Arawa

:For the native language of western Brazil, see Arauan languages.

In Māori tradition, Arawa was one of the great ocean-going, voyaging canoes that was used in the migrations that settled New Zealand. It was formed from a great tree in Rarotonga,Given that 'Rarotonga' is a word of a type that occurs fairly commonly in Polynesian languages, and that it is also, for instance, a placename in New Zealand, it should not be assumed without further proof that this is a memory of Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. a place "which lies on the other side of Hawaiki" (Grey 1956:107). The canoe belonged to Tama-te-kapua, son of Houmai-tawhiti. When his father and brother had been killed in a series of battles between his family and the high-chief Uenuku, Tama collected his possessions and family, kidnapped Ngatoro-i-rangi, the navigator of the Tainui canoe, and set out in the canoe Arawa. The Arawa landed in New Zealand near Cape Runaway. Following his death, Tama was buried on the summit of Mount Moehau at the northern tip of the Coromandel Range. The modern descendants of the Arawa settlers live in the Bay of Plenty - Volcanic Plateau region.

Notes

References

R.D. Craig, Dictionary of Polynesian Mythology (Greenwood Press: New York, 1989), 24.
G. Grey, Polynesian Mythology, Illustrated edition, reprinted 1976. (Whitcombe and Tombs: Christchurch), 1956.

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