Contemporary Traditional Maori Culture,part2"The Maori Creation Story: The Separation of

Heaven and Earth"       

By Aliana Quintana, 1/1/12Period.5 Culture and Geography

Source:George Grey, 1956, Polnesian Mythology (ed. by William W. Bird): Christchurch, Whitcombe and Tombs Ltd., 250 p. (BL 2615. G843p1956); and Mr. Ruben Meza, 2012

(According to the Maori Tradition) "All humans are descended from one pair of ancestors,Rangi

and Papa, Who arre also called Heaven and Earth.

"In those days, Heaven and earth clung closely together, and all was darkness"

"Rangi and Papa had six sons: (1) Tane-mahuta, the father of the forest their inhabitants"

(2)Tawhiri-ma-tea, the father of winds and storms"

(3) Tangaroa, the father of fish and reptiles";

(40) Tu-matauenga, the father of fierce human beings" 

Haumia-tiktiki, father of food that grows without cultivation"

Rongo-ma-tane, the father of cultivated food

In the beginning these six sons and all other beings lived in darkness for an extremely longtime, able only to wonder what light and vision might be

like.

After a battle betweeen the six sons, Tu-matauenga ate four of his brothers as food, sparing Tawhiri-ma-

tea, the father of winds and storms.

This is why today people are fierce and have war, why people eat plants and animals, and why there

are storms