name had become a synonym for all lands outside New Zealand not long after the settlement of the people here. If we could, however, find a country—say in Indonesia or that neighbourhood—where the kumara grows wild, it would with more probability be the Hawaiki referred to in the chant.
The Maori account of the origin of the kumara is briefly this: It is the offspring of Pani-tinaku, a woman, who is said to have been the wife of Rongo-maui, also called Rongo-marae-roa, Rongo-ma-tane, and Rongo-a-tau. Pani is said to have been the person who gave the food to Hawaiki; the food was the kumara; hence the name of Hawaiki, meaning plentiful food.[1] But the kumara appears to have been in charge of Whanui, which is a name for the star Vega, but quite possibly is also a territorial designation. It is also said that the root was stolen by Rongo-maui from Whanui. Another story is to the effect that Pani and her husband Tiki visited an island where the people had no kumara, and finding that food was scarce, he sent back his wife to another country called Tawai to fetch some for the people with whom he was staying. Tawai, here, may be the N.W. island of the Hawaiian group, now called Kauai, which until the last 100 years was called Tauai; but from the archaic nature of the tradition, I am inclined to think it is more ancient than the settlement of Kauai island. Rongo-māui combines the names of one of the great quartette of Polynesian gods—Rongo, with that of Māui, the greatest of all Polynesian heroes, often wrongly called a god, a claim to which he can be admitted only in the sense of being a deified ancestor. It is this Rongo (i.e. Rongo-māui) that is probably meant when he is said to be the god, or patron
- ↑ Hamiora Pio's collection of Maori traditions, MSS. with the Polynesian Society.
