Hotunui, an account in English extracted from 'The Ancient History of the Maori' by John White

The following account in English of the life of Hotunui, ancestor of the Marutūahu peoples, was extracted from The Ancient History of the Maori by John White, Vol IX, Tainui, pp194-203. It is a translation of a Māori language text found in the same book. The Māori text can be read here: 




The account of Hotu-nui (great sob) only shall be given in this part of this history.
Hotu-nui took to wife a woman of the Kawhia tribes, who were descended from people who migrated to New Zealand before those who came in Tai-nui.
When his wife expected her first-born he prepared his ground to plant a crop of kumara, but he could not complete his work for want of the kumara-tubers to set in his field. He went to plunder the storehouse of Mahanga, to procure some kumara. The big toe of Hotu-nui's foot was crooked and turned outwards. When Mahanga discovered that his storehouse had been plundered he sought for any signs by which he could discover the thief, and at the door of the storehouse saw the prints of a foot with a crooked toe bent outwards, which was like the foot of Hotu-nui, and from this the news spread that Hotu-nui had robbed the kumara storehouse of Mahanga, which made Hotu-nui much ashamed.
Mahanga was father-in-law to Hotu-nui. Hotu-nui determined to leave his present home and go to some distant place, to be far from the people who had discovered his theft, that he might escape their jeers and taunts, and not lose his rank, or power to command.
He went to his wife, and said, “O mother! when I have departed, and your child is born, call it by the name of Maru-tuahu (hilled up), in remembrance of my plot of ground, of which I made the little mounds into which to put the tubers, but which I did not plant, for want of kumara.”
He left his wife, and with fifty [one hundred] people migrated towards Hau-raki (calm, no wind), and came out at Whare-kawa (house baptized), at the place where Marama (moon) and her slave man landed from the Tai-nui, when that canoe was in that district. Here Hotu-nui and his companions found a people residing, who were the owners of the land, and were called Uri-o-pou (descendants of Pou); and Hotu-nui and his companions took up their abode in a pa called Whakatiwai (canoe without side boards), belonging to that people. The name of the head-chief and commander of all that district was Rua-hiore (pit of the tail), with whom Hotu-nui and his companions lived as vassals: that is, when Hotu-nui and his followers caught fish in a net, the people of Rua-hiore took them from them by force; as also when they dug fern-roots or convolvulus-roots the Uri-o-pou plundered these also, nor would they leave the least of anything in the possession of Hotu-nui and his people.
Soon after Hotu-nui had left his wife she had a son, and called him Maru-tuahu (only hilled up); and when he had grown to a big boy he joined in the games played by the other children of his home. The games were whipping tops, and throwing the fern-stalk; and bowling hoops, and all the games with which children amuse themselves.
When the whipping-top of Maru-tuahu flew beyond those of his playfellows, some of his companions were jealous, and said, “The top of this bastard flies the greater distance,” and thus they jeered whenever he played a game better than they. They played at a game of wrestling, and Maru overcame all with whom he wrestled. His playfellows said, “Bastard, where is your father?” He was ashamed, and went to the house and asked his mother, and said, “O mother! where is my father?”
She answered, “Do you look to the place in the sky where the sun comes up.”
He kept these words of his mother in his heart; and when he became a man and was tattooed he thought of her words, and said to his slave, “We two must go in search of my father.” He left his home, and went far from where he was born, and as they came to a pa in their travels they inquired, “Has a migration of people passed here?” The people said, “No; but a migration of people passed here a long time ago; it was a migration of people led by Hotu-nui.” Maru-tuahu asked, “In what direction did they go?” The people answered, “They went towards the rising sun.” Maru-tuahu asked the same question of the people of each pa which he passed in his journey. At one of these he asked, “Has a migration of people passed here?” and was answered, “Yes, long ago; and it was led by Hotu-nui.” Maru-tuahu went on, and came out at Whare-kawa, on the Hau-raki waters (Thames).
