The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume 2 (of 3)

69

E. Shortland, Maori Religion and Mythology, p. 44. Such a stalk to aid the spirit on its passage was called a tiri. Compare E. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, p. 517, s. v. "Tiri." The ceremony described in the text resembles in some points the one which seems intended to raise the soul of the deceased to heaven. See above, p. 25.

70

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 232; John White, "A Chapter from Maori Mythology," Report of the Third Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held at Christchurch, New Zealand, in January 1891, pp. 361 sq.

71

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 48 sq., 67, 118; E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 153 sqq.; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 233 sq.

72

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 67, 118; E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, ii. 83, 84.

73

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, p. 83.

74

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 84 sqq.; Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori (London, 1884), pp. 122 sqq. As to the belief in the reappearance of the dead among the living compare R. A. Cruise, Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in New Zealand (London, 1823), p. 186: "The belief in the reappearance of the dead is universal among the New Zealanders: they fancy they hear their deceased relatives speaking to them when the wind is high; whenever they pass the place where a man has been murdered, it is customary for each person to throw a stone upon it; and the same practice is observed by all those who visit a cavern at the North Cape, through which the spirits of departed men are supposed to pass on their way to a future world."

75

Elsdon Best, "Spiritual Concepts of the Maori," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. ix. no. 4 (December 1900), p. 182.

76

Elsdon Best, op. cit. p. 184.

77

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 104.

78

E. Shortland, The Southern Districts of New Zealand (London, 1851), p. 294; id., Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 80, 81; id., Maori Religion and Mythology, pp. 10 sq.; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 108, "Maori gods are so mixed up with the spirits of ancestors, whose worship entered largely into their religion, that it is difficult to distinguish one from the other."

79

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, p. 81; id., Maori Religion and Mythology, p. 11. As to the karakias, which were prayers or invocations, spells or incantations, addressed to gods or ancestral spirits, see E. Shortland, Maori Religion and Mythology, pp. 28 sqq.; E. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, p. 128, s. v. "karakia." Apparently the karakia partook of the nature of a spell rather than of a prayer, since it was believed to be so potent that the mere utterance of it compelled the gods to do the will of the person who recited the formula. See R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 180 sq.: "The Maori, in his heathen state, never undertook any work, whether hunting, fishing, planting, or war, without first uttering a karakia; he would not even take a journey without repeating a spell to secure his safety; still he could not be said to pray, for, properly speaking, they had no such thing as prayer. As in war, they armed themselves with the most formidable weapons they could procure, and laid their plans with the greatest skill they possessed, so to secure the fruition of their desires, they used their most powerful means to compel the gods to be obedient to their wishes, whether they sought for victory over their foes, fruitful crops, successful fishings, or huntings, they called in the aid of potent incantations; when they planted their kumara [sweet potatoes], they sought to compel the god who presided over them to yield a good increase; when they prepared their nets and their hooks, they must force the ocean god to let his fish enter them; as the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by storm, so the heathen Maori sought, by spells and incantations, to compel the gods to yield to their wishes; they added sacrifices and offerings at the same time, to appease as it were their anger, for being thus constrained to do what they wished them. Their ancestors were addressed as powerful familiar friends; they gave them offerings, and if it can be said that any prayers were offered up, it was to them they were made. The word karakia, which we use for prayer, formerly meant a spell, charm, or incantation."

80

Elsdon Best, "Maori Religion," Report of the Twelfth Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held at Brisbane, 1909, p. 459.

81

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 81 sq.

82

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 82 sq.; id., The Southern Districts of New Zealand, pp. 296 sq.

