150: The Ngaroto Carving

Just what influenced the carvers of the Ngaroto pou design? Ngaroto means ‘the lake’ - (Nga – ‘the’, roto – ‘lake’). There is no legend attached to the lake that is known. The term Ngaro means ‘hidden’ & ‘to’ means in the verb ‘have’ – have hidden, but that may mean nothing as the pou was reportedly lost in 1800. Did an invading tribe burn it and then dump it in the lake, or was it hidden in the lake by the tribe to protect it (and why then was it burned like the other most unusual wooden carved images...see below)

Legend has it that the carving was lost around 1800 yet no story ever referred to this item as being lost or even sacred, or that it even existed prior to it being discovered in 1906. No story of this pou exists in Maori folklore before it’s discovery. That may mean nothing, it may mean much. For this is similar to the Korotangi jade bird. No one knew what it was when it was found, and there was no story that existed about a stone bird. But when it was found….

Mr. R. W. Bourne states that the carved post must have been covered by seven or eight feet of water, but that it was not buried in the lake mud. No Maori had lived about the lake since 1863 so the item was therefore lost for at least 60 years. It is nearly 9’ tall and may have been much taller at one point. Did it represent the tall-ones with a different hair style to the straight haired Polynesian? Was it reminiscent of the Hawaiian carvings of Lono. Lono came to earth on a rainbow. Lono is the god of agriculture and rain and as rain brings rainbows so that sort of makes sense. However, this rain god is related to the fire goddess as one of Lono’s manifestations, Lonomakua, is in the Pele family. Do the spikes mean rain or fire. They do not mean rainbow. The number of spikes seems irrelevant as Lono shows anywhere from 5-8. There is no room on the head of the Ngaroto carving for any more spikes. Lono shown in this way is not the way the ancient carvings represented Lono and we do not know why they changed at a time well before The Ngaroto carving was rediscovered.

No old carvings of Lono exist but all recent images of Lono have spikes on his head and an extended chest and a curved back…all these are also represented in the carving from lake Ngaroto. It is said to carved between 1200-1500. Quite a wide date range for something that can be tested.

It is unique in the following ways; It has no carved features upon it…apart from a few notches on the chest.

• The curves leading from the shoulder are not representative of a fern frond

• The head spikes are found nowhere else but Hawaii and represent rain or fire.

The Ngaroto carving has been giving the name Te Uenuku. It is carved from Totara, that they can tell us. What they won’t tell us is the date; I’m sure they know it! Tainui call this carving Te Uenuku after the sun god from Polynesia. Are there any examples of the sun god in this or any from in any old archaic Polynesian carving? Well, no there isn’t. And that creates a problem just as the Korotangi creates a problem with an imagined story being attributed to a dead duck. The pou was carved in NZ out of Totara and was done so to house a stone meant to house the spirit of Uenuku (or Kahukura). According to local legend, the spirit of Uenuku was brought to New Zealand by the people on the Tainui canoe, in a stone. When they landed, they made a carving with a round opening at the top, in which the stone was placed so that the spirit of Uenuku inhabited the stone.

Uenuku isn’t so much the god of the rainbow but rather than the rainbow is a manifestation of Uenuku. The spikes are not related to a rainbow. The curved portion is not reminiscent of a rainbow but it is of a sun; if ancient people used prongs like we do to represent the rays of the sun. Uenuku was the spirit guardian invoked by tribal tohunga and appealed to for advice and omens in times of war. Each hapū had an image of Kahukura, often a small carved wooden figure, which was kept in a tapu (holy) place. A literal translation of Kahukura is a red garment ( cloak/chief - chief/red). Does this mean then something different to Uenuku the rainbow? Was Te Uenuku draped in a red cloak resting on the shoulder caved at the back like the photo from 1975 at the museum. No legend talks of it anything red in association with this pou or the stone. Although Uenuku is the god of war!