When they were still journeying towards Hau-raki Maru-tuahu and his slave saw how birds, the pigeon and tui, congregated on a certain puriri (Vitex littoralis), up which Maru-tuahu climbed to spear them. Two daughters of Rua-hiore, going from their home to collect kiekie (Freycinetia banksii), of which to make floor-mats, went towards the tree up which Maru-tuahu was spearing birds, which was growing in a place called Te-tarata (Pittosporum crassifolium), and is still growing at this day. The younger sister saw Maru-tuahu, but did not inform her elder sister. When they got back to their home at the pa, the younger sister said to the people, “Beautiful! how beautiful is the man I have seen!” Her father said, “Go and invite him to this settlement.” The two sisters again went to where Maru-tuahu and his slave had been seen by her. The slave saw them going towards them, and called to his master Maru-tuahu, and said, “People are coming this way.” Maru-tuahu came down at once, because he had not any garments on while up in the tree. The women went up to the two men, and said, “Let us go to the settlement.” Maru-tuahu answered, “You go, and we will follow.” As the women went back they disputed about Maru-tuahu. Each said she would have him as her husband. “But” said the younger sister, “I will have him as I first saw him.”
The names of these women were—the elder, Pare-moehau (head-dress of Melicytus ramiflorus); the younger, Hine-urunga (daughter leant upon, or pillow).
Mara-tuahu left his tahaa (gourd) of oil in [a crevice of] a rock with his comb, and followed the young women to a pa called Pu-anoano (dizziness by looking from a height). That night he left his garment in the pa in charge of his slave, and-went back to where he had left his comb and oil. Having washed himself, he oiled his hair and adorned his head with red feathers, and came back to the pa. On the morrow he asked the occupants of the pa, “Has any migration of people passed this way?” They asked, “Of whom?” He answered, “I merely ask the question.” The people said, “There was one migration of people of Hotu-nui in days long past.” He knew from this answer that Hotu-nui was at Whakatiwai, and he went to see him. Having arrived where his father Hotu-nui lived, he did not enter the pa by the usual way. He was sacred, and might not go by the road passed over by the tribe, but climbed over the palisading and went to the house of Hotu-nui, but was not recognised by him. Maru-tuahu stayed in the house; and, when food was brought for Maru-tuahu and for his companion the slave, Maru-tuahu did not go to partake of it, but went to that which had been provided for Hotu-nui. When Hotu-nui put his hand out to take of the food, Maru-tuahu also put his hand out to take of the food at the same time. Each ate what he had taken; but, when Hotu-nui stretched out his hand to take more, Maru-tuahu put his hand over the hand of Hotu-nui to take of the food in the honae (basket), at which Hotu-nui was angry, because Maru-tuahu passed cooked food over his sacred hand. Maru-tuahu made this remark: “It is of your own.” Hotu-nui ceased to eat; but, in meditating over the event, he thought the young man before him was his son Maru-tuahu.
When they two were sitting in the verandah in front of the house, Hotu-nui asked, “What is your name?”
Maru-tuahu said, “Did you say to your wife, ‘If you have a child let it be named after the plot of ground which I prepared, but did not plant’?”
Hotu-nui said, “I did so.”
Maru-tuahu said, “My name is Maru-tuahu.”
Hotu-nui wept over his son till the sun had set, and gave orders that the people must not go out of the pa that night, as the night was sacred because of the sacred mounds (d) that must be heaped up in the ceremony of the baptism of his son. When parents are at home, the children are baptized in infancy, but, as Maru-tuahu had not been favoured by the presence of his parents when he was an infant, he had not been baptized; but now his father baptized him.
Maru-tuahu took the two daughters of Rua-hiore to wife, Pare-moehau and Hine-urunga, and lived with them at Whakatiwai.
Maru-tuahu asked his father, “Are your masters kind to you?”
Hotu-nui answered, “I am not allowed to keep the least morsel in my hand by the people in the midst of whom I live.” And he told him of all the ill-treatment he and his people had received from the people of Rua-hiore, who were called the Uri-o-pou Tribe.
To prove what his father had told him, Maru-tuahu sent a messenger to the Uri-o-pou people to ask for a few of the fish they had just taken in a net. The messenger delivered his message, and was answered by the Uri-o-pou by the question, “Is the flax growing at O-toi (damp) used to tie the locks of your hair up [and thereby so sacred that you cannot make nets of it]?” Maru-tuahu took the hint, and ordered his people to make many and great nets, and catch and dry much fish, to provide a feast for the Uri-o-pou. The people of Hotu-nui collected leaves of the trees called pukapuka (Brachyglottis repanda), which are not unlike the patiki (flounder). These leaves were put with the fish collected for the feast, to make those who beheld the pile think all were fish. A house was built eight kumi [eight times sixty-six feet] long, in which the feast was to be given. The object of this feast was to carry out a wish of Maru-tuahu to exterminate the Uri-o-pou people, to revenge their cruel conduct, and the degrading position in which they held Hotu-nui.
