Cowan. — Maori Place-names. 113 



Art. XVIII. — Maori Place-names : with Special Reference to 

 the Great Lakes and Mountains of the South Island. 



By J. Cowan. 



[Bead before the Wellington Philosophical Society, Ath October, 1905.] 



In this paper I do not propose to enter at length upon the large 

 question of Maori nomenclature, about which so much has been 

 written, but simply to note some hitherto unrecorded names 

 of interest in the South Island, more particularly those of the 

 lakes and mountains, which I have from Maori sources. During 

 the last few years attention has been many times directed to 

 the desirability of preserving Maori place-names wherever pos- 

 sible, and to the necessity for fixing the correct orthography of 

 many of the Native names at present spelled in a more or less 

 inaccurate fashion. We have a good many cases of carelessly 

 spelled names in and around Wellington — even the Native names 

 of some of the streets are incorrect — but there is no reason why 

 this sort of thing should be perpetuated. In the South Island, 

 however, matters are much worse. I could give a list of many 

 scores of names of localities in the Island — towns, villages, rail- 

 way-stations, rivers, lakes, and mountains — all erroneously spelt, 

 many of them atrociously mangled by the pakeha. Those 

 present who are acquainted with Maori will no doubt be able 

 to recall many mistakes of this sort. One glaring instance is 

 typical of the careless method of orthography common through- 

 out the South Island. " Kurow " (locally pronounced as " Kew- 

 ro ") is the official name of a township and railway-station in 

 north Otago. This, as it stands, is neither Maori, English, 

 nor Japanese. As a matter of fact it should be " Kohu-rau," 

 which means " many mists," or " roofed with mists " —the 

 name of a mountain near the township. There is something 

 appropriate and poetic in the name " Kohu-rau " ; but I sup- 

 pose " Kurow " it will be henceforth and always. 



A great many of the names given to mountains and lakes 

 in the South Island are personal names. The Maoris bestowed 

 the names of their chiefs upon prominent features of the land- 

 scape, just as we pakehas name them after our early explorers, 

 and our statesmen, and other men of note. The attempts made 

 to interpret these names under the mistaken idea that they are 

 locally descriptive titles have led to some curious and amusing 

 blunders. Other names, again, are tritely appropriate to the 

 locality. Many others are exceedingly interesting because they 

 memorise the 'ancient homes of the Maori in the South Sea 



