Hinemoa

Role: maiden · First appears: Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa

In Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa, Hinemoa and Tutanekai loved one another. Tutanekai sent Tiki to tell her of his sorrow and ask her to come to him. Hinemoa promised to come by canoe when Tutanekai played his sweetest music to guide her through the darkness. Her father, Amukaria, ordered all the canoes taken off the lake, preventing her from answering the call.

One evening, Hinemoa tied six empty gourds together for floats, left her mat behind at Wai-rere-wai, and swam toward Mokoia. Exhausted, cold and trembling, she reached the rocks and took shelter in the cave Wai-ki-miha. When Tutanekai’s slave brought water intended for him, she repeatedly asked for his calabash, drank from it and broke it. Tutanekai found her in the cave, dropped his weapon and called her name.

The chapter’s present-day frame has Ngawai, Hinemoa’s descendant, by the sea, “telling herself in low tones, in Maori, of all the sorrows of Hinemoa, her ancestress.”

Relationship record

Life events

• Tutanekai sent Tiki to tell Hinemoa of his sorrow and ask her to come to him.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa)
  • With: Tutanekai Tiki (friend of Tutanekai)
  • “So he sent Tiki, his friend, to Hinemoa, to tell her of his great sorrow in being away from her, and to ask her to come to him and to his heart, that it might lose its fright and be full of gladness.”
• Hinemoa promised to come to Tutanekai by canoe when his music called her.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa)
  • With: Tutanekai
  • “and she promised to come to Tutanekai in a canoe, late on a black night, when he would play his sweetest music to call for her and to guide her in the darkness.”
• Amukaria ordered all the canoes taken off the lake, preventing Hinemoa from answering Tutanekai’s call.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa · 📍 the lake)
  • With: Amukaria
  • “Amukaria, a great Ariki, was only willing to give Hinemoa as wife to a Rangatira of a very high mana, for her beauty was like the Morning Sun over the lake, and he, knowing the power and danger of such beauty, gave order that all the canoes should be taken off the lake.”
• Hinemoa fashioned floating gourds and swam toward Mokoia.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa · 📍 Wai-rere-wai)
  • “She went to the store-house, and took six dry and empty gourds, and tied them together with flax for floats, and she went to the edge of the water, called Wai-rere-wai, threw off her mat of kiwi feathers, and cast herself to swim the long, long way with the help of the floating gourds.”
• Hinemoa reached Mokoia exhausted and took shelter in the cave Wai-ki-miha.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa · 📍 Mokoia)
  • “and at last, with all her strength gone, her hands reach the rocks of Mokoia, where the hot spring is in the cave Wai-ki-miha. In this cave she took shelter, for she was cold, and trembling like a dead leaf.”
• Hinemoa repeatedly took the water intended for Tutanekai and broke his calabashes.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa · 📍 Wai-ki-miha)
  • “Again did Tutanekai send the slave, and again spoke Hinemoa: ‘Give me Tutanekai’s calabash’--and again the frightened slave reached it to her into the darkness, and she drank and broke it again.”
• Tutanekai discovered Hinemoa in the cave, dropped his weapon, and called her name.(Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa · 📍 Wai-ki-miha)
  • With: Tutanekai
  • “Ha! the powerful weapon fell to the ground like a useless stick; forgotten was the God of War; forgotten the lizards: sorrow and fear and full of love sounds the voice out of the cave: ‘Hinemoa!’”

Chapter XII · Te Aroha o Hinemoa: The Love of Hinemoa

• courtship with Tutanekai “Listen then, while we wander along the border of the sea to the love that has been, the love of both, the two, of Hinemoa and Tutanekai.”
• parent: Amukaria “Sometimes there were great gatherings of the people on the mainland, in the pa (village) of Amukaria, Hinemoa’s father, and Tutanekai came over, but he felt sorrowful amidst the feasting and frolic.”
• younger kin: Ngawai “Her eyes full of tears, Ngawai wandered along the rolling waves, telling herself in low tones, in Maori, of all the sorrows of Hinemoa, her ancestress.”

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Extracted from the original text of Te Tohunga. Made with Rho MD.