THE SOUTHERN MAORI

Otago Witness, Issue 4028, 26 May 1931, Page 67

THE SOUTHERN MAORI

STRAY PAPERS LI.—AMBIGUOUS AND CONTROVERSIAL NAMES. In addition to gathering as many previously uncollected names of places as I could I endeavoured to secure the correct forms of a number of ancient renderings of Maori nomenclature. For instance, Captain Morrell visited Molyneux Bay in 1830, and found there a native village of 28 huts, and this village he called Tavaimoo, but none of the Maoris in the district could throw any light on this name. Possibly the captain asked the name of the .place, and the Maoris pointed out the changed course of the Molyneux, exclaiming “ Te awa i nuia ” (the river formerly). This suggestion may seem far-fetched, but it must be remembered that the Southern Maori frequently sounded “ w ” as “ v,” and he would be pointing out what he regarded as the locality’s most striking feature. The only alternative suggestion seems to be that the name should rightfully be written Te-wai-mu, but no such name is within the scope of tradition or recollection. An old record gives the name of the village as Miri-kau-waka, but this is merely a mis-reridering of its correct name, Muri-kau-whaka (or Murikauhaka). In the plan of the Otago block, 1844, the country between “ Lake Rakitoto ” and Tokomairiro is marked “ Towitorata ” and Mr Roberts wrote: —“Opposite Balelutha on the north bank of the Molyneux, was Towai-torata.” I could learn nothing about sueh a name, nor about the name Ona-kau-hara applied to a place east of Manuka Island up the Molyneux. The name might possibly be One-kauhoro (crackling sand). The name Matoa early applied to the district north of Stirling is probably a caligrapbic error for Matou, which is how Tuckett spelt Matau (or Mataau) the name of the Clutha River. The statement that the Maori name of Stirling was Tae-puta-noa was outside the knowledge of my informants. One said: " The site of the Stirling railway station was Ohuru, and the hill near the river was Kamaru. There was an old village between the two places, but I forget its name. It was not Taeputanoa, which is a name I never heard before.” It is possible, of course, that some place on the river bank may have borne this name when the first settlers arrived.

The nearest my informants could get to Te Kahewaka, which was early given as a name near Coal Point, was that it was probably intended for Te-wai-hoaka, the name of a creek in that vicinity. That strange name Otanomomo Came in for some consideration, and I have two opinions about it. The first runs: “ The name should be O-tane-moamoa, but I do not know its real meaning. Tane may mean * speaking to a woman by a man,’ or * a husband,’ and moamoa is a kind of fish, and perhaps it had other meanings.” The other opinion runs: “ O-tane moamoa is the name of a bush. Tane means ‘ a man ’ and moamoa means * drinking out of the hands It is also the name of a kind of rock cod, the kind called Maori Chief, I think.”

The name of the railway siding called Waitapeka was altered to Kakapuaka in 1903. One of my informants said this should have been Ka-kapu-waka, meaning “ placing things in a canoe,” but later two old men gave me what they affirmed was the correct ancient form of the name. It defined, they said, a lagoon or small lake opposite Finegand, near the main railway line, south of Bal clutha, and was correctly Kapu-a-waka meaning “ canoes lying together.” The twofold question, “ What is the correct rendering of Tahakopa and what is the Maori name of the Maelennan River t” gives rise to a large volume of conjecture. On September 13, 1895, Mr C. W. Adams, chief surveyor, wrote to Hoani Rakiraki at Kaka Point, asking for the names of the Maelennan River and the piece of land between it and the Tahakopa, and forwarding charts to fill in. Mr Rakiraki could yiot supply those two names, but he got others from his father, Haimona Rakitapu. As the latter died in October, 1895, there was not sufficient time in fill in all the charts. What was done, however, was given to me in 1915; and the information has all been incorporated in former articles. The name Kahuika given to the land at the junction of the’two rivers is a common name for all such junctions, meaning “the joinings,” and is not a real place-name. Mr Rakiraki considered that Tahakopa was a correct name and meant “ the side of a dent,” but neither his father nor he could give a name for the Maelennan, and i have never met any Maori who could. One woman, who gave me a number of names, stated she had heard its name when she was a girl. It had struck her as being a sad name, and as far as she could remember it began with “ Wai ” but she could not recall the remainder of the name. The river now usually called Tahakopa has been rendered as Tauhukupu, Tahaukupu, Tapuke. Taukupu and Tahakapu, but my informants seemed to think Tahakopa was correct, one remarking that kopa was quite good Maori. “ Whaka-kopa is a bird turning when flying,” he ex plained, “and kopa means any bend or the shape of a bend. I would translate Taha-kopa as meaning ’ the side of a bend ’.”

