Trbal mauri.

This was a sacred talisman that holds the health of the tribe. Best points out that with the people who inhabited the Bay of Plentye about Whakatane ere the arrival of the Mata-atua canoe in the 14th. century, the tribal mauri was the "makaka" at Whakatane. With the Mataatua tribes it was a sacred manuka tree that also grew at Whakatane whither it had been brought from Hawaiki. In sickness and distress the tribal mauri was appealed to by invocation, but it was also appealed to beforehand as a preventive measure.