THE STORY OF A SWORD.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 226, 24 September 1928, Page 6

THE STORY OF A SWORD.

Arthur s famed Excalibur is not more twined about with legend than the curved Mexican sword that Major Von Tenipsky held in his dying grasp on the battlefield of Te Ngutu-o-te-manu sixty years ago. Various pakehas have at times claimed that they had handled or owned Von Tempsky’s sword, and lately a story found currency in print that a resident of Raglan purchased it, with other military items, from the Government over thirty years ago and some months ago sold it to a casual purchaser for two pounds. This is in my belief a fiction. The weapon has never been out of Maori hands since it was taken on the field of war in 18CS.

Von Tempsky’s sword is probably of Spanish make; at any rate he acquired it in Mexico and used it m the guerilla warfare in Central America before he came to New Zealand. In his M.S. diary of events in the Waikato War in 1863-64 he speaks of his “trusty Mexican blade”; he always carried it when on the warpath with his Forest Rangers. In 18G8 the Forest Rangers no longer existed as a corps; Von Tempsky was then an inspector in the Armed Constabulary, serving in the campaign against Titokowaru and his Taranaki Hauhaus. The last survivor of his old brother officers (Colonel Roberts) told me that he saw him chipping away with the sword at a trailing rata vine in the bush at Te Ngutu-o-te-day ’ waitil, g for orders from McDonnell that never came.

from I 1 S "£° Wcr ° W,th Tit okowaru and an L 1 -? a e laKin,blc Bent, who was an eye-witness. O f those events, I gathered the after-history of the sword of “Manurau.” as the the’mn c ? lled }on 1 empsky. Kimble Bent, on the morning after the bush battle, identified the majors body, and the Maori who had taken the mraded r it ,I f ,^ able l be s, ause of its c ’»'ed shape, hl ?nu ‘ tr . ,u J n P laut ’y before the people when he fallen pakehas bodies were cremated outside the pa fence. The sword was then laid before ?h! w T"’ Wh °’ , as tlle chief and hi ? h P r *est of the Hauhaus, proclaimed it a “parakia,” or “taumaliatanga, a thank offering for victory, a sacred tO Vl” S ° d , s ’ in accoi ’dance with ancient custom It was henceforth tapu to Uenuku, the deity of war. The relic was religiously preserved tribo Wa T H . l . th ® .eostody Of the Ngati-Ruanui tribe. In the eighties it was kept, carefully wrapped m greased flannel to preserve it from lust, under the threshold of a chief’s house in larihaka; it gave “mana tapu” to the house. Vhen its custodian died it was buried with him and there in a grave at Parihaka, to the best of niy belief, it lies to this day. “Manurau” had a great warrior reputation among Ins Maori foes, and sometimes friends and his favourite weapon, which he usually carried unsheathed, leaving the scabbard in camp, became imbued, m the aboriginal belief, with something of his own personal prowess and invincibility. I have seen the scabbard; it is in the possession of Von 1 empsky’s daughter. No doubt the old people who had the sword buried with its last holder did so to make sure that it would not return to pakeha hands per medium of some of the young generation, who would not hesitate to turn into cash even a tapu thankoffering to the g°ds. J.C.