Whakapapa of stone

All species are related through whakapapa or kinship relationships. In Māori creation stories, everything in the universe is related back to Ranginui, the sky father, and Papatūānuku, the earth mother. This framework binds us all through whakapapa. In this video, Matua Wiremu Puke (Ngāti Wairere, Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāpuhi), shares with tauira origins of different types of stone and their relationship to Ranginui and Papatūānuku.

Transcript

Wiremu Puke (Ngāti Wairere, Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāpuhi)

When I became a carver, there’s a lot of things that I had to learn. I had to learn about the whakapapa of our hapū, of our people here. I had to learn the whakapapa of the trees, whakapapa of the stars and also the philosophies and many of the stories and narratives that inspire me to do these carvings.

Whakapapa relates to so many things, and it mainly relates to human connections through kinship – animals, birds, the heavens, the stars – because that was the form of structure that was used to recite these things. It was easier to recite them in various types of tables of whakapapa. So there was one for the evolution of rock from Ranginui and Papatūānuku Ka moe, i puta mai a Hine-tū-pari-maunga, Rakahore and so forth, so those names of those rocks and stones tells me the evolution of stone that comes out of a volcano and rolls down te Hine-tū-pari-maunga into the creeks and into the rivers, becomes water washed and rolled as boulders, and then those are used for making adzes and patu.

That’s the whakapapa of geology, and also Hine-tua-hōanga, the sandstone, which was used for grinding greenstone and stone.

So I’m going to hand these taonga around, and I want you to give me some feedback what you think it could be. What type of stone is that?

Layton

Greenstone.

Wiremu Puke

Yeah, what’s the Māori word for it?

Alyssa

Pounamu.

Wiremu Puke

Correct, it’s called pounamu. What other items can you think of that are made from pounamu that you see people with?

Mikayla

Necklaces, earrings.

Wiremu Puke

Necklaces, earrings, heitiki as well.

One of the things that we try and figure out how good a pounamu stone is or a particular type of stone is that we actually do this. Just hold this, hold there?

When it makes that sound, that high ping sound, it means the stone is very hard and it’s very good for making adzes.

So if you ever become a geologist, you have a pick, you hear that high pinging sound like this? That’s very good stone. Yep.

Mikayla 

How do you know if it’s not a good stone?

Wiremu Puke

It doesn’t quite make the higher sound but it doesn’t keep an edge as well.

Acknowledgements

Wiremu Puke (Ngāti Wairere, Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāpuhi) Students: Layton, Micheal, Mikayla and Alyssa. Endeavour School, Kirikiriroa Hukanui Marae, Ngāti Wairere Special thanks to Dante Bonica, mentor of Wiremu Milky Way timelapse, Okan Bozat. Released under Creative Commons CC BY 3.0 Lava flow, Godawan Subscriptions. Released under Creative Commons CC BY 3.0 Drone footage stream in Waikato, Waikato Regional Council Wiremu lashing adze from Tohunga Whakairo (Master Carver), courtesy of filmmaker Sebastian Lowe

This content was developed as part of the project 'Te ohomauri o Wairere – the empowering life force of Wairere', funded by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment through its Unlocking Curious Minds initiative.