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Maui (Maori mythology)
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In Maori mythology, Maui is a culture hero famous for his exploits and his trickery.
offspring of Tu (humankind) increased and multiplied and did not know death until the generation of Maui-tikitiki (Biggs 1966:449). Maui is the son of Taranga, the wife of Makeatutara. He has a miraculous birth—his mother throws her premature infant into the sea wrapped in a tress of hair from her topknot (tikitiki)—hence Maui is known as Maui-tikitiki-a-Taranga.
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In Maori mythology, Maui is a culture hero famous for his exploits and his trickery.
Maui's birth
The offspring of Tu (humankind) increased and multiplied and did not know death until the generation of Maui-tikitiki (Biggs 1966:449). Maui is the son of Taranga, the wife of Makeatutara. He has a miraculous birth—his mother throws her premature infant into the sea wrapped in a tress of hair from her topknot (tikitiki)—hence Maui is known as Maui-tikitiki-a-Taranga. Ocean spirits find and wrap the child in sea-weed. Maui's divine ancestor, Tama-nui-ki-te-rangi (or Rangi) then takes the child and nourishes it to adolescence.
Finds his mother and brothers
Maui emerges from the sea and goes to his mother's foot, with the whole around it while the father is looking for food that all the chickens eat while they are asleep, finding there his four brothers, Maui-taha, Maui-roto, Maui-pae, and Maui-waho. Maui's brothers at first are wary of the new-comer but, after he performs several feats such as transforming himself into different kinds of birds, they acknowledge his power and admire him.
At first Taranga does not recognise Maui as her child. At first she denies him, saying, "This is the first time I have seen you. Get out of this house. You are not my child." Reluctantly, Maui moves towards the door, muttering as he goes, "I'll go, then, if you say so. Perhaps I am the child of a stranger, but I did believe that I was born near the ocean, wrapped by you in your girdle, and cast into the sea. And I was rescued by Rangi, and nurtured by him in the sky, where I used to gaze down and watch this house, and listen to your voices. Indeed, I know the names of your children. There is Maui-to-the-side, and Maui-within; there is Maui-opposite, and Maui-without. And I say to you that I am Maui-the-girdle-of-Taranga!" Then, at last, Taranga calls out to him, "You are indeed my last-born, the child of my old age, Maui-the-girdle-of-Taranga" and she kisses him and takes him to sleep in her own bed.
At first the older brothers are jealous and suspicious of the newcomer, saying, “We were conceived in wedlock, and born on the wide-wefted sleeping mat of legitimacy, and we are not asked to sleep with our mother. Yet this abortion, cast into the sea and nursed by seaweed, returns to life and is called to her couch. How are we to know he is really our brother?" After a while though, the brothers accept that the newcomer is one of them (Biggs 1966:449, Tregear 1891:233).
Restrains the sun
Maui takes the jaw-bone of his ancestress Muri-ranga-whenua and uses it as a weapon in his first expedition. This is to snare the Sun and make it go slower because the days were too short for people to get their work done. With the help of his brothers, Maui nooses the Sun and beats him severely with the jaw-bone club until the Sun promises to go slower in future (Tregear 1891:233-234).
Hauls up the North Island
His next exploit is to haul up land from the depth of the ocean—here he again uses the jaw-bone, this time as a fish-hook. Maui, using blood from his nose for bait, hauls the great fish up from the depths. When it emerges from the water Maui goes to find a priest to perform the appropriate ceremonies and prayers, leaving his brothers in charge of the fish. They, however, do not wait for Maui to return but begin to cut up the fish (to grab their share), which immediately begins to writhe in agony, causing it to break up into mountains, cliffs and valleys. If the brothers had listened to Maui the island would have been a level plain and people would have been able to travel with ease on its surface. Thus the North Island of New Zealand is known as Te Ika-a-Maui (The Fish of Maui) (Tregear 1891:234).
