“TOTARA-I-AHUA”

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 17, 11 April 1927, Page 11

“TOTARA-I-AHUA”

TALE OF ONE TREE HILL OLD FORTIFIED VILLAGE Until European times. One Tree Hill, or Maungakiekie, was one of the most important fortified villages in Tamaki. The fortunes of many tribes have been decided in combat on its slopes. Tales of the Hill were told by Mr. George Graham, an authority on Maori tradition, to a party from the Workers’ Educational Association on Saturday. COMMEMORATIVE TREE “It is difficult to gather from Maori tradition a chronological account of any particular place,” said Mr. Graham, "but there seems little doubt that the earliest known- name of the hill was 'Totara-i-ahua,’ which signifies that a totara tree was planted there to commemorate something. The tree from which the hill took this name formerly grew on the western slope, and commemorated a chief of the seventeenth century. In the middle of the eighteenth century, when the famous chief Kiwi ruled at One Tree Hill, the tribe reverenced the totara as a symbol of its own growth and prosperity. The people believed that the tree was wrapped up in their destiny, but even after Kiwi’s defeat, and the dispersal of his people, the tree remained. Until recent times it stood there, but some settler committed the shameful act of cutting it down.” ANCIENT CAMPAIGNS

Mr. Graham explained that the common Maori name for the hill, Maungakiekie, meant the “mountain of the kiekie,” a climbing plant with leaves like the cabbage tree. Since it was inconceivable that this plant had ever grown on the hill, it had been suggested that the real name was Maungat.ietie, meaning a tall or conical hill. The present name of One Tree Hill seemed to have been given to it\ by Sir John Logan Campbell, who, it was believed, had planted a pine tree on the summit, where a clump of trees stand now. There was no reason to suppose that the name of the hill had anything to do with the ancient totara. The ancient campaigns - were described by Mr. Graham: "About the end of the fourteenth century Tainui people, from Kawhia, and Arawas, from the Bay of Plenty, made their way towards Tamaki. In course of time their chiefs, through inter-marriage, became accepted as leaders by the inhabitants, and thus the earlier and later strains were mingled. There were traditions of fierce fighting with Hauraki invaders from Thames and Ngati-whatua from Kaipara. Many hill-forts were destroyed in these campaigns. “In the middle of the eighteenth century Tamaki was a prosperous land, inhabited by a powerful people. At that time there lived at One Tree Hill a chief named Kiwi. He was a man of noble birth, uniting in his own person lines of descent from the ancestors of nearly every tribe in the region. KILLED HIS HOSTS

Kiwi visited the Kaipara people, but forgot his duty as a guest sufficiently to quarrel with his hosts, and even kill some of them. In revenge, the Kaipara tribes made three invasions, and crushed Kiwi at the epic battle of Titirangi. The victorious chief Tapuriri made his headquarters at One Tree Hill, but the Ngati-whatua were in turn driven from Tamaki by their fear of Honga Ika. When d’Urville and other Europeans landed, they found the isthmus deserted.