Contemporary Traditional             Maori Culture, part2    "The Maori Creation Story: The             Separation

of Heaven and Earth

              By Shu Guan, 01-19-2012,                  Period4,Culture and Geography

Source:George Grey, 1956, Polynesian Mythology:Christchurch, Whitcombe and Tombs

Ltd., 250 p. and Mr. Ruben Meza, 2012

"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-matauenga, the father of forests and their inhabitants."

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

(3)Tangaroa, the father of fish and reptiles.

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

(5)Haumia-tikitiki, the father of food that grows without cultivation.

 

(6)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 as 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.