Waka traditions

This is a little clip about the story of Paikea.

How many of those traditions would there be Basil, and different waka traditions?

Actually quite a large number. We tend to focus on sort of the main waka, you know Mātaatua, Te Arawa, Tākitimu, Horouta, and so on, but there are actually quite a lot of smaller waka, particularly up north, up Ngā Puhi way, and even waka like Māui. Māui’s waka in some traditions, Nukutaimemeha, was left on top Hikurangi maunga. In other traditions his waka is actually the South Island, Te Waka-a-Māui. So there is actually numerous, although there’s that smaller group which people tend to know about for a lot of the main iwi.

Which ones have you focussed on, on the website?

We basically try to tell the story of all of them, so down here we’ve organised the country according to different parts of the country. And each of them we tell them the story of the different waka that landed in those parts of the country. I mean this for example is the Bay of Plenty, this is a map of the Bay of Plenty and this is some of the different waka, some of the smaller waka, that actually landed there. The two biggest waka, Mātaatua and Te Arawa, and Tainui, all of whom landed in the Bay of Plenty actually, are not even on that map I think. Oh Mātaatua is, yes, but Te Arawa and Tainui who also landed in the Bay of Plenty at least initially. These are the landing sites of the Te Arawa waka, and this red little canoes are the landing sites of the Tainui. And the Tainui waka of course landed first of all here on Whangaparaoa (Is that right? Think so.) and then moved right round the coast, came through what was called the famous Portage, between Manukau and Waitematā Harbour, then down the coast to eventually… to Kāwhia. And eventually the Tainui waka of course became the great founding waka of the Tainui peoples in Waikato.

Waikato o Ngāti Maniapoto