Canoes

Bush tracks crossing ranges of hills and mountains and rivers were the only means of inland transport in early New Zealand; consequently the manufacture of canoes became essential for all coastal transport as well as for river journeys. To cross lakes or make small journeys, rafts were manufactured from raupo lashed in bundles. These were either double or in the shape of canoes. Other rafts were of logs lashed together in outrigger style.

There was considerable work in the making of a large canoe from a forest tree. First, a tohunga would lift the tapu from the tree and Tane, ruler of the forest, be propitiated by appropriate ritual. Totara was the tree chosen for canoes. By means of adzes and the use of fire the tree was felled, men working in relays. Then commenced the hollowing process, and a dug-out canoe resulted. Often it was a matter of considerable labour dragging the canoe to the water. If it were required as a war canoe, special top sides, or rauawa, were fitted as well as a bow piece (tauihu), and a carved stern post (taurapa); but if for fishing or coastal work, less elaborate finishing was the rule. River canoes were plain dug-out types.

Tattooing

Tattoo or moko, particularly facial tattoo, had developed in New Zealand to a high degree of perfection, and a fully tattooed man presented a remarkable appearance, every portion of his face being adorned with spirals and curved lines drawn with much nicety and precision. The tattooing implement (uhi) consisted of a small adze-like shaft to which was attached a bone blade, often toothed for better incision. The blade was regularly dipped into a mixture of soot and water, the soot being obtained by burning the resinous heart wood of the white pine or, in the north, of the kauri. The tattooing artist struck the uhi with a light mallet, usually a stalk of bracken fern. The incisions were painful and most work was done over a period of time.

The hips and buttocks of men were also tattooed. These were exposed in the frenzy of the war dance. Women had tattoo confined to the chin, lips, and sometimes the centre of the forehead. Experts on women's tattoo practised using iron blades until about the turn of the century. Men with tattoo could still be seen in Wellington as late as 1918.

Games

In the autumn when the main harvests of sea, land, and forest had been gathered and stored for winter, the people gave themselves over to a short period of games, amusements, and competitive contests. Elders appear to have entered into the spirit of the various games as eagerly as did the children and vied with each other in kite flying, top spinning, posture dancing, wrestling, dart throwing, memory tests, and the erection of string figures, etc. Children's games included the sailing of flax boats, the use of poi balls, in which women also excelled, skipping, and swimming.

Boys were taught from their youth upwards to acquire dexterity in the use of weapons as well as developing keenness of vision and the attributes of a warrior. Armed with korari (flax flower stalks) they practised the strokes and parries as instructed by adults. Using kakaho (flower stalks of the toetoe) the young people also became adept in the use of the spear and dart.

The Maori expressed himself in songs and melodies of which thousands were known when Europeans arrived. There were many subjects on which songs were founded, such as the yearning of a widow for her husband, and ditties or lullabies for children. Maori songs usually covered a range of not more than one and a half notes; but inside that range there were many half or even quarter tones.

The Community – Life and Death

Women in general were regarded as being the inferior of man, though it was possible for a woman endowed with initiative to acquire considerable standing in her own tribe. Children retained an interest in all land, fishing, and seashore rights derived from both parents, and this in many cases elevated the status of women. As Best (1924) stated: “the Maori leaned to agnatic filiation; the male sex possesses greater mana than does the female, for is not man descended directly from the gods, while woman had to be created from earth!”

It was usual for children to be born in the open air or in a temporary building specially erected for the purpose. Children of superior families were received into the tribe after a special baptismal ceremony conducted by a leading priestly expert. Small babies were retained at night in a kit (kete) packed with fine moss or muka fibre. In this manner they were able to survive the crowded conditions of the whare-puni. As they grew older they were carried on the backs of the mothers who wore a large-sized cloak, usually a korowai, to hold them in position.

When a person was taken sick he was immediately transferred to a temporary building set apart from the sleeping houses of the majority of the people. He became tapu until recovery was effected or death intervened in which case the hut would eventually be burned. Most Maoris preferred to die, as they had lived, in the open air. Sometimes sick persons were taken a considerable distance that they might die on their own land. Carved pillars or posts might indicate resting places in the case of a chief.

The powers of memory possessed by the Maori were considerable and highly developed. Schools of learning were established, the scholars being selected youths and young men from superior families. There were various grades of schools, the most tapu being the Whare Wananga, where a knowledge of esoteric lore, ritual, and ceremony was imparted by a tohunga. In such schools, under conditions of intense tapu, the sacred teaching and rites pertaining to the cult of Io the Supreme Being were performed as well as the lore pertaining to the various heavens. Certain stones termed whatu turuki were presented to pupils who gained proficiency in all grades of instruction, a high standard of aptitude being required. In schools of various grades men were taught their genealogy or whakapapa, in most cases reaching back to one or another of the ancestors who came in the “Fleet”.

Death to the Maori was an event of considerable importance and great significance, for it ushered in the rite of the tangi, weeping for the dead, now limited to three days, but once longer. The body of the deceased was trussed with knees up before becoming rigid, the arms being placed across the breast and the body covered with a garment. The hair was oiled, dressed, and adorned with plumes of native birds such as huia and long-tailed cuckoo. The face was adorned with red ochre. Usually after the days of the tangi had been completed, the body was placed in the branches of a tree, a cave, or sacred burial place, several trees being set aside for this purpose in different localities. One such tree at Hokianga Harbour was still tapu because of the bodies placed in its branches. Laceration of the body was a common custom during the tangi, chiefly confined to near women relatives. At a later date it was usually customary to have a bone-scraping ceremony when the bones would be placed in a secure hiding place.

by William John Phillipps, formerly Registrar and Ethnologist, Dominion Museum, Wellington.

• The Coming of the Maori, Buck, Sir P. H. (1949)
• The Moa-hunter Period in Maori Culture, Duff, R. (1956)
• Anthropology in the South Seas (jt. ed.) Freeman, J. D., and Geddes, W. R. (1959)
• Culture Change in Prehistoric New Zealand, Golson, J.