MAORI MEMORIES.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 April 1938, Page 2

MAORI MEMORIES.

HAHUNGA AND HAKERI. (Recorded by J.H.S. for “Times-Age.”) The disposal of their dead was a strange custom of the Maori. After exposure to the sun and the rain, birds and insects on a stage in the branches of a tree for thirteen moons, nothing but the skull and bones remained. Then, in order to stimulate the living and induce them to emulate the noble acts of the dead, while forgetting any shortcomings, a magnificent Hahunga (feast for the dead) was prepared. Literally they believed that, in regard to wrongs or injuries. "It is more blessed to forget than to forgive.”

The purified bones of great chiefs, adorned with their mats, weapons and ornaments, were thus exposed on several successive occasions. Orations having the brevity of monumental texts were delivered by friends and reconciled foes alike. From this we may not infer that they indulged in that inverted paraphrase “Speak naught good, but of the dead.” The splendid hospitality of the Hahunga ended every bitterness between erstwhile enemies. Another feast, called the Hakari was quite different from the Hahunga. The Hakari was a banquet of reconciliation given by nations to each other, in which the only rivalry was to outdo the one-time enemy in splendour and munificence. The. preparations were begun in the planting and continued to the harvest. Wooden pyramids fifty feet high in five foot stages, flanked with ranges of frames six feet above the ground, with a total length of half a mile up to two miles, were laden’with every description of Maori food, fresh or preserved, comprising kumara, taro, aruhe, mutton birds and others in oil, dried fish, hinau and karaka berries, with other delicacies. From five to ten thousand Maoris would indulge in feasting, singing, dancing, crying, climbing, swimming, kite flying and poi games.