By:Larry Garcia 1-31-12Culture and Geography

Contemporary Traditional Maori Culture,Part 2

"The Maori Creation Story:The Separation of Heaven and Earth

(According to Maori tradition)"All humans are  descended from one pair of ancestors Rangi and

 Papa,who are also called Heaven and Earth."

"In those days,Heaven and earth clung closely together, and all was darkness."

"Rangi and Papa had six sons:(1) Tane-mahuta,the father of the forests and their inhabitants";

"(2)Tawhiri-ma-tea,the father of winds and storms";

"(3)Tangaroa,the father of fish and reptiles";

(4)Tu-Matauenga,the father of fierce human beings";

"(5) Haumia-tikitiki,the father of food that grows without cultivation";

"(6) and Rongo-ma-tane,the father of cultivated food."

"In the beginning these six sons and all other beings lived in darkness for an extremly long time, able only

to wonder what light and vision might be like." 

After a battle between the six sons,Tu-matauenga ate 4 of his brothers as food, sparing Tawhiri-ma-tea, the

father of winds and storms.

This is why today people are fierce and have war,why people eat plants and animals, and why there are

storms.