XXVII. Ruling Chiefs

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XXVII

RULING CHIEFS

TRADITIONS relating to the colonizing period in Hawaiian history emphasize the insignia of rank which became the tangible signs by which a man's position was assured in aristocratic society. These were: First, a family genealogy tracing back to the gods through one of the two sons of Ki‘i, Ulu and Nana-ulu, and by as many branches (lala) as family relationship could be stretched to cover. Second, a name chant, composed at birth or given in afterlife, glorifying the family history not only of persons concerned but also of places made sacred by particular events or association. Third, signs in the heavens by which aumakua of the day recognized their offspring on earth. Fourth, a special place set aside as sacred to the birth of high-ranking chiefs. Fifth, the sacred cord (aha) stretched at the entrance of a chief's dwelling, under which all of lower rank must pass but which fell "of itself" before the approach of anyone of equal or higher position. Sixth, wealth, especially in lands, labor, and specialized objects such as foods, ornaments, colors belonging to ranking chiefs alone. Seventh, the power of the tapu, which gave the ranking chief immense personal privilege, although the ruling chief might have actually more power over lands and wealth; before certain captive chiefesses of Maui of incredible sanctity, according to Kamakau, Kamehameha himself had to remove his garment. Eighth, the right to officiate in the heiau as both chief and priest. Ninth, at death, the final deification of the bones and their laying away in a sacred (in later years a secret) place difficult of access, the most important such place in ancient times being the Iao valley on the island of Maui. Rank therefore depended primarily upon blood; but of equal importance was the conduct of life by which one could, by carelessness in preserving the tapus and in making proper marriages, lose caste and prerogatives under the severe discipline of the Aha-ali‘i or so-called

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[paragraph continues] "college of chiefs," or could, through a royal marriage, raise the rank of one's descendants upon the family line.

The period during which political life became thus stabilized--through the building up of a ruling-chief class under a social system based upon strict religious observances--follows or overlaps the mythical migrations and colonization represented in legend by the arrival of the Kamau group and the activities of the kupua Kamapua‘a, the coming of Pele and her family, the arrival of Kane and Kanaloa and their attention to the water supply, and the introduction of food plants.

Following the family of Akalana on the Ulu line appear three Nana names of chiefs who are said, like the Maui brothers, to have ruled the western end of Oahu in Waialua, Wahiawa, and Ewa districts. The last of the three, Nana-kaoko, has a wife, Ka-hihi-o-ka-lani, whose name resembles that of the chiefess as servants for whom Kahano son of Newa brought over the Menehune to Oahu. It is this Nana-kaoko and his wife who are the traditional founders on Oahu of the sacred place for the birth of chiefs at Ku-kani-loko in the uplands of Wahiawa, similar to that already set up at Holoholoku on Kauai. At Ho‘olono-pahu (Sounding the pahu drum) the navel cord was tied and cut while the drum sounded. Afterbirth, cord, and later the navel string (piko) were carefully deposited, often in a heiau for safekeeping. ¹ The site chosen is one frequently visited by thunderstorms, whose manifestations were regarded as the voice of ancestral gods of the heavens welcoming an offspring of divine rank. The drums perhaps simulated the voice of deity.

It was from the time of Heleipawa of Maui, whom some identify with Kapawa, that there began to be composed chants for a ruling chief in which were named his birth and burial places, the spots in which afterbirth, umbilical cord, and navel string were deposited, his house site, and other places sacred to his history. The site of the famous pleasure house (Hale-i-ka-lea) in Kipahulu built by Heleipawa was still to be seen in Kamakau's day, and the tapu spring of

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fresh water, welling up in the sea at Kaui from a depth of twenty feet and walled up so firmly that the waves had not loosened the stones, where the chiefs of his day washed off the salt water when coming in from surfing. ²

Another Maui chief, Haho, son of Paumakua and grandson of Hua-nui-ka-la‘ila‘i, was the traditional founder of the Aha-ali‘i or ranking body of chiefs who might be distinguished by the use of the sacred cord called aha. They cultivated a metaphorical form of speech in order that their words might be concealed from the uninitiated. The awe attached to rank was accentuated by the dreaded tapu which attended the person of a chief. Those of highest rank never went abroad except at night lest their shadow falling upon the ground render it tapu. They were already gods, and at death their bones were separated from the flesh and placed in a receptacle (kaai) woven out of sennit or ie vine, in some cases shaped to imitate a torso, and worshiped as a family deity, while the soft parts of the body were laid away in some sacred place of burial like that back of the "Needle" in Iao valley. Kamakau records the names of chiefs down to Kalaniopu‘u of Hawaii who were thus honored and enumerates also the names of their sacred cords. ³