His canoe the South Island
In Maori traditions from the South Island of New Zealand, Maui’s canoe became the South Island, with Banks Peninsula marking the place supporting his foot as he pulled up the extremely heavy fish. Therefore, besides Te Wai Pounamu, another Maori name for the South Island is Te Waka a Maui (The canoe of Maui).
Discovers the secret of fire
Maui, finding that fire has been lost on the earth, resolves to find Mahuika the Fire-goddess and learn the secret art of obtaining fire. He visits her but his tricks make her furious and, although he obtains the secret of fire, he barely escapes with his life. He transforms himself into a hawk, but to no avail for Mahuika sets both land and sea on fire. Maui prays to his great ancestors, Tawhirimatea and Whatiri-matakataka who answer with pouring rain and extinguish the fire. Maui soon after goes out fishing with Irawaru, the husband of Hina, Maui's sister. They disagree when their fishing lines get tangled and, when they return to shore, Maui turns Irawaru into a dog. Hina is distraught and throws herself into the sea, but she does not die. (Tregear 1891:234).
Finds his father
Maui stays with his mother and brothers. Each morning Taranga disappears. Taking the shape of a kereru (wood pigeon) Maui descends after her and finds her with his father, Makeatutara. When Maui’s father is performing the baptismal ceremonies for Maui he makes a mistake in the incantations and this ill omen leads, in the end, to the death of Maui (Tregear 1891:233).
Seeks immortality
Maui now considers himself ready to win immortality for humankind. His father tries to dissuade him, predicting that he will fail because of the mistakes in his baptismal ceremony. His father says to him, “My son, I know that you are a brave fellow and that you have done all things. Yet I am afraid that there is someone who will defeat you.”
“Who could that be?” asks Maui. “Your ancestress Hine-nui-te-po (Great woman of the nightworld). You can see her flashing there on the horizon.” “Is she as strong as the sun?” asks Maui. “I trapped him and beat him. Is she greater than the sea, which is greater than the land? Yet I have dragged land from it. Now let us see whether we will find life or death.” His father answers, “You are right, my last-born, and the strength of my old age. Go, find your ancestress who lives at the side of the sky.” “What does she look like?” asks Maui. “The red flashing in the western sky comes from her,” says the father. “Her body is like a human being, but her eyes are greenstone, her hair sea-kelp, and her mouth is like a barracouta's mouth” (Biggs 1966:449).
Maui, undaunted, sets out westward, with his companions, to the home of Hine-nui-te-po. In some versions, his companions are the smallest birds of the forest, the tomtit, the robin, the grey warbler, and the fantail. In other versions, the companions are his brothers. He finds Hine asleep with her legs apart and he and his companions see sharp flints of obsidian and greenstone between her thighs. “Now,” Maui tells his friends, “when I go into the body of this old woman, do not laugh at me. Wait until I come out again from her mouth. Then you may laugh as much as you want.”
“You will be killed!” was all the companions could say. “If you laugh I will indeed be killed. But if I pass right through her body I will live, and she will die.”
Then he readied himself, winding the cord of his battle club tightly round his wrist and casting aside his garment. As Maui began his task, the cheeks of his watching friends puckered with suppressed laughter. As his head and arms disappear one of his brothers - or the fantail - can hold back no longer and bursts out laughing. The old lady wakes, opens her eyes, claps her legs together and cuts Maui in two. Now Maui has become the first being to die and, because he has failed in his task, all human beings are mortal. The goddess keeps her position at the portal to the underworld through which all humans must travel (Biggs 1966:449-450, Tregear 1891:234).
Maui and Rohe
In a rare version, a goddess named Rohe is Maui's wife. He mistreats her in a cruel and unusual way. He wishes her to exchange faces with him because she is beautiful and he is ugly. When she objects he gets his way by reciting an incantation over her as she is sleeping. When she awakes and realises what has happened she leaves this world and goes down into the underworld where she becomes a goddess of death (Tregear 1891:421).
Names and epithets
- Maui-tikitiki ("Maui the top-knot")
- Maui-tikitiki-a-Taranga ("Maui the top-knot of Taranga")
- Maui-potiki ("Maui the last born”).
See also
External links
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