It is said that the Te Awamutu Museum holds a large stone said to be inhabited by the spirit of Uenuku. According to local legend, the spirit of Uenuku was brought to New Zealand by the people on the Tainui canoe, in a stone. When they landed, they made a carving with a round opening at the top, in which the stone was placed so that the spirit of Uenuku inhabited the stone had a home. Due to his spiritual significance, photographs of the stone figure of Uenuku are prohibited without the permission of the Maori sovereign. Whether this is true or not, no one is saying.

However, we aren’t saying it isn’t the case but it seems odd to many that a God, in a certain forms, that was supposed to be kept by each hapu or tribe in carved stone format… yet in all of Polynesia not one single example exists with even a remote resemblence to Te Uenuku (other than 1800s' lono's), nor in any museum in the world. The one Tainui brought with them was supposed to be a large stone - yet Te Uenuku would not be able to house a stone greater than 20cm high and 14cm wide. That is not to say it wasn’t placed lying down by why would you do that with a ‘god’? The stone does not need to be in carved form like a potato god, it just as easily be the item in Te Awamutu museum noted as ascension item - 2011.31.2. However, that stone would have to be made up of material from a specific Polynesian Island and any stone found that is said to be Uenuku, could simply be tested in that regard. It would be good if it could be found, but we doubt it existed for the reasons of history. Maori transcribed many stories to Europeans about their legends, history and ways. Not one tells of a pou holding a stone, and not one one tell of a stone holding the spirit of Uenuku brought here from “Hawaiiki.

Even the anchor stone said to be from the Tainui waka, is made of local rock found here in NZ !!!

Uenuku, the human being, lived part of his life in Rarotonga, the last port of call before canoes left for Aotearoa. No legend or story talks of Uenuku and the Tainui canoe in any other from than the ancient legend of the 'person' of Uenuku. The Maori canoes made the land at Rarotonga which was also overpopulated, and furthermore the chief Uenuku, with whom the ancestors of the Maori had disputed with in Raiatea and Tahiti, was or his son was, the leading chieftain in Raratonga. Due to the causes that had brought about the migration (war) and the economic situation on Rarotonga, Uenuku would be aware of the danger of any landing that might develop into a lengthy stay. Those who would become the Maori did stay longer than anticipated but why they then had a stone bearing the spirit of Uenuku I am not sure.

His spirit, stone, form and sacred nature are never mentioned anywhere that we could find. Yet with some research we found a story of a rock fashioned to house Uenuku (therefore his spirit) in Tahiti before the Canoe Tamatea left for Aotearoa. The rock was so kept in a house they built for it. Keep in mind this relates to the canoe Tamatea, not the Tainui which left from Rarotonga. So the stone that is said to have been brought with Tainui is not 'the' stone that housed the sprint of Uenuku, but a stone that represented the spirit of Uenuku. Uenuku-rangi is one of the original gods, offspring of the Sky-father and Earth-mother—and his visible form is the rainbow.

In explaining the absence of any tradition associating Hoturoa and the Tainui people with Uenuku, Rore Erueti states that not all canoes left Hawaiki because of war, but some as was the case with Tainui, departed in order to possess themselves of places of which they had heard. The objective however, was New Zealand, and it would appear that the “Fleet” in this case was following the procedure of previous migrations by making Rarotonga their final departure point.

The two rainbow "gods" (Uenuku and Kahukura, were viewed as important tribal gods, more especially in connection with war), occupied an important place among the tribes of the eastern coast of the North Island, where Maru was not so prominent as he was among the Aotea people of the west. Te Kahawari is a rock on Waikawa (now Portland Island off the Mahia peninsula). It is said that Kahukura (Uenuku - the rainbow - as a god) abides there. This rock was likely under the landslide that covered a Maori village in 1880. The spot needs excavating.

We do know from stories, that the Tainui canoe brought with them to this country two sacred stones, named respectively Tanekaihi and Moko-paru, and that these effigies were transported overland from the Wai-te-mata to Kawhia. But these things were at best but inferior household deities, and not for one moment to be compared or confounded with the tribal gods of those canoes - Maru and Uenuku - who were doubtless deified ancestors, and as such were in communication with a still higher class of god. Yet no mention of these gods in any form coming with them from Hawaiiki has ever been recorded.