The surveyors seem to have given a nun.tier of Maori names to features in the Catlins and Tautuku forests, and

unless one actually knew one from the other it would be hard to say which, if any, were genuine Maori place-names. Sueh names as Matai, Waikoata (Fern Creek), Waitere (swift creek), Waiheke (dripping water), etc., require in quiry before they are adopted as genuine. All my informants knew that Houipapa was a manufactured name, but one of them thought Papatowai was a name given by the Maoris. With respect to the well-known Rata-nui one of my two principal informants could not say if it was genuine, but the other reckoned it was the original name of tha* range. In a very early map of Otago (about 1853) a hill west of the Kaihiku Range was marked Pahuero. Perhaps this was meant for the Pohueroa Hill. On our present maps the name Pohara-aroha does not seem to me to be correct, hut I neglected to make inquiries about it when among my aged Maori friends. The name Waikouaiti has caused much controversy, and many and diverse have been the attempts to fix the spelling according to its pronunciation. Recently I have noticed two North Island explanations that the name is really Wai-kawa-iti, meaning “ little neap tide,” but my old friends, one of whom was born on the banks of the river, seemed to regard Waikouaiti as correct. The general opinion seems to be that it was named because it was very low indeed when the name-givers saw it. There may have been an unusually dry summer bringing drought conditions and justifying the three renderings of the meaning given to me—viz., “ The little quantity of water, “ the river with the scarcity of water,” and “ trickling water.” The name Puketeraki came up quite a number of times in our discussions. One of my friends thought that Puke-te-raki (the sky hill) was right; another thought it had been originally Puke-tihi-raki (puke, hill; tihi, summit; raki, sky), but all the rest considered the name was really Puke-ti-raki, although they could not give its origin. Unless it is a name brought from Hawaiki it could have been bestowed because the ti (cabbage trees) were so abundant on it, or in sueh regularity of growth as to appear like rows in orderliness.

Tumai is a name about which some inquiry has been made, and one of my informants said that he did not know the district, but that the name meant a person or perhaps a clump of trees, standing on a hill in plain sight. Another said that Tumai derived its name from a tree there “ split by thunder ” (lightning), but still remaining standing after the great storm had rolled by in the long ago. Taieri is a name which many think should be amended to Taiari, but it is quite correct according to southern dialectial usage, which says taieha for taiaha, pounemu for pounamu, kumera for kumara, and so on. None of my informants knew the origin or meaning of the name, until a well-informed man told me it was called after a tipnna (ancestor) of that name. As a word, “ Taieri meant to throw a man down in a struggle or a cross-buttock in wrestling.” The name of the pa (fort) of Tukiauau was once given to me as Waihora-puka, which appears to be the name of Lee Creek, and once as Waka-raupo, my informant saying this meant “ bulrush canoe.” The correct name is Whaka-rau-puka. “Up at the head waters of the Waitaki, at Lake Ohou,” said one old man,” there is a pond called Opokoruru named after a woman, and another pond near it, Wai-mataau, is also named after a woman. The Hawea tribe was not named after the lake, but the lake was named after the tribe. The highest peak in the Te Aka range is called Kohu-rau, but has been corrupted to Kurow.”

