Hokioi: the extinct eagle

Tu Tangata, Issue 18, 1 June 1984, Page 34

Hokioi: the extinct eagle

Alan Taylor

N., Al , r „ . xl . r xtti • • the mythology of the maori, there is reference to Hokioi a mysterious bird of great mana. Rarely seen, it was much feared as predator and omen of misfortune. A large crested bird, it has been identified by scientists as Harpogornis, the now extinct New Zealand eagle.

With a remarkable wingspan of over seven feet, it was first discovered in South Island swamps among the massive bones of moa, geese and swans. Known to early Polynesian settlers of a thousand years ago, Harpogornis seems to have disappeared by about the 11th century; remaining only in the memory and imagination of the maori. To hear the night cry of Hokioi was to hear the coming lament of the tangi; the cry of the bird being a harbinger of death, usually of a chief. Further, it was also believed (by some tribes) that its eery call warned of approaching enemies. Also known as Hakuwai, Hokoioi lived in the heavens and in one ancient fable there is a story about Hokioi and Kaahu the harrier hawk.

One fine sunny day, Kaahu and Hokioi had an argument. Kaahu said to Hokioi that he could fly no higher than the almost flightless fern bird. This greatly angered Hokioi, who quickly challenged Kaahu to a trial of flight to see who could fly the highest. Kaahu accepted the challenge, and both birds rose in the air with Kaahu scanning the landscape below, as is the habit of all harrier hawks. As the challengers soared into the heavens, Kaahu suddenly saw a forest fire below and eagerly swooped down to prey on the creatures fleeing from the flames. As he did so, Hokioi cried out to Kaahu: “He pakiwaha koe you are a boaster!” Then he rose higher into the sky. Never again to be seen by man. However, in the darkness of night, he is heard calling out his own name in derision of Kaahu the hawk: “Hokioi! Hokioi! Hokioi Hu!” As heard by maori, Hu represents the rushing sound of Hokioi’s flight as he mysteriously passes through the night. As for any man who boasts of name and descent, it is pointedly said: “Like Hokioi he is calling out his own name!”

Classic maori carving was highly stylised. It was essentially an art of ancestral carving; the whale and lizard only appearing in storehouse and canoe decoration. Not until the 19th century was the range of subjects broadened to include what is probably a folk recollection of the eagle in the mythological form of the great bird of Ruakapanga. Almost naturalistic in

style, Ruakapanga’s manunui decorates the interior of Te Mana o Turanga an outstanding Rongowhakaata tribal meeting house built in 1882 at Whakato marae near Gisborne. In the story of Pourangahua, it was the great bird that carried the hero and kumara from Hawaiki to New Zealand. Given the maori concept (and experi-

ence) of a dynamic symbol of power associated with sacred myth, it is surprising that the eagle has been neglected in maori art; Ruakapanga’s great bird being the only suggestion of its existence in carving. However, Hokioi (in naturalistic eagle form) is scheduled to reappear in carving at the Orakei marae, Auckland, where the remarkable bird is to be incorporated in a carved centre post or poutoko-

manawa of the new meeting house. As a result, it may well appear in future meeting houses: a powerful symbol of mana maori. The accompanying drawing of Harpogornis or extinct eagle, is based on the research of Don Brathwaite. The artist is a young apprentice carver at Orakei.