The Wanganui Chronicle MONDAY, JANUARY 17, 1949. TAPU

Wanganui Chronicle, 17 January 1949, Page 4

The Wanganui Chronicle MONDAY, JANUARY 17, 1949. TAPU

THE placing of a tapu on a portion of the North Auckland coastal region as a result of the drowning of three men has raised the question as to whether such a restriction should nowbo respected. The fishermen of the coast claim that as the men who lost their lives were pakeha and not Maori the tribal chiefs have no right to place a tapu on the coast. Before considering the rights and wrongs of the special ease it would be as well to consider first of all what is the institution of tapu. Tapu, in Maori with its corelative term taboo over a wide area of the Pacific Islands is no meaningless custom. It had its purpose and that purpose is fortified by an’ appeal to the Gods. The term “tapu” is defined in Reed’s Maori dictionary as: forbidden; inaccessible: not to be defiled; sacred. All of these definitions have one thing in common, the note of prohibition or warn-ing-off.

The Maori in common with other members of the Polynesian races has a great veneration for his ancestors. It is a mode of expression of the commandment “Honour Thy Father and Thy Mother that thy days may be long in the land the Lord thy God giveth thee.”

Respect for the dead was no idle formality. The belief in the continuance of personality after death is inherent in this belief. To offend one’s ancestors was to look for trouble and it would occasion no surprise if the spirits of the departed returned to vex the living. Such a notion has been in evidence with many primitive peoples. Tapu, then, is a phase of propitiation which takes a prominent place in the early development of religion, and never eeases to be present in the highly developed religions. The propitiatory phase, while strong and no doubt stressed by the tohungas was not the only element present in tapu. It was found to be a convenient instrument to enforce game preservation, an important part of the economy of a people living on the produce of the soil and to a large extent upon the natural produce of the soil. For instance, when a stream had been fished for a long time it was obvious that the eel population would soon be depleted and as eels formed a large part of the Maori larder it was obviously undesirable that all of the convenient waters should be early depleted. . To do so would throw upon the members of the tribe the necessity for removing from one pa site to a new one. Seeing that various pahs provided shelter for up to a thousand occupants the removal of such a community was no easy task and naturally one sought to be avoided. The ensuring of a nearby food supply was, therefore, the first essential of living. It became necessary to enforce some sort of close season and this was done by placing a tapu upon the various streams in some sort of order. Such a situation could be helped by fortuitous happenings. The drowning of a human being in a waterway would naturally present itself as an occasion for imposing a tapu, for such a prohibition would achieve several ends. It would be an act of propitiation to the spirits that were presumably responsible for the drowning in the first place. Due respect having been shown to those. Powers it was also necessary to avoid making an enemy of the victim of the tragedy. If eels ate his body and the members or the tribe ate the eels, would the once-removed be a sufficient absolution from the degredation of having eaten a man’s flesh thereby causing offence to his spirit? It would be safe to take no risks and a tapu placed upon the stream would be a satisfactory way of achieving the end.

Lesides food supply, and connected very closely with it is the problem of sanitation. The pollution of streams in a community where the water is drawn immediately from the natural flow must be guarded against and the defiling of land in constant use by the members of lhe tribe would be an equally dangerous eventuality to be avoided. Mere telling individuals not to disobey instructions would be insufficient, just as today/the mere telling of people not to throw broken bottles upon the main highways on a Saturday night,, a customary proceedure each and every weekend of the year in this enlightened country with its advanced population is not sufficient to bring such a practice to an end. The Maori met the. situation by the-institution of the tapu with its s P ln tnal penalties. It took the place of the police and did it more side himse V lf beCaUSe mdividual earried his own constable in-