83

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, p. 80. Compare id., Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, p. 81; id., The Southern Districts of New Zealand, p. 294; id., Maori Religion and Mythology, pp. 10 sq. In Maori mythology Rangi is the personification of the sky, and Papa of earth. They were the primal parents, and the other great gods were their offspring. See Elsdon Best, "The Maori Genius for Personification," Transactions of the New Zealand Institute, liii. (1921) p. 2. Among the great primordial deities who were worshipped by all tribes of New Zealand may be mentioned Tane, Tu, Tangaroa, and Rongo. Of the four, Tane was the origin and tutelary deity of forests and birds: no tree might be felled and no bird caught till certain rites had been performed to placate him. Tu was the god of war. Tangaroa was the god of the ocean, the origin and tutelary deity of fish. Rongo was the god of peace, and presided over agriculture. See Elsdon Best, "Maori Religion," Report of the Twelfth Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held at Brisbane, 1909, p. 458. The same four gods, with names only dialectically different, were, as we shall see later on, the principal deities of the Sandwich Islanders, the most distant geographically from the Maoris of all the Polynesians. The coincidence furnishes an example of the homogeneity of religion which prevailed among the various branches of the Polynesian race.

84

E. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, pp. 30 sq., s. v. "Atua."

85

J. Dumont d'Urville, Voyage autour du Monde et à la recherche de la Pérouse, Histoire du Voyage (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 516 sq.

86

Elsdon Best, "Notes on the Art of War as conducted by the Maori of New Zealand," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xi. no. 2 (June 1902). pp. 63 sq.

87

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 134 sq.

88

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 137.

89

J. L. Nicholas, Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand (London, 1817), i. 254.

90

J. Dumont d'Urville, Voyage autour du Monde et à la recherche de la Pérouse, Histoire du Voyage (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 516.

91

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 118.

92

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, pp. 84 sq.

93

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 84; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 163.

94

E. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, pp. 268 sq., s. v. "Noa."

95

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, pp. 85 sq.; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 163, 164.

96

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 40.

97

J. Dumont d'Urville, Voyage autour du Monde et à la recherche de la Pérouse, Histoire du Voyage (Paris, 1832-1833), iii. 685; W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 86; E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 104 sq.; Servant, "Notice sur la Nouvelle-Zélande," Annales de la Propagation de la Foi, xv. (1843) p. 23; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 166 sq.; Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 104 sqq. The taboo could be got rid of more simply by the tabooed man touching his child or grandchild and taking food or drink from the child's hands. But when that was done, the taboo was transferred to the child, who retained it for the rest of the day. See E. Dieffenbach, op. cit. ii. 105.

98

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 85; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 165 sq.; Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 103 sq.

99

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 85.

100

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 96, 114 sq.

101

E. Shortland, The Southern Districts of New Zealand, pp. 68 sq.

102

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 114 sq.

103

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 40, 112 sq., 356; E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, p. 104; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 149, 164, 212 sq.; E. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, pp. 23 sq., s. v. "Ariki." The word ariki signifies properly the first-born or heir, whether male or female, of a family.

104

Lieut. – Col. W. E. Gudgeon, "Maori Religion," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xiv. no. 3 (September 1905), p. 130. Compare id., "The Tipua-Kura and other Manifestations of the Spirit World," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xv. no. 57 (March 1906), p. 38.

105

R. Taylor, Te Ika a Maui, p. 173. Mana means authority, especially divine authority or supernatural power. See E. Tregear, Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, p. 203, s. v. "Mana"; and for a full discussion of the conception see Lieut. – Col. W. E. Gudgeon, "Mana Tangata," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xiv. no. 2 (June 1905), pp. 49-66. "Mana plays a leading part in the ability of a leader, or successes in war of celebrated warriors. When a man frequently undertakes daring deeds, which ought under ordinary circumstances to fail, but none the less prove successful, he is said to possess mana, and thereafter is regarded as one peculiarly favoured by the gods, and in such cases it is held that he can only be overcome by some act or default; such as a disregard or neglect of some religious or warlike observance, which has been shown by experience to be essential to success in war, but which our warrior, spoiled by a long career of good fortune, had come to regard as necessary to ordinary mortals only and of but little consequence to men of mana" (W. E. Gudgeon, op. cit. p. 62). "There were cases in which the mana of a man depended upon the facility with which he could communicate with the spirits of departed ancestors, that is, upon his capacity to enforce the aid and attendance of these minor deities. To this end every man with any pretension to mana had a knowledge of certain forms of invocation by which he could summon the spirits of long departed heroes and ancestors, but it must not be supposed that these invocations would necessarily have power in the mouths of all men, for such was not the case. The efficacy of a karakia or invocation depended in part on its method of delivery, and in part on the mana of the man who used it" (W. E. Gudgeon, op. cit. p. 50). Compare R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 172, 173; Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 100.

