Rock Art in Maori Culture – Brian Allingham

Ancient paintings and other markings on the walls of caves and rock outcrops are widespread throughout the world. Aotearoa - New Zealand is no exception and possesses a rich heritage of Māori rock art. Traditional pre-nineteenth century Māori rock art is widespread in both the North and South Islands of New Zealand, although most of the sites recorded to date are in Te Waipounamu (South Island), and as a result much of our knowledge of rock art relates to South Island sites. We do not know exactly when the first people arrived in Aotearoa, although it is generally understood to be within the last millennium. It is, therefore, difficult to say exactly when rock art was first practiced here, let alone by whom. Archaeological evidence shows tropical Polynesian art styles introduced to Aotearoa were modified gradually into regional varieties that reflected settlement patterns and tribal movement around the country. Identity and symbolism expressed in formal traditional Māori art embody the dynamics of a culture alive with intimate spiritual rela-tionships with the tupuna (ancestors) - expressed verbally through karakia (prayer) and actively through tikanga (protocols) – and that sought their protection during the earthly realm. For example, the wharenui (formal meeting house) was, and remains, physically structured as an ancestral form that literally embraces the occupants. Integral relationships therefore exist between subjects and designs in Maori rock art and those in tā moko (tattooing), whakairo (carvings) and decorative designs such as kōwhaiwhai (rafter patterns) for example. Many rock art subjects comprise varia-tions on main repeated themes, often using complex subliminal imagery. The extensive rock surfaces in some shelters or caves provided an open ‘canvas’ presenting the Māori artist freedom of expression unrestricted by limitations of structural form or function. This led to the creation of some works extending many metres along the walls or roofs of some of the larger shelters. However, other sites with extensive surfaces with potential for large paintings sometimes contain relatively small conventional images only.

In Te Waipounamu Maori would occupy some of the rock shelters while travelling, other shelters would be used on a semi-permanent basis during seasonal mahika kai (gathering rounds) when local resources from forest, wetland, and open country were harvested. Leaving aside any questions as to why paintings or other markings were applied to shelter walls, many of these works displayed a clear identity in the landscape in a culturally recognisable way that may have reflected whakapapa (inter-generational) connections to certain areas, and perhaps territorial rights to occupy or harvest from them.

Māori rock art methods and styles

Traditional Māori rock art in both of the main islands was painted, drawn, carved, incised, abraded and occasionally chipped out of the surface of the rock, the method of application and subject matter often reflecting both geology and regional cultural diversity. Most South Island Māori rock art sub-jects are painted in black carbon derived from soot mixed with oil and other additives (as recorded from local Māori by Herries Beattie 1918). Some black paintings had designs incised through them into the underlying limestone to expose the contrasting white. This rare but effective technique is centred on sites in North Otago, were several subjects appear to depict Pouakai (the extinct New Zealand Giant Eagle, Harpagornis moorei) suggesting this technique is relatively old in New Zealand terms and possibly a local development. Final-ly incised figures depicting subjects introduced by Europeans are recorded in rock shelters in South Canterbury and North Otago, but not cutting through black paint as seen in the examples featuring extinct birds, as described above. Works in red paint and ‘crayon’ are also fairly widespread in the Māori rock art of Te Waipounamu, often associated with black figures, and sometimes in both colours as seen in Te Ika a Maui (North Island). Kōkōwai (iron oxides) provided a plentiful natural source for mixing into red paint or use as crayons; colour tones recorded so far range from orange through to deep carmine red. Single polychrome subjects in black and yellow are widely distributed in South Canterbury but rare elsewhere. Yellow, white and blue pigments were available from clay deposits and other minerals.

Clay derived white as a single colour was occasionally used on darker rock surfaces such as schist in North Otago. Blue is known at only a few Māori rock art sites and seems to have been very rarely used in this context.

Regional diversity in Māori rock art subjects and styles is reflected in the birds, birdmen, fish, dogs and other animals often depicted in South Island sites that are virtually absent in North Island rock art. In Te Ika a Maui the shores of Lake Tarawera are renowned for red paintings of waka. A variety of canoe designs are depicted on shelter walls around the Bay of Plenty and Waikato River, most well known perhaps being the carvings at Kaingaroa. These designs are rare in the South Island where most of the numerous waka pictured are far more stylised. Sites in Taranaki (North Island west coast) are carved with unique designs and subjects, such as footprints not recorded in Māori art elsewhere. Yet aspects of some carvings and paintings in the Lake Taupo and Tokoroa regions of the central North Island would not look out of place in the South Island. Nor, would rock art and tree carvings from the Chatham Islands.

Age

No direct dating of rock art has been carried out in Aotearoa, and in the context of the relatively short span of New Zealand prehistory current dating techniques, such as radiocarbon dating, do not currently provide the level of precision required for meaningful research. Paintings of extinct birds like moa and the extinct New Zealand Giant Eagle appear to be drawn from live observations, making this rock art at least 500 years old or more. Obvious de-pictions of extinct birds are rare in Māori art. Perhaps the only undisputed example portraying moa features a group of three birds outlined in red with black infill, located in a small shelter in the Pareora River catchment in South Canterbury. A large black painting, probably of an eagle, on the roof of a cave in the adjoining valley appears also to date from a fairly early period.

Moa bones and tools found during archaeological excavation in the floors of many shelters containing Māori rock art in the South Island indicate some of the birds were consumed by the occupants, and much of the rock art in Te Waipounamu is thought to date from moa-hunter times (Trotter and Mc-Culloch).

While this may be true, extensive research into South Canterbury and North Otago Māori rock art sites by the South Island Māori Rock Art Project has recorded numerous examples of Māori rock art directly superimposed by obviously later work, some possibly attributable to suc-cessive tribal migrations into Te Waipounamu. The latest examples of tra-ditional Māori rock art include subjects introduced by Europeans, such as sailing ships, horses and Te Reo Māori written in European characters, as taught by early Christian missionaries to enable bible reading. The com-bined evidence to date suggests that Māori rock art was practiced over an extended period from times when moa were observed, through to the nineteenth century. While the meaning of the rock art may remain largely unknown, what is certain is that many of the works are masterpieces in their own right, and the work of true artists in every sense of the word. Ancient Māori designs in rock art and other media now feature widely in modern art world wide.

Bibliography

Ambrose, W. 1970. Archaeology and rock drawings in the Waitaki Gorge, Central South Island. Records of the Canterbury Museum, Volume 8, No. 5.

Beattie, H. 1918. Journal of the Polynesian Society, Volume 27: 137 – 151.Shortland, E. 1851. The Southern Districts of New Zealand. Longmans, London.

Trotter, M. and B. McCulloch 1981. Prehistoric Rock Art in New Zealand. Longman Paul, New Zealand Archaeology Association Monograph No. 12.