PAGES FROM THE PAST.

Taranaki Daily News, 3 February 1923, Page 9

PAGES FROM THE PAST.

MAORI IMPLEMENTS AND WEAPONS. FINDING OF THE POTAMAWIIIRIA. (By “Juvenis.”) I propose to suspend the account of the early history of Taranaki to make some remarks on Maori implements and weapons. I am led. to do this because oi the finding at Ppkearuhe on Sunday last of the famous Potamawhiria, the large axe which had been lost by the Ngatiawa for several centuries, and over which the Maoris are naturally very jubilant. It has been suggested to me that a brief description of some of the more noteworthy of the primitive appliances of peace and war used by the ancient Maoris, might prove interesting. I have been looking up my old records, anil for what loilows I must give credit to other students and observers of the conditions of old Maori life.

It will be scarcely necessary to tell you that the aboriginal inhabitants of New Zealand were unacquainted with I the arts of extracting metals from their ! ores and of making pottery. Wood, ! stone, and bone supplied the material i out of which all or most of the various articles they required were fashioned or j manufactured, and the flax bush stip- ; plied the staple of their clothing material. With a wooden spade the Maori tilled the ground, dug his fern root, excavated the rua or places in which his winter supplies of food were stored and parepare, or fortifications, of his ph. With fragments of stone of various kinds, ground down with infinite labour to a cutting edge, he made axes and adzes, lashing them with flax to wooden handles; he felled the tree, hollowed and shaped it to form his waka tana or war canoe, 70 or SO feet long; dubbed down slabs of equal length to form the rauawa or bulv.'urks; shaped and fitted the haumi, and made paddles to propel his man-of-war through the W. : th /.nilar tools, made of the same materials, and a bit of shell or bone, or a flint or flake struck off a block of obsidian, he carved the figures and scroll .work of the ornamental prow and sternpost. With the same tools l.e hewed out and drestsed down slabs to form the poutokomanawa, or pillar support, of the ridge pole of his house, and all the other timbers required in its construction—the tauhu and papa, thc maihi and matapihi—with their elaborate carving and ornamentation. Some of these houses were skilfully constructed. and finished in a style which surprises those who have seen good specimens of them. A minute description of a house 'built and finished in old Maori style for Mr. Colenso in 1844 is to ne found at pp. 50, vol. XIV., “Transactions of the New Zealand Institute.”

According to tradition, the ancestors of the Maori came over to this -island some i venty or twenty-two generations ago. They came from" a place or places referred to in thoir traditions as Hawfl iki. They camo in several canoes—the names of which are preserved in separate ibnd independent parties, at different times, arriving and landing at different places. The accounts of these migratory expeditions vary greatly, but so far as I am acquainted with them, they contain little to aid us in an endeavour to identify or connect the people who came in these canoes, in respect of their implements, weapons, arts, or manu- ; factures, with existing races in other parts of the world, or to trace them | with anything like certainty to their original 'home- The generally accepted I theory is, I believe, that the New Zea- 1 landers a.r P a mixed race combining the | physical characteristics of the Asiatic and African types of mankind. Taking into consideration the fact that these people, without any precise standard of measure, with such utterly inadequate appliances as they possessed or could procure, were able to achieve the results which are to be seen in many specimens of their handicraft, we cannot. I think, withhold* our admiration. The carvings and sculptures with which they decorated their canoes, houses, patakas; the palisades and wharaoas oi their pas, etc., though grotesque and certainlv not true to nature, as representations of the objects we suppose to have been intended to be represented. are yet not lacking in boldness of conception, breadth of design, and a certain artistic finish, which together evidence genius in the artist and consummate skill in the artificer. The canoes themselves, the houses, the pas and the fortifications, of which now the traces only are to be seen, cause a feeling of wonder, which will not be diminished when we enquire more particularly what wore the instruments and appliances at the command of the men who\ formed .and elaborated these things. ' Most of the carvings wo now see were not executed with the old tools, and are not, therefore, specimens of the art. and skill of the old tohunga, but they are mainly copied from the older carvings, and, though executed with better tools, are not superior to them as works of art. Entering upon my subject, I will first notice what may be called the agricultural implements used by the Maori of the olden time. THE KO. was the principal implement used in such agriculture as was known to the Maori. It is composed of a shaft of hard wood,' generally manuka or maire, from seven to nine feet long, flat at the lower end, and brought to an edge at Hie sides and foot. Five or six inches from the bottom is an attachment, which is movable, called a teka or takahi. The shaft is hold with both hands and struck into the ground; and the left foot being pressed upon the projecting takahi or spur, it is driven down as far as necessary, and by lowering the shaft the sod is turned (specimen). The ko was also used in planting the kumara and in digging aruhe (fern root), which in the old time was the principal food, especially in-winter anil in time of war when the people often had to leave their ordinary dwelling places and betake themselves to their fortified pa. Maori cultivations in those days were not so extensive as they became after the introduction of thc potato. The maara kumara and th? taro plantations occupied less space than was required when the potato came into general cultivation, and extensive bush clearings, or waerenga, were made. Before that time, the kumara, taro and hue, or gourd, were almost the only plants cultivated for food. The kumara was brought to New Zealand by most of the original canoes. The taro is said to have been brought in the Mataatua canoe, by Ruaauru. The- ancestors of the Ngatiawa of the Bay of Plenty came, in this canoe, and it is in their country that the taro is most extensively grown at the present time. In a small volume published jn 1830, ■ volume qf the “Library of Entertain*

ing Knowledge” (which gives an ex' c.eedingly interesting account of the New Zealanders of that day), an implement described as “a pole with a crossbar fixed to it, about three feet from the ground,’’ is mentioned as being used by. the Maoris for digging. This, no doubt, was the ko. The spade and plough of the pakeliq- Ap-ve entirely superseded the ko.