106

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 147, 352. The soul was thought to reside especially in the left eye; accordingly it was the left eye of an enemy which was most commonly swallowed by a victorious chief who desired to increase his spiritual power. See J. Dumont d'Urville, Voyage autour du Monde et à la recherche de la Pérouse, Histoire du Voyage (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 527; E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 118, 128 sq.

107

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 94.

108

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 98.

109

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 87; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 165.

110

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 87; E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 104.

111

Richard A. Cruise, Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in New Zealand (London, 1823), pp. 283 sq. Compare J. Dumont d'Urville, Voyage autour du Monde et à la recherche de la Pérouse, Histoire du Voyage (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 533.

112

Elsdon Best, "Maori Religion," Report of the Twelfth Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held at Brisbane, 1909, p. 463.

113

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 165.

114

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 101; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 164 sq.

115

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 165.

116

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, pp. 164 sq.

117

W. Brown, New Zealand and its Aborigines (London, 1845), p. 76.

118

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 95-97.

119

E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, p. 111; Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 137 sqq.; R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 168.

120

R. Taylor, Te Ika A Maui, p. 171.

121

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 97.

122

Old New Zealand, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 94.

123

E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 100, "Ridiculous as this custom of the tapu has appeared to some, and as many of its applications really are, it was, notwithstanding, a wholesome restraint, and, in many cases, almost the only one that could have been imposed; the heavy penalties attached to the violation of its laws serving in one tribe, or in several not in actual hostility with each other, as moral and legal commandments. It was undoubtedly the ordinance of a wise legislator." Compare G. F. Angas, Savage Life and Scenes in Australia and New Zealand, i. 330, "Doubtless this law is the result of some wise regulation for the protection of property and individuals, and it has in many things a beneficial influence amongst a people who have no written or regularly established code of laws of their own." To the same effect another authority on the Maoris observes: "The most politic and useful of all the superstitious institutions of the Maori people is that which involves the rites of tapu. It has always seemed to me that this institution, with its far-reaching ramifications, must have been the conception of a very gifted mind, for, as a governing factor, it is very superior to the Hindu institution of caste. It must, moreover, have been initiated during a period of civilisation, to which the Polynesians have long been strangers, but with which at one period of their history they were sufficiently familiar." See Lieut. – Colonel Gudgeon, "The Tipua-Kura and other Manifestations of the Spirit World," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xv. no. 57 (March 1906), p. 49.

124

E. Shortland, The Southern Districts of New Zealand, pp. 30 sq., 294 sq.; id., Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 114 sqq.; id., Maori Religion and Mythology, 31 sq.; W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, pp. 141 sq. Most malignant and dangerous of all appear to have been thought the spirits of abortions or still-born infants. See Elsdon Best, "The Lore of the Whare-Kohanga," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xv. no. 57 (March 1906), pp. 12-15; Reise der Oesterreichischen Fregatte Novara um die Erde, Anthropologischer Theil, Dritte Abtheilung, Ethnographie, bearbeitet von Dr. Fr. Müller (Vienna, 1868), pp. 59 sq. Even more dangerous than the spirits of dead infants were supposed to be the spirits of human germs, which the Maoris imagined to exist in the menstrual fluid. See E. Shortland, Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders, pp. 115, 292; id., Maori Religion and Mythology, pp. 107 sq. As to disease inflicted by ancestral spirits (atuas) for breaches of taboo, see further J. L. Nicholas, Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand (London, 1817), i. 272 sq., ii. 176 sq.; E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 105, "The breaking of the tapu, if the crime does not become known, is, they believe, punished by the Atua, who inflicts disease upon the criminal; if discovered, it is punished by him whom it regards, and often becomes the cause of war."

125

Richard A. Cruise, Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in New Zealand (London, 1823), p. 320; J. Dumont d'Urville, Voyage autour du Monde et à la recherche de la Pérouse, Histoire du Voyage (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 517; W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, pp. 141 sq.; E. Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 117; Elsdon Best, "Maori Medical Lore," Journal of the Polynesian Society, vol. xiii. no. 4 (December 1904), p. 228. As to the superstitious veneration of lizards among the peoples of the Malay-Polynesian stock, see G. A. Wilken, Verspreide Geschriften (The Hague, 1912), iv. 125 sqq.

