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The Maori Canoe

European Graft

European Graft

In speaking of the Maori of the Bay of Islands as he saw them in 1840, Wilkes says: "The greatest changes which have taken place in their customs are the introduction of the use of firearms, and the adoption of the whaleboats instead of their canoes."

European ships were named kaipuke by the Maori, but why that term should have been selected we know not. Tuta Nihoniho made page 194the following remarks on the subject: 'The term kaipuke is applied to ships only, and does not seem to have been used prior to the advent of European vessels in these waters. Such vessels were at first termed puke, on account of their size and great height above water. With sails set, they were a very impressive sight to the Maori; the ships looked like hills, hence puke." Tuta thinks that the name kaipuke was applied to European ships because food was cooked and eaten on board, an unusual occurrence on board native canoes. This surmise does not appeal to me. Colenso's guess was that it meant "a floating hill possessing valuables." Hoani Nahe thought that a ship was called kaipuke because the crew had their meals on board (no food could be eaten on board a Maori canoe). But Louise Becke states that the natives of the Gilbert and Kingsmill Groups also call a ship by the same name (see Journal of Polynesian Society, vol. 4, p. 155). In isles near New Ireland foreigners are styled kaibuke.

In Tongan buke is the deck of a canoe, also at Niue. The word puke was apparently used to denote a large canoe in several Polynesian communities, as at Taumako, and east coast natives applied it to Cook's vessel. The word pahi was also employed by the Maori to denote a large sea-going canoe. Cook's vessel is still remembered on the east coast as Te Puke o Te Paea (The Ship of Te Paea). This "Te Paea" may be for Tupaea, Cook's Tahitian interpreter; but there is a story told by Mr. Uren, of Poverty Bay, to the effect that Cook was called Paea by local natives, so called from his command of "Fire!" during the quarrel at Turanga-nui. A species of turnip or cabbage, seeds of which were obtained from Cook's vessel, was also named paea.

According to Ellis, the Tahitians imagined that the first ships they saw were islands; their inhabitants supernatural, vindictive, and revengeful beings.

In his account of Cook's sojourn at Easter Island in 1774, Forster describes the visit of some natives to the vessel: "They expressed the most unbounded admiration at every thing they saw, and every one of them measured the whole length of the vessel from stem to stern, with his extended arms; such a great quantity of timber of so stupendous a size being altogether incomprehensible to people whose canoes were patched of many small bits of wood."

In describing the visit of a Maori to Cook's vessel at Dusky Sound in 1773, Forster says: "The number and strength of our decks and of other parts of our vessel engrossed his admiration more than anything else."

On the 6th February, 1770, an old Maori of Queen Charlotte Sound told Tupaea (Cook's Tahitian interpreter) that no such page 195vessel as Cook's had been seen in those parts before, but that they had a tradition that "there came once to this place a small vessel from a distant part, wherein were four men that were all killed upon their landing."

Banks states that an old native of Queen Charlotte Sound informed Tupaea that "they had a tradition of two large vessels, much larger than theirs, which some time or other came here, and were totally destroyed by the inhabitants, and all the people belonging to them killed."

Cook also mentions that he heard at Queen Charlotte Sound that a ship had been wrecked on the coast of Terrawittee—a name that he seems to have used as including lands from about Port Nicholson northwards towards Otaki. We have gained no knowledge of any such traditions in later days, except a vague one concerning the ship of Rongotute that is said by Wai-rarapa natives to have been wrecked at Palliser Bay many years ago.