

^ 



Pis-t 



4. Side post. Poupou; Wood, 126 cm. (49 5/8 in.) high; Opotiki; 

 Whakaiohea tribe; Te Huringa period (1800 — present); 

 10 National Museum of New Zealand, Wellington 



being carved in Hauraki, several of the carvers took sick 

 and died. Mereana Mokomoko, for whom the house 

 was being built, and her fellow tribesmen, the carvers, 

 believed an error was the cause of her trouble: the chips 

 from the chisel of Mereana's father, Apanui Hamaiwa- 

 ho, had been used in a cooking fire. This was a terrible 

 thing to do. To correct it, a ritual fire of carving chips 

 was lit and two sweet potatoes were cooked in it. After 

 they were cooked Mereana in her capacity as chief's 

 daughter was asked to eat them. Reporting this event 

 later she said, "I trembled with fear lest death should 

 come to me also!" But the old men reassured her that 

 she had the power to remove the evil spell which was 

 destroying the carvers. She ate the sweet potato and 

 eventually, the house, Hotunui, was completed. 



Mistakes were regarded very seriously in the art 

 world of the Maori. There are famous instances in the 

 literature. A rafter painter at Te Whaiti made a mistake 

 in the painting of a certain pattern and this was noted 

 by the tohunga who opened the house. He prophesied 

 an early death for the artist, and according to the peo- 

 ple he was dead within a year. A truly tragic case was 

 that of the chief Te Waru of Ngati Whaoa of Te Arawa 

 who one day walked casually into the carving shed 

 smoking his pipe. He had forgotten to leave his pipe 

 and tobacco outside. In those days food of any sort was 

 not permitted — tobacco was cooked food. As a result of 

 this error the carvers quit work and so Te Waru had to 

 try and finish the house by himself. It is reported that 

 he lost three wives and two children before he finally 

 gave up and sold his unfinished dream to a European 

 dealer named Charles Nelson. Nelson then hired carv- 

 ers to complete the house, which he erected at Rotorua. 



In March 1900 Charles Nelson persuaded the peo- 

 ple to give his house the full measure of traditional 

 opening ceremonials, somewhat like the rituals for the 

 opening of "Te Maori." This resulted in one of the strang- 

 est happenings of the Maori world in which a Pakeha 

 (European) was demanding and getting the ritual cere- 

 monies for his house which he planned to sell soon 

 afterwards. No one can do that sort of thing nowadays. 

 What he was doing was using the people to "authenti- 

 cate" his house so he could get a good price for it. The 

 house is Rauru, which is now in Germany. As it hap- 

 pened he exceeded the requirements of protocol by 

 arranging for two tohunga (ritual experts), instead of 

 one, to open the house. Nelson was thus the cause of 

 committing another grave error and as a result the sec- 

 ond tohunga who performed the opening ceremonies 

 died within eight days of the event. My relative, the first 

 tohunga, died over a year later. The chief, Te Waru, 

 who committed the original error, lived to a ripe old 

 age, but he was burned to death in his hut at Paeroa. 

 The house that he attempted to build when he was still 

 a young man was in honor of "the beautiful wife of his 



Continued on p. 19 