126

G. F. Angas, Savage Life and Scenes in Australia and New Zealand, ii. 67.

127

W. Yate, An Account of New Zealand, p. 142.

128

Horatio Hale, U.S. Exploring Expedition, Ethnography and Philology (Philadelphia, 1846), pp. 4 sq.; F. H. H. Guillemard, Australasia, ii. (London, 1894) pp. 497, 499. As to the scarcity of running water, see Captain James Cook, Voyages (London, 1809), iii. 206, v. 389. He was told that there was a running stream on the high island of Kao. As to the soil of Tongataboo, see Captain James Wilson, Missionary Voyage to the Southern Pacific Ocean (London, 1899), p. 280, "The soil is everywhere prolific, and consists of a fine rich mould, upon an average about fourteen or fifteen inches deep, free from stones, except near the beach, where coral rocks appear above the surface. Beneath this mould is a red loam four or five inches thick; next is a very strong blue clay in small quantities; and in some places has been found a black earth, which emits a very fragrant smell resembling bergamot, but it soon evaporates when exposed to the air."

129

Captain James Cook, Voyages, v. 277. For descriptions of the volcano see W. Mariner, Tonga Islands, Second Edition (London, 1818), i. 240 sq.; and especially Thomas West, Ten Years in South-Eastern Polynesia (London, 1865), pp. 89 sqq. Both these writers ascended the volcano.

130

Thomas West, op. cit. pp. 79 sqq.; J. E. Erskine, Journal of a Cruise among the Islands of the Western Pacific (London, 1853), p. 120; F. H. H. Guillemard, Australasia, ii. p. 497.

131

T. West, op. cit. pp. 82 sqq.; George Brown, Melanesians and Polynesians (London, 1910), pp. 4 sq.

132

T. West, op. cit. pp. 88 sq.

133

T. West, op. cit. pp. 92-93.

134

I infer this from the entry "Volcanic island, 1886," in Mr. Guillemard's map of the Pacific Islands. He does not mention it in the text (Australasia, ii. p. 497).

135

George Brown, Melanesians and Polynesians, p. 6.

136

T. West, op. cit. p. 94.

137

George Brown, op. cit. p. 4.

138

T. West, op. cit. 95.

139

Captain James Cook, Voyages, v. 344.

140

Captain James Cook, Voyages, v. 381.

141

Captain the Hon. W. Waldegrave, R.N., "Extracts from a Private Journal," Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, iii. (1833) p. 193.

142

Charles Darwin, Journal of Researches, etc., during the Voyage of the "Beagle" (London, 1912), pp. 471 sqq.; Sir Charles Lyell, Principles of Geology, Twelfth Edition (London, 1875), ii. 602 sqq.; T. H. Huxley, Physiography (London, 1881), pp. 256 sqq.

143

George Brown, Melanesians and Polynesians (London, 1910), pp. 13 sq.

144

John Crawfurd, Grammar and Dictionary of the Malay Language (London, 1852), Preliminary Dissertation, p. 253, quoted by Thomas West, Ten Years in South-Central Polynesia, pp. 248 sqq. But the more usual view is that the starting-point of the dispersal of the Polynesian race in the Pacific was Samoa.

145

Sarah S. Farmer, Tonga and the Friendly Islands (London, 1855), pp. 134-137; Le P. Reiter, "Traditions Tonguiennes," Anthropos, xii. – xiii. (1917-1918), pp. 1026-1040; E. E. Collcott, "Legends from Tonga," Folk-lore, xxxii. (1921) pp. 45-48. Miss Farmer probably obtained the story from the Rev. John Thomas, who was a missionary in the islands for twenty-five years (from 1826 to 1850). She acknowledges her obligations to him for information on the religion of the natives (p. 125). For the period of Mr. Thomas's residence in Tonga, see Miss Farmer's book, p. 161. The story is told in closely similar forms in many other islands of the Pacific. For some of the evidence see my edition of Apollodorus, The Library, vol. ii. p. 331 sqq.