All the people of Uri-o-pou came to partake of the feast given by Maru-tuahu. The tribes who came were Uri-o pou (descendants of Pou—post), Marama (moon), and Wai-taha (side of the water). These completely filled the house; and in the night the people of Maru-tuahu attacked and killed their guests in the house, and took possession of their lands from Whakatiwai up to Rawaki (sea-breeze).
This was the first attack by Maru-tuahu and the people of Hotu-nui on the original owners of the land, and their taking possession of the district.
The name of this battle is Ika-pukapuka (the fish like the Brachyglottis repanda).
Maru-tuahu lived at Whakatiwai, and his wives had children. Pare-moehau, the elder sister, had Tama-te-po (son of the night); Whanaunga (relative), from whom came the Nga-ti-whanga Tribe; Tama-te-ra (son of the day), from whom came the Nga-ti-tama-te-ra Tribe. And the younger sister Hine-urunga had Ngako (fat meat), and Tauru-kapakapa (fluttering west wind).
The name and influence of Maru-tuahu was not taken by his senior children (the children of the elder sister), nor by the last-born, but was taken by the intermediate-born child by Tengako, whose descendants are now called the Nga-ti-maru (descendants of Maru).
Hotu-nui and Maru-tuahu died some time after the slaughter of the Ika-pukapuka. The tribe of Maru-tuahu now numbered in all seventy [one hundred and forty] warriors, but they steadily kept in view the necessity of making every endeavour to increase the number.
About this time a new kind of mat called tatara (a loose open mat) was brought to Whakatiwai by some people of other tribes who were travelling. This mat was made of the flax called whara-riki (Phormium colensoi), and was much admired by the descendants of Maru-tuahu, who inquired of the possessors, “Where does the flax grow of which this mat is made?” and were answered, “In Hau-raki” (the Thames). The females of the descendants of Maru-tuahu wished to procure some, and make mats like the mat they saw. Six of the women, including the wife of Tauru-kapakapa called Waenganui (centre), went in a canoe from Whakatiwai to Wara-hoe (false). These were seen by the owners of that district, who admired the good looks of Waenganui, and determined to take her as wife for one of their chiefs. The women had gone inland to procure the flax-leaves, and on their return to the canoe Waenganui was taken by force by the people from her five companions. The five returned to their home and reported to their tribe what had taken place, and said, “Our companion Waenganui has been detained by the Tu-hekea (man descending) Tribe.”
Tauru-kapakapa, the husband of the captured woman, went to rescue her. He went by the bank of the Thames up to the mouth of the Pi-ako River, and on up the Kere-pehi (heavy weight) Creek, and on in the path leading to Te-hiku (tail of a fish), and came out at Wai-hou (the water that burrows beneath the ground), then on to Te-awa-iti (the little creek), where he stayed at a pa called Matangi-rahi (great breeze). From there he went on by the Wai-hou to Te-rangi-ora (Brachyglottis repanda), where he obtained a canoe, and came down the river. The tribe occupying this pa were the Nga-ti-hako, some of whom accompanied him in his mission to obtain his wife. The chief of this tribe was called Wharewharenga-te-rangi (the steep of heaven). When the canoe had got to Hui-rau (meeting of hundreds), Tauru-kapakapa blew a blast on his war-trumpet, which made the people of the pa who had taken Waenganui ask, “Who owns the trumpet we hear?”
Waenganui asked them, “How is the tide? Does it flow or ebb?”
They answered, “It is ebbing.”
She said, “If it had been flowing, the trumpet which we have heard would be that of Tauru-kapakapa.”
When the canoe had got to Te-pare (wreath for the head), Tauru-kapakapa again blew a blast on his trumpet, which convinced Waenganui that the blast was blown by her husband. The canoe went on to O-rua-rangi (food of Rua-rangi), where Waenganui was detained. Tauru-kapa-kapa called to the people of the pa and said, “Give my wife to me.”
