616 Transactions.- — Miscellaneous. 



equally valuable and not less necessary work will undoubtedly 

 fall to bis sbare in giving tbe public, or at least tlie student, the 

 treasures of his knowledge in the shape of facts and criticism. 



Mr. Turnbull Thomson's philological papers, read before 

 some of the affiliated Societies of the Institute, on " The "Whence 

 of the Maori," tracing their aboriginal home to Peninsular 

 India, or " Bharata," first drew my attention seriously to the 

 subject, as I had some acquaintance, as a student, with the 

 rehgious systems and mythologies of the Hindus : and my 

 comparative study of Maori traditions with these has now led 

 to a discovery of so many analogies and coincidences, that I 

 have been impelled to brmg the results of this inquiry before 

 you — for discussion at least. Mr. Thomson's conclusions, as 

 results of philological inquiry, are completely borne out by the 

 supplementary evidence to be adduced from Maori tradition 

 and mythology. My investigations, if correct, establish the 

 following : — 



(1.) That the Maoris, as a race, are of an An-Aryan, or 

 Turanian origin : members of a family of people 

 that once held possession of Peninsular India, or 

 Bharata : 



(2.) That with these is amalgamated an Aryan element, 

 more immediately represented by their priests and 

 chiefs : 



(3.) That the cause that provoked their emigration was the 

 overthrow, generally, of their race by the invading 

 Aryans ; large portions of the country having been 

 absorbed among the territories of the superior race. 



For information on the ]\Iaori part of the subject I am 

 indebted to some of the papers of Mr. Colenso, and of others, 

 published in the "Transactions;" but more particularly to a 

 work, " Te Ika a Maui," by the late Kev. Richard Taylor. I 

 purpose, in this paper, to confine myself more immediately to 

 the Turanian element of the question, leaving the Aryan 

 element to be more fully dealt with on some future occasion. 



The chiefs and priests, and perhaps some of the tribes who 

 retain a more Caucasian cast of features, seem to have Aryan 

 blood in their veins. The Aryans who broke into India called 

 themselves Aryas. The chiefs and tohmuias among the Maoris 

 call themselves, as distinguished from the lower ranks, arilcia — 

 a name which is perhaps equivalent to " Children of the Aryas." 

 Both words mean "nobles" or "lords;" the derivation of the 

 name, from a Sanskrit word that refers to the plough, I will notice 

 in my next paper. 



The following cosmological poem of the Maoris appears of 

 an order far higher than might have been expected from a 

 people of their position in the ethnological scale ; it has all the 



