Contemporary Traditional Maori Culture, Part 2

"The Maori Creation Story: The       Separation of Heaven and Earth"

By: Analine HernandezJanuary 18, 2012- Period: 5

Culture and GeorgaphySource: George Grey, 1956, Polynesian

Mythology (ed. by William W. Bird): Christchurch, Whitcombe and Tombs Ltd., 250 p. (BL 2615.G843p 1956)

 

(According to the Maori tradition) "All humans are descended from one pair of ancestors, Rangi and Papa, who are also called Heaven and Earth.

 

" In those days, Heaven and Earth clung closely together, and all was darkness.

 

" Rangi and Papa had six sons: (1) Tane-mahuta, the fatherof the forests and their inhabitants";

 

"(2)Tawhiri-ma-tea, the father of winds and storms"; 

 

"(3)Tangraroa, the father of fish and reptile";

 

(4)Tu-matauenga, the father of fierce human beings";

 

"(5)Hamumia-tikitiki, the father of food that grows without cultivation";

 

"(8) and Rongo-ma-tane, the father of cultivated food."

 

"In the beginning these six sons and all other beings lived in darkness for an extremely long time, able only to wonder what light and vision might be like."

 

After a battle between the six sons, Tu-matauenga ate 4 of his brothers food, sparing Tawhiri-ma-tea, the father of winds and storms.

 

This is why today people are fierce and have war, why people eat plants and animals, and why there are storms.