Many generations before Heleipawa and Haho, on the Ulu line, occur such mythical figures as Ku-hele-i-moana and his wife Mapuna-i-aala (Springing up in fragrance), daughter of Haumea; Akalana (Wakalana) and the Maui brothers; the Aikanaka to Laka group--all, except the first, famous names in southern tradition and all centering about the hill Kauiki in the fertile Hana district on the rain-washed eastern extremity of the island of Maui, where the sun rises out of the sea and the Kohala coast is to be seen beyond the channel of Ale-nui-haha (Great waves crashing).

From the time of La‘a-mai-kahiki down to that of Umi, East Maui, comprising Koolau, Hana, Kipahulu, and Kaupo

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districts, was governed separately from the rest of the island and its chiefs were grouped about the fortified hill of Kauiki, famous in history, song, and story. Myths are told about its origin. Some say that it sprang from the navel of Hamoa. Others that it was born to the parents of Pele, or to the hill Kai-hua-kala by his wife Kahaule. Others relate how Ka-lala-walu (The eight-branched) brought the hill from Kahiki as an adopted child, but grew tired of its nibbling at her breasts and tried to leave it along the way, first at Kaloa, then at Kaena, then at the Ka-wai-papa stream. Others tell of the wanderings and death of Pu‘uhele, little sister of Pele. The bay about Kauiki gives evidence of subsidence following some volcanic outbreak, and men say that formerly Kane and Kanaloa planted a garden below the hill, and they point out two rocks below the hill on the inaccessible sea side which are called "the coconuts of Kane and Kanaloa" and the "root-stock" (kumu) of Kauiki. Mythical names are attached to the dwellers on Kauiki in ancient days. On the summit may be seen the rock placed by Aiai as an outlook for schools of fish entering the bay. Here Maui stood to push the sky higher because it lay so near the earth at Kauiki. Here lived Hina-hana-ia-ka-malama, she who worked at tapa making in the moon, and her husband, father of Puna and Hema on the Ulu line of chiefs.

All about the bay are crowded the memorials of those old days in the shape of a rock, a basin of water, a wave, a spring, a cave, or a mere name remembered from the time when chiefs and their followers thronged the bay, whose trifling deeds or misdeeds are still cherished in the memories of their living descendants. "If I told you all, it would fill a book," said old Kilinahi, watchman for schools of fish off the bay. Hawaiian verse loves to play with the memory of Kauiki. A hula begins,

O Kauiki, mauna ki‘eki‘e,
Huki a‘e la a pa i ka lani
He po‘ohiwi no kai halulu. . . . "Kauiki, mountain famous in story,
Stretching upward to touch the heavens,
A shoulder for the buffeting sea. . . ."

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and a modern verse opens with,

Healoha no Kauiki,
Au i ke kai me he manu la! "Kauiki is beloved,
Afloat on the sea like a bird!"

[paragraph continues] Hana is called "a land beloved of chiefs because of the fortress of Kauiki and the ease of living in that place." In time of war the hill was reached by a ladder of ohia poles bound together with withes. On the summit was spread a springy plant to serve as bed. Fishponds below furnished unlimited stores of fish. Heaps of awa root "delighted the nostrils of the dear firstborn chiefs." ⁴

Maui chiefs who settled with their families in later days about Kauiki were Kanaloa and Kalahumoku, sons of Hualani the wife of Kanipahu, and half-brothers to Kalapana who ruled Hawaii; Eleio; Ka-la-ehaeha; Lei; Ka-mohohali‘i; Kalae-hina; Ho‘olae. ⁵ Much earlier, on the Ulu line, comes the name of Hua son of Pohukaina, said to be a contemporary of the prophet Naula-a-Maihea who came with La‘a-mai-kahiki from the south. Two legends are connected with his ns me. One is the tragic story of his grandmother, the beautiful Popoalaea, put to death by her jealous husband. The other is the story of Hua's quarrel with his prophet Luaho‘omoe (Ulu-ho‘omoe) and the terrible drought that befell as a result of his impious conduct in condemning the prophet to death on a trumped-up charge. The story resembles the Kuula legend from the same locality and in fact Kuula the fish god is said to be descended from a son of the prophet whose death was attended by such evil results. Kepelino tells us that a struggle for power early arose between the secular and religious heads of the people, finally adjusted by uniting both powers in the person of the ruling chief, who became thus entitled to perform certain sacred offices in company with the priest. Both the Hua and the Kuula legend

