Te Ao Hurihuri O Ngā Taonga Tuku Iho: The Evolving Worlds of Our Ancestral Treasures

Abstract

Inside our meeting houses, our orators will often use this saying to bring those gathered together as a single group reinforcing the Māori concept of tatou, tatou-we are one people. Indeed, our ancestral narratives chart the ongoing importance of both people and the land. These values were made manifest through the creation, reception, and circulation of our taonga tuku iho (treasures handed down from our ancestors). These were not merely objects-they were conceived, named, and treated as actual people. This essay will address how biography was articulated in a number of different ways within Māori art, both in the physical sense but also in the concept of the biography of an object (Kopytoff; Tapsell, "Flight"). In doing so, it sheds light on the evolving nature of Māori art through periods of distress and celebration, and the ongoing importance and relevance of taonga tuku iho for Māori today. HE WHAKAPAPAMāori identify ourselves as tribal peoples by reciting our whakatauki, which provides our specific connections to the land and through that our whakapapa. In my case I say: Ko Rakaumangamanga te maunga Ko Ipipiri te moana Ko Ngāpuhi te iwi [Rakaumangamanga is my mountain / Ipipiri is my ocean / Ngāpuhi are my people.] Ellis, Te Ao Hurihuri O Ng ā Taonga Tuku Iho 439 Ko Hikurangi te maunga Ko Waiapu te awa Ko Ngāti Porou te iwi [Hikurangi is my mountain / Waiapu is my river / Ngāti Porou are my people.]In this way I lay out my ancestral links with mountains, rivers, and oceans, and through that to my tribes, both of which (as with other Māori groups) are named after a single eponymous ancestor. Apirana Ngata described whakapapa as "the process of laying one thing upon another. If you visualise the foundation ancestors as the first generation, the next and succeeding generations are placed on them in ordered layers" (6). Indeed, Ngata offers no less than five methodologies in relation to whakapapa, each one presenting different layers of ancestors.Our history stretches back some fifty generations to begin with Te Po, the Night-time, when all was dark, before the primal parents Papatuanuku and Ranginui were separated by their children, and the world of light-Te Ao Marama-emerged. Our whakapapa also stretches back some eighteen to twenty generations to the Pacific, to our homeland of Hawaiki, which is generally believed to be somewhere in the Eastern Pacific, around the Cook Islands perhaps. Our ancestor Kupe traveled to this land around the period 1200-1400 (around the same time others were leaving the area to travel to Hawai'i), which spurred others also to make the voyage here, taking about a week and using ocean-going waka. These series of migrations were primarily one way, with no evidence (yet) of any return voyage back to the Pacific. The names of the waka, as well as their navigators and captains, have been passed down orally through the generations, and remain vital tenets of Māori individual and community identity.Once here, our ancestors spread through the new land fairly rapidly, from the top of the N...

Artefact Categories, Artefact Assemblages and Ontological Alterity

“…Interest expands beyond the form of the finished product to include all stages of manufacture and use, from raw material acquisition through manufacture to use and, indeed, re-use (Turner & Bonica 1994). Ellis (2016) also discusses the role of taonga tuku iho for Māori and ways of approaching the study of material culture. She challenges us to acknowledge the persistent colonial power imbalances in anthropology and other disciplines related to heritage and archaeology.…”

Use Of Māori (People, Images And Practices) In New Zealand’s Diplomacy: An Examination Of Symbolism

“…This opposition by Māori women staff to karanga being taught to non-Māori staff can be located in a wider context as illustrated by Ellis (2016) who notes that:…”

“…Following this belief or narrative through, by nailing this carving to the residence door in this way, the Ministry has nailed the tūpuna figure or mythological creature the tokotoko represents to the door. Ellis (2016) in her analysis of taonga tuku iho 158 depicts taonga as "often considered as living beings, part of the whakapapa and history of the land and the communities with which they are associated" (p.…”

“…443). Tapsell goes on to reflect that "in time, such taonga do not just represent ancestors, they become those ancestors" (Tapsell as cited in Ellis, 2016). This practice can also be viewed through a Māori cultural lens of tapu and the resulting offence to Māori when such tapu related to a tupuna such as the tokotoko is breached.…”

“…The works of art displayed at the New Zealand Embassy in Seoul (together with the residence) follow a similar pattern to other posts in relation to the use of taonga. Within the Ambassador's residence, for example, there is a carved mere (Figure 172), a pounamu breastplate (Figure 173), by the same artist Chris Charteris as in Noumea, Figure 119), a papahou (feather box) (Figure 174), framed kete (Figure 175), and prints by Māori artists 158 Defined by Ellis (2016) as ancestral treasures passed down from the ancestors through the generations (p. 443).…”