They answered, “She will not be given up.”
Again he called and said, “Give me my wife.”
And again they answered in proverbs; and he left without going on shore, and went back to Whakatiwai, and all his people agreed to exterminate the tribe who had thus taken the wife of the son of Maru-tuahu.
A body of warriors collected, and went to the Pa O-rua-rangi, where they lay in ambush on the opposite side of the river on the bank of which the pa stood; and a chief called Kai-rangatira (food of chiefs) went as a spy into the pa, but ere he departed he said to his companions, “After I have left you, do not eat or drink.” They did not heed his commands, but ate and drank as soon as he had gone.
He went into the pa, and slept in the house where the fishing nets were kept. He slept so soundly that he did not wake till the noise of the fern-beaters pounding the fern for the morning meal awoke him. He also heard the noise of the people who were preparing to take their nets to go out to fish. When he rose the sun was high in the heavens. He chanted an incantation called Puni (blind, or close) over all in the pa, that they might not see him, and walked through the midst of the people, some of whom asked others, “Who is that?” The people did not know that he was a man from another district. He went on to his people in ambush, who rose and attacked the pa and took it, and killed most of the occupants. This was done by the few warriors of Tauru-kapakapa; but though few in number they were all warriors.
They took the pa and occupied it, and stayed there.
Though there were many pas in that district, Tauru-kapakapa did not attack them, as they had not done any evil act.
This was the second time that the people of the Thames were conquered by the offspring of Maru-tuahu.
The descendants of Maru-tuahu and the original owners of the district lived in amity for one season, when Kai-rangatira paid a visit to the people of Te-puru (the dam, plug). When the people of the surrounding pas saw him they said, “This is the man who as spy went into the O-rua-rangi Pa.” Kai-rangatira went on to the pa at Kohanga (nest), the people of which, as he passed, said, “When this man is seen to return, send a messenger to us.” There were ten pas the people of which had said this. These were Tara-ru (trembling spike), Tutu-kaka (perch of the Nestor productus), Koro-nae (drink out of the hand), Poro-iti (little block), Totara (Podocarpus totara), Haaronga-kahu (skimmed by the Circus gouldii in its flight), Wai-kauri (old, aged), Kopu (stomach), Huru-moimoi (dogskin mat), Puta (hole), and Nga-hua-hou (new or first fruit). When Kai-rangatira was seen on his way home the people of these pas assembled; and when he had passed the Totara Pa and had got to the Ku-pata (wet mat) they rushed on him and struck at him with their spears: but he parried the first thrust; and the second time he was thrust at he said, “What can I accomplish! I am alone.” The third time he was pierced with many spears and fell, and died.
Tauru-kapakapa went to obtain the assistance of the tribe who had gone with him to recover his wife, who were called Nga-ti-hako; but they murdered him. This act for a time nonplussed the descendants of Maru-tuahu; but in time they assembled in a body, and attacked the ten pas and took them, and killed most of the occupants. Those who escaped fled, some to Whitianga (Mercury Bay), where their descendants at this day are called the Nga-ti-hei. This was the conquest of the original people of Hauraki, and the taking of the land of the whole district; and the descendants of Maru-tuahu became the lords of the soil.
The Nga-ti-maru (descendants of Maru-tuahu) next attacked the Nga-ti-hako for the murder of Tauru-kapa-kapa, and gained the victory of Te-matau (the fish-hook), from which Paeko (pout the lips) and Whare-wharenga-te-rangi escaped and fled to Roto-rua (two lakes), Maketu (ridge of the nose), and Whakatane (appear like a man).
There were also some who escaped from the slaughter of Teika-pukapuka (leaves like fish), who were of the Uri-o-pou Tribe. These fled to the north and settled in the Hokianga district, (d) of whom the chief Mara-tea (a certain fish) is the descendant.
These battles were fought by “the few in number,” the descendants of Maru-tuahu, son of Hotu-nui, the great leader of the Tai-nui migration. Thus the Thames district was taken by them, and they became established in their home in Hauraki.
The power and command of Maru-tuahu did not descend to his first-born children [the offspring of the elder sister), but to Te-ngako, the intermediate one; but all are called Nga-ti-maru. 

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