A hill behind Pukeuri is named not after an incident in a man’s life but through what happened to him after his death. The chief Te Whiwhi died, and his corpse was placed in a hole near the top of the hill, awaiting a suitable opportunity to be transferred to Punaniaru. The night before the party went for the body a great downpour of rain occurred, and the hillside slipped and the bones have not been recovered yet. The hill was thereupon named Te-horo-o-te-whiwhi (the landslip of Te Whiwhi). Fog on it is regarded as a sure sign of rain. One of my aged friends suggested that Kakau-nui (now called Kakanui) might be the southern form of Ngakaiinui, meaning “great heat.” I have a note that the correct name of Maheno is Kuruhiku. Rae-o-paaka and Te-mimi-e-te-haki are two places between Waikouaiti and Dunedin, the locality unascertained, and Te-atua-o-taiehu is a hill somewhere on Otago Peninsula. One of the old men thought Te-pou-a-te-wera was on Mapoutahi or Goat Island, and that the neck joining that peninsula to the mainland was called Paki-hau-kea after the man who had charge of the pa when it was taken. The Maori names of Conical Hill and its neighbours completely eluded all my informants although some of them had heard of them when boys. One added, “ When I was a boy I was taken a trip south, and near Pomahaka I saw smoke coming out of the ground. My mother said it was from burning coal, and that if the Maoris cooked food on that steam the food went black. The name of that place was Te-rua-karehu, meaning * the hole of coal or ashes,’ but sometimes it was called Te-ahi-a-ue. The white man calls it the Burning Plain.” The same man said that in 1891 the Royal Commissioner asked him for the Maori name of Longford to bestow in place of Gore, but he was unable to supply it. It has

been recorded that the correct name of Nokomai should be Nukumai, but one of my informants said there was a place up the Mataura, the correct name of which was Rokomai. A list of Maori, or alleged Maori, place names from ancient sources dealing with South Otago and Southland was taken among the surviving old Maoris without result. The list was as follows:—Pohawai, Kopara, Otariti, Aparaniati, Tahapai, Pukupuku, Pau, Poponiaina, Waikini, Waipaki. Otewao, Wainiarama, and Mawano. Some, of the aged people had heard of Roto-ua (rainy lake), said to be an ancient name of Lake Manapouri. Some pronounced Wakatipu as spelt, and some as Fakatipu (or Whakatipu). Asking after a chief called Tukete I was told there were three men of this name in the history, and that the third one lived at Stewart Island, where the Maori track across the island is called Te-ara-a-tukete (the path of Tukete), and a lagoon near Mason Bay is Te-hapua-o-tukete. I could not learn the exact location of 0-hau-wera, a cluster of rocks well up the Waiau River, nor could those interviewed recall the name of the Maori landing place behind Green Islets.

It is a difficult thing collecting Maori place names because the pronunciation of different individuals varies so much. As an illustration of vowel changes take the name of the Maori wooden utensil which some called ipu, some opu, and some upu. It can be realised also that differences in spelling might easily result through the faulty pronunciation or imperfect knowledge of any person interviewed. In 1905 Mr James Cowan visited Colac Bay and secured many names, and for purposes of comparison the differences in spelling between his list and mine are here given. In the great majority of cases we coincided, but the following differed, my rendering being given in parentheses:—Okotekote (Okutukutu), Rakipaka (Rakipako), Arenui (Urenui), Tauhere-rauti (Ta-whiri-rauti), Taramaitihiti (Taramahitihiti), Otaetae (Otaitai), Oterewa (Otarewa), Pohetorea (Pohoitorea), Oliinekoriri (Ohinekorero), Te-kiri-o-tunohu (Te-kiri-o-tunehu). Mr Cowan rightly corrects Oporo to Opora, and gives the name of Thornbury Junction as Te Aria, a name new to me. My thanks are due to Mr Cowan for lending me his note books.

On March 22, 1856, the Otago Witness published an article entitled “ Bluff and Southern Country of Otago,” and in it the writer spells Waimatuku as Ymatook and Waihopai as Wyopai. He writes of the New and Jacob’s Rivers, and adds the following:—“Note.—Oreti and Aperima respectively, the Native appellations of the two chief rivers, having become obsolete even among the few Natives of the country, the universally used and Christian names have been here introduced.” It is a strange commentary on this to know that the Maori names once so jauntily discarded arc now used, and that others are being sought and valued.