Settlement in New Lands

Te Ao Hou, September 1962, Page 43

Settlement in New Lands Te Taou trace their origin as a hapu from this battle, and also from another ancestress of that time, Makawe, a daughter of Haumoewharangi. After the invasion of the newly-won lands following the battle of Otakinini, Makawe lived at Te Makiri, a pa on the Kaipara river, just south of Helensville. Here, around this pa, in an area between Kaukapakapa and Taupaki, Te Taou grew up. Many of their pa sites were on the west of the Kaipara river and many had been the homes of the earlier owners of the land. Te Taou territory extended in the west to the coast at a point behind the triple pa sites of Waituoro, Taipu a te Marama and te Heke which stand on the western range near Helensville. To the north along the sandy peninsula, Ngatiwhatua proper and Uri o Hau held sway. As the name Taipu a te Marama indicates, this pa stood on sandy country. The famous Oneonenui pa near Muriwai is another pa with a self-

explanatory title. Te Taou came to know the sandhills very well, and every prominence which rose unchanging above the sea of sand gained a Maori name. The long beach was known in the south as Muriwai, and in its northern stretches as Rangatira; and the lakes, small and large, each had a name given in memory of some event in the past. Legends to add significance to the sandhills came into being. Remembering the great Kawharu of whom Ngatiwhatua said, ‘His face was as long as from my fingertips to my elbow’, the lakes stretching from Muriwai settlement to South Head became ‘the footsteps of Kawharu’, and Te Taou believed that it was to Paeroa, an area on the dunes near Wharepapa, that Rona had fled after bringing down the wrath of the moon upon his family. Braving the risk of an encounter with taniwha in the very deep and blue lakes, they dug cause-ways between these stretches of fresh water. Through this inland waterway, which in many places can still be seen, the people of Te Taou, and probably residents of an earlier age, hauled their canoes. No eels were found in the lakes, but there were fresh water mussels, crayfish and waterfowl. On the coast, which was also an important highway, there were toheroa and excellent fish, with sometimes the gift of whales from Tangaroa. Te Taou did not always cross the changing contours of sand on peaceful missions. There are many stories of people running to the sandhills to escape or ambush war parties. The battles of Haumoewharangi and Kawharu had scarcely passed into history when Waiohua under Kiwi of Maungakiekie pa, Tamaki isthmus, began another series of battles on the sandhills and country round about.