New life for an old Lullaby: He oriori mō Tuteremoana

Lullabies, or oriori, are used in Māori society to impart knowledge of significant spiritual, historical and practical things.  They can be very long, and are clearly intended to be heard by more than the individual for whom they were originally composed.

To establish the Southern Bays connection, we have to stretch the idea of “southern bay” beyond Ōwhiro, Island and Houghton Bays to the western headland of Wellington heads, and Tarakena Bay.  Rangitatau pā stood there from very early times until the 1820s.  Rangitatau is closely associated with Tūteremoana, who is believed to have lived there at times.  The people who lived, fished, hunted and farmed in the Southern Bays region were of the same iwi as those of Rangitatau, so the conclusion that this work is the first known to be associated with the area is inescapable.  

Wellington Harbour, of course, is Te Whanganui a Tara, The Great Harbour of Tara and Tūteremoana was not far removed from Tara himself:

Tara, Whātonga’s son, was the great-great-grandson of Kupe the Polynesian explorer. On his voyages Kupe had himself visited the Wellington Harbour region, leaving his name at various sites.

Tara had a son called Whakanui or Wakanui, who had a son called Tūria. Tūria married Hinematua and they had a son called Te Ao Haeretahi who married Rakaimāori. They in turn had a son called Tūteremoana who became the paramount chief of Ngāi Tara. His name has been given to rocks on a beach just north of the Whanganui River, to the highest point of Kapiti, and to a fishing rock just south of Barrett’s Reef in Wellington Harbour.*

The oriori was passed down orally into modern times.  The author of the tribal history Rangitane, J.M. (Jock) McEwen, introduces it with reference to the late Ruka Broughton of Ngā Rauru, an expert well known in this area as a result of his teaching at Victoria University until his death in 1986:

... the song was quite widely known in the southern part of the North Island until quite recent times.  Mr Ruka Broughton told me a few years ago that the people of the Whanganui river were well acquainted with it, but were surprised when he told them it belonged to Ngai Tara, the ancient people of Wellington.  Most of the Whanganui people, however, have connections with Rangitane and Ngai Tara.

The oriori was first published in the Journal of the Polynesian Society in 1907, with a translation and paraphrase by G. H. Davies and J. H. Pope, and notes by the traditional Māori  scholar Te Whatahoro.  McEwen described the translation as “extremely free”, as indeed it was, and Messrs Davies and Pope were inspired by their efforts to produce an introduction to their efforts in several stanzas of Edwardian verse:

Demand for Māori's knowledge is but small,

But still 'tis well worth while to understand

The thoughts of strong and brave, nay, peerless men—

Their “process” from the One down to the All!

...

Our method, in the main, has been to place

The sequence of the thoughts on Māori  lines

That best will help the Pākehā to read

The Māori , and the views held by his race.

Fortunately, the Ngati Maniapoto scholar Pei te Hurinui Jones published a new translation into English in Nga Moteatea Part III in 1970, allowing easier study. 

This translation was in turn republished by McEwen in 1986.  The oriori appeared in print again in 1998, in He Waiata Onamata Songs From the Past, along with an audio CD track by Paora Temuera of Ngati Raukawa The recording was held in the Radio New Zealand Māori  archive Nga Taonga Korero.

He Waiata Onamata summarised the text in this way:

This is Tūhotoariki's oriori.  He was a chief of the Ngai Tara tribe.  It was composed for his brother's descendant Tūteremoana, and is a karakia for a ceremony dedicating the child to achieve the ultimate in life skills. The first verse recognises the child's birth, while the second urges the child to grow to be a worthy warrior.  The third verse tells the child to labour industriously in the gathering of food and other activities essential to the good health of the body.  The fourth directs the child's thoughts towards acquiring sacred lore pertaining to Io-matua [a supreme Atua or 'god'] The song concludes by reminding the child to be responsible, honest, and honourable in all his intentions and actions as set out in the lore of the sacred house of learning.

The oriori continues to be studied today, for traditional knowledge, as in this comment from the on-line encyclopedia Te Ara:

The song ‘He oriori mō Tūteremoana’ describes a canoe, believed to be the Tākitimu, safely following in the wake of a pod of whales during a storm. Some of the whales are specifically named in this song. The tohunga (priest) on board the Tākitimu was Ruawharo. He possessed the mauri (life force) of whales, which he laid to rest at Māhia Peninsula to attract whales to the region. 

And the song inspires others in very modern ways.  Ross Nepia Himona, who published poetry on the internet, based his Wayfinders 7 on the oriori:

There I was, e tama, out there in cyberspace mindspace 

surfing along the electronic tide of the great wide expanse 

of the ocean Te Moana-nui-o-Te-Ipurangi, Internet to you, 

and I came face to face with Io. Aue, woe is me.

And modern Māori  leaders are also drawing on the oriori as a point of reference for their present-day preoccupations.  Amster Reedy, of Ngati Porou, who is completing a PhD on oriori, uses He Oriori mo Tūteremoana in his presentations on the relationship between Māori  knowledge and social marketing.

This oriori forms the basis of a wellness framework, with major philosophical, pedagogical and practical implications for those working with children, families, whanau, hapu, and iwi 

The consultancy Gardiner and Parata used a line from the oriori;  “te hiringa i te mahara” (the power of the mind) to name a national professional development programme funded by the Ministry of Education that targets Māori secondary school teachers with particular emphasis on te reo Māori teachers. The project began in June 1998, to address the stress associated with the excessive workload of Māori secondary school teachers. 

A current Wellington City Councillor, Ray Ahipene-Mercer, descends from Ngai Tara, and Tūteremoana's family.  He says Tūteremoana is still discussed among Māori, and points out that his influence was very widespread, from Hawkes Bay to Kapiti.  The highest point on Kapiti Island is named for him, and Mr Ahipene-Mercer says Tūteremoana is buried on the southern end of that island.  His association with Rangitatau Pā and the southern coast generally was one of the issues raised by Mr Ahipene-Mercer and the Wellington Clean Water campaign during the successful efforts to eliminate the  dumping of raw sewage into the sea in this area. He quotes a whakatauki, or proverb about Tūteremoana - Te tama whakaete turanga rau, i titi te upoko ki te kura a rangi – which he translates as “the youth whose efforts let him stand in a hundred places, his head shining with the glow of the skies”.

The Māori  Party leader, Tariana Turia, when first a Minister used the oriori to promote smoking cessation among Māori , and in supporting the Crimes (Abolition of Force as a Justification for Child Discipline) Amendment Bill.  In 2006 her co-leader Peter Sharples quoted from the oriori in parliament in the first reading debate of the  Copyright (New Technologies and Performers rights) Amendment Bill:

Madam Speaker, the Māori Party will support this Bill and we look forward to a fertile discussion, in which we are all better informed about the means of protecting and preserving the mana and integrity of our language, our words, our world. I leave with a final inspiration from the oriori of Tūteremoana which reminds us of the importance of protecting Māori  knowledge: Kotahi tonu te hiringa, i kake ai Tane ki Tikitiki o rangi ko te hiringa i te mahara - There was but one great power which enabled Tane to reach Tikitiki o rangi, it was the power of the mind.

The oriori was also quoted recently in a naming ceremony for an Island Bay Pākehā baby, with the celebrant explaining that this was done in an effort to link the birth to the earliest people of the area.

It is extraordinary that a Māori composition hundred of years old should inspire and stimulate Pākehā and Māori  in 2008.   Or is it?