Polynesian Mythology And Ancient Traditional History Of The New Zealanders by Grey George

Author:Grey, George [Grey, George]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Global Grey
Published: 2014-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Footnotes;

1 The Maoris have another name for this whirlpool; they call it 'the steep descent where the world ends.'

2 Whanga-Paraoa, the bay of the sperm whale, so called from the whale found there.

3 Kai Motiti koe e noho ana, 'I suppose you are at Motiti, as you can find no firewood.'

4 The fishing bank of Taikehu.

5 Apterix australis.

Polynesian Mythology And Ancient Traditional History Of The New Zealanders By Sir George Grey

THE CURSE OF MANAIA

(Ko Manaia, ko Kuiwai)

WHEN the Tainui and the Arawa sailed away from Hawaiki with Ngatoro-i-rangi on board, he left behind him his younger sister, Kuiwai, who was married to a powerful chief named Manaia. Some time after the canoes had left, a great meeting of all the people of his tribe was held by Manaia, to remove a tapu, and when the religious part of the ceremony was ended, the women cooked food for the strangers.

When their ovens were opened, the food in the oven of Kuiwai, the wife of Manaia, and sister of Ngatoro-i-rangi, was found to be much under done, and Manaia was very angry with his wife, and gave her a severe beating, and cursed, saying: 'Accursed be your head; are the logs of firewood as sacred as the bones of your brother, that you were so sparing of them as not to put into the fire in which the stones were heated enough to make them red hot? Will you dare to do the like again? If you do I'll serve the flesh of your brother in the same way, it shall frizzle on the red-hot stones of Waikorora.'

And his poor wife was quite overcome with shame, and burst out crying, and went on sobbing and weeping all the time she was taking the under-done food out of the oven, and when she had put it in baskets, and earned them up to her husband, and laid them before him, she ate nothing herself, but went on one side and cried bitterly, and then retired and hid herself in the house.

And just before night closed in on them, she cast her garments on one side, and girded herself with a new sash made from the young shoots of the toetoe, and stood on the threshold, and spread out her gods, Kahukura, Itupawa, and Rongomai, and she and her daughter, and her sister Haungaroa, stood before them, and the appearance of the gods was most propitious; and when her incantations were ended, she said to her daughter: 'My child, your journey will be a most fortunate one.' The gods were then by her bound up in cloths, and she hung them up again, and returned into the house.

She then said to her daughter: 'Now depart, and when you reach your uncle Ngatoro, and your other relations, tell them that they have been cursed by Manaia, because the food in my oven was not cooked upon the occasion of a great assembly for taking off a tapu, and that he then said: "Are the logs

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