Ngā ika a Tangaroa

Māori and their ancestors are island people – the moana is central to their spiritual and physical realms. For hundreds of years, Māori relied on Tangaroa for food and other resources.

Children of Tangaroa

There are many traditions regarding the whakapapa of fish, but it makes sense to call them the children of Tangaroa since Tangaroa is god of the sea and all that dwells within it. When the canoe captained by Tamatekapua was voyaging towards New Zealand, it met Te Parata – an ocean creature that almost swallowed the canoe and its crew. They were saved by a shark, in honour of which the crew renamed the canoe and their tribe Te Arawa – a shark name.

Fishing was and is an important food source for Māori, and tūpuna caught fish by many methods – spearing, line fishing, trapping and netting. Net fishing was the main economic business in the heavily populated Bay of Islands at the time of early European arrivals. Māori seine nets made of muka dwarfed the size of those of the British arrivals.

Making a new fishing net, like all big jobs, was a communal activity – imbued with tapu for the people and place of making. No-one was allowed at the scene of operations except those actually engaged in the task. Despite the inconvenience, such restrictions were rigorously enforced – with severe punishment for trespassing. No fire could be lit and no food could be prepared within the forbidden area until the net was finished and the tapu was lifted.

Value concepts like tapu and noa are associated with objects and places for catching fish.

In terms of Māori knowledge of the animal itself, sharks and whales were more significant to Māori.

Makō/mangō

There are many Māori names for the various types of sharks found in the waters of Aotearoa, but mangō (in the north) and makō (in the south) are among the most well known and used as generic terms for sharks. Warriors are compared to sharks – in battle cries such as ‘kia mate uruora tātou, kei mate-ā-tarakihi’ (let us die like white sharks, not tarakihi). The makō is equated to the tiger shark, blue pointer, dogfish or gummy shark.

Guardian animals

Ocean taniwha could take the form of sharks such as Ruamano, a taniwha of iwi in the Far North. If a waka capsized, the crew would call upon Ruamano to save them. In such cases, taniwha are also acting as guardian animals – an atua acting through an animal.

Among Ngāti Wai people at Whangaruru, northeast of Whangārei in Te Tai Tokerau, guardian animals are called mana, equivalent to the Tūhoe usage of kaitiaki. Mana refers to a class of divine beings and is always associated with supernatural power.

Guardian animals are deities who have entered a specific member of an animal species, and calling these animals mana expresses the belief that the guardians are the source from which people derive the power of mana.

The fisher who catches fish has mana because success in fishing is essentially uncertain. A person with great mana will succeed, where by human reckoning they are likely to fail. People also have mana when they have the mana of the tribe visit them and give them the power.

Of the six guardian animals known to the people of Whangaruru, there were two sharks, a stingray, a shag, a morepork (Hinerūrū) and a dog. These mana come very close to certain people of their own volition, and their appearance always has a specific and important meaning to those they visit.

Tohorā

Māori traditions include whales in the category of ika – whales being the largest of the children of Tangaroa. Tohorā (or tohoraha) is a generic term for whales but also specifically used for the southern right whale – a migratory whale that ranges through all the coastal waters of Aotearoa. Another generic Māori name for whales is te whānau puha – the family of animals that expel air. An ocean taniwha sometimes takes the form of a whale.

In Māori thinking, a stranded whale is a gift from the gods and a bountiful ‘cut and come again’ buffet. Before touching a stranded whale, karakia need to be recited to free it from tapu.

Whales are regarded in Māori thought as both supernormal and subservient – at least to some people – and were relied on as guardians of vessels and rescuers of people in marine mishaps and shipwrecks.

Several of the migratory ocean-going waka include stories of being guided and aided by whales. Māori traditions include multiple stories of people riding whales, including Paikea, a prominent Ngāti Porou ancestor.

Whakataukī about whales compare them with rangatira. Te kāhui parāoa (a gathering of sperm whales) indicates a group of chiefs. He paenga pakake (beached whales) refers to fallen chiefs on a battlefield.