakening). - In the ancient Maori story of lawhaki’s climb to Heaven the position is reversed, and it is the celestial woman Hapai who loves the earthly man. The divine maid flew to earth and lay beside the noble youth. A year later lie made some disparaging remark about their little girl. This hurt Hapai’s mother love, and she flew back to heaven with the child in her arms. Tawhaki, mourning his beautiful wife and child, sought the depths of the forest where the venerable guardian woman of the woods showed him the Aka Tarewa .(Suspended vine) by which he climbed to Heaven and again found celestial joy. . The beautiful valley misnamed Akatarnwa was intended to he called after Tawhaki’s means of ascent to Heaven, but its meaning is* lost by changing one letter. Stuart Peterson’s splendid illustration, full of life and action, will help to immortalise the story.