140 Man a?id Shark 



to the deified sharks, while fishermen and others, who were much at sea, 

 sought their favor." 



Just as half a world away, in other times, Roman gladiators entered 

 an arena to battle to the death with lions for imperial entertainment, so 

 did Hawaiian warriors enter the shark pen in duels with sharks. The war- 

 rior's only weapon was a shark-tooth dagger, a short length of wood 

 shaped like a stout broomstick, gripped in his hand. Protruding from 

 the stick was a shark's tooth, which stuck out between two fingers of the 

 man's fist. Unlike the matador who can make a misstep and live to face 

 a charging bull again, the shark-warrior had but a single life-or-death 

 chance. He had to let the onrushing shark charge him. Then, at the last 

 instant, the warrior dived beneath the shark and tried to rip the shark's 

 belly with his crude weapon. It is said in Hawaiian legends that the 

 warriors sometimes killed the shark. If they did, they must have used 

 much akua, or magic. Perhaps it was stipulated by royal edict that if a 

 warrior drew blood he was allowed to leave the pen, providing that he 

 was able to escape the shark. But it seems impossible that the duels be- 

 tween man and shark ended any other way than in victory for the shark, 

 which, after all, had a maw of teeth to use against the one tooth gripped 

 in its antagonist's fist. 



The shark pen was a circle of lava stones, enclosing about a 4-acre 

 area at the edge of a bay in the harbor. The circle of rocks had an opening 

 on its seaward side so that water could flow into it. Fish— and human 

 bait— were thrown into the pen to lure sharks through the passage. When 

 a contest was to take place, the passage was closed so that neither op- 

 ponent could escape. Close to the shark pen, on the bottom of the 

 harbor itself, lived the Queen Shark, regally guarded by two stalwart 

 sharks from each of the Hawaiian Islands. The Queen condescended to 

 allow the shark jousts near her royal lair. But she had to be propitiated 

 with offerings which were undoubtedly human, for it was an economic 

 fact of life in old Hawaii that people were cheaper than pigs. 



As mentioned previously, some of the stones that formed the shark 

 pen were still in place when the dredgers began tearing up the harbor 

 bottom in the early 1900's for the construction of Pearl Harbor Naval 

 Base. As part of the harbor project, a big dry dock was built at a cost of 

 more than $4,000,000. The foundation suddenly collapsed under the pres- 

 sure of an underwater eruption, and the drydock was destroyed. Navy 

 inspectors and construction men scurried around trying to find the cause, 

 but the natives knew what had happened. "Queen Shark is huhii— angry 

 —and humps her back," they said. 



Belief in shark myths has persisted for years, even in modern Hawaii. 

 Less than a century ago, many Hawaiian women wore tattoos on their 

 ankles in remembrance of an ancient chieftainess who had been bitten on 



