MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 September 1938, Page 2

MAORI MEMORIES

NOHEA TO MAORI. (Recorded by J.H.S. for “Times-Age.”) Our earliest historians concluded, probably quite correctly, that the first human inhabitants of New Zealand were the Maoris. They said too that the brown race occupied all islands from the Sandwich group to New Zealand and from Tonga in the west to Easter Island in the east, and the black race people the islands from Fiji to New Guinea. This means that the blacks were born and lived in the tropics for centuries whilst the browns came from more temperate latitudes. Even the Maoris of our South Island are paler than their cousins of the North Island. The browns have lank hair and scant beards, while the blacks have frizzly hair and bushy beards and their dialect, differs from the other race. Naturalists call the black race Melanesians. and the brown race Polynesians. The brown skins are also divided, Micronesians, having low stature, a different dialect and the complete absence of our once familiar Maori form of Tapu. Between them and the Polynesians proper there is a greater difference than that between Dutch and English. Humboldt clearly proves that those who peopled Samoa came from Malay, thus giving us the true source of the Maori. Sumatra was the birthplace of the Malayans, and “Little Java” the first step in the South Sea Voyage. “Hawa iki” the legendary land means literally “Little Java.” In Melayan words, Sama means “like unto,” and Samoa "all together.” In the canoe voyage, landing places of the same derivation may be recognised on the map Suma-tra, Java, Sammow, Sumbava, Sama, and Samoa. The Malay and Maori languages have been separated for 800 to 1000 years, and associated with others en route. Yet numbers from 1 to 10, and simple words such as family, taste, sight, pain, and natural objects remain much the same in both.