A Fairy's Love Song

Te Ao Hou, September 1965, Page 41

A Fairy's Love Song Mr Mervyn McLean's transcription and discussion of the music of this song is published above. Two main versions of the song are in existence. One is song No. 38 in Apirana Ngata's Nga Moteatea, and the other is quoted by Hoani Nahe in the ‘Journal of the Polynesian Society’ vol. 3, p 31. The text published here is closer to the latter version, though not identical with it. Hoani Nahe tells us that the version he records is ‘the love-song of Whanawhana and Rangipouri, chiefs of the iwi atua, or Fairies…the chief of the Patupaiarehe [fairies] ardently desired Tawhaitu, who was the wife of Ruarangi, ancestor of the Ruarangi hapu of Ngati Haua’. In the Ngapuhi version and explanation recorded by Ngata, the fairy chief Te Rangipouri loves Ripiroaiti, wife of Ruarangi, who came in Kupe's canoe. Ngata's version has Taputeururoa as the fairy man's first wife, whereas in Hoani Nahe's version and explanation, Taputeruru and Ripiroaiti, also Nukupori and Tuku (in this version, Tiki) are the names of fairy chiefs. The translation given here is therefore somewhat conjectural. It follows Ngata's version in interpreting ‘whanawhana’ as meaning ‘joyful’, but since the version published here, like that of Hoani Nahe, has ‘ko’ instead of ‘ka’ before this word, it should perhaps be regarded as a proper name. Similarly, ‘tawhaitu’ might be better interpreted as the name of the woman in question. The word ‘maori’ is used in the song in the sense of ‘human’. Since she is the first human woman whom the fairies have encountered, she is described as ‘the first of her race’.