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play up the priests' side of the contest. A story like that of the chief Ka-lau-nui-a-hua (The long leaf of Hua, referring to family descent) on the island of Hawaii shows the disaster that follows when a prophet's warning is disregarded.

LEGEND OF POPOALAEA

Popo-alaea (Ball of red clay), a chiefess of rank in Hana district on Maui during the rule of Kamohoali‘i, is won as a re-ward of victory in strength-testing games by the chief Kaakea (Makea) and he makes their home close to the crater above Kaupo at a place called Koae-kea because there the koae birds flock (or at the village of Hono-ka-lani). He is jealous, especially of her fondness for her younger brother. People bring malicious tales, and he sharpens his axe to kill her. She flees with an attendant and the two women hide in the cavern at the pool of Wai-anapanapa. At night they go to the village of Hono-kalani for food. The people report seeing ghosts. He watches, and detects her hiding place from the moving shadow of the fly brush, waved by her attendant, cast upon the surface of the water. Searching the cave, he dashes out the brains of the two women upon the rocks.

Today, on the night of Ku, god of justice, the water in the pool runs red. At some time each morning prismatic colors (anapa) such as are sacred to divine chiefs play over the waters of this pool as proof of her innocence. The water of the pool makes even a dark skin look white when immersed in it. ⁶

LEGEND OF HUA AND THE PROPHET

Hua's seer Lua-ho‘omoe (Ulu-ho‘omoe) arouses the chief's anger and he seeks an excuse to discredit him and put him to death. He therefore sends his men to the mountains after a certain species of bird found only on the coast. They appeal to the seer, who points out the impossibility of the task to his chief. When the men bring the birds from the sea, Hua pretends that they have been trapped in the mountains and condemns the seer for predicting falsely. The seer has the birds cut open to show that it is seafood, not mountain berries, upon which they

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have fed. Hua nevertheless orders his death. A drought ensues and fish disappear from the sea. Only for the two sons of the seer, named Kaa-ka-kai and Kaa-na-hua, is a place provided where rain falls, and thither they retire in secret. Naula-a-Maihea scans the sky from the summit of Kaala on Oahu and sees a cloud resting over Pu‘u-o-inaina in Hanaula. He prepares a great offering of swine for the sons of Hua and the drought is broken. ⁷

LEGEND OF KALAUNUIAHUA

Ka-lau-nui-a-hua consults the priestess Waahia as to the result of his war expedition and she consistently predicts disaster. He attempts in vain to put her to death. Finally at her own suggestion he has her body burned in the heiau of Keeku in Kona. She puts a tapu against his coming out of the house during the burning lest her god punish the land. As the smoke rises, it takes the shape of two cocks fighting, then of two mud hens. The chief can no longer resist tearing away the thatch with his hand as he hears the shouts of the multitude at this last portent, and the spirit of Waahia takes possession of his hand through the god Kane-nui-akea. If he but points with his hand, the land falls before him.

Hua conquers the chiefs of Maui, Molokai, Oahu, and proceeds with the captured chiefs to Kauai. Here the spirit leaves his hand and enters that of a man of Kauai. His men are routed and he and the three chiefs, Ka-malo-o-Hua of Maui, Ka-hoku-o-Hua of Molokai, Hua-pouleilei of Ewa and Waianae are taken prisoner by Kukona of Kauai, great-great-grandson of La‘a-mai-kahiki, according to the genealogy. Kukona treats his prisoners with great magnanimity. On one occasion he feigns sleep, overhears them grumbling against him and discussing a plot to murder him, a proposal vehemently protested against by Ka-malo-o-Hua, then pretends to awaken and repeats to them the whole conversation as if it were a dream. As a tribute to Ka-malo-o-Hua's good faith, he then dismisses the three chiefs to their own lands with all the honors of war, but keeps

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[paragraph continues] Ka-lau-nui for some years a captive. There are in consequence no fresh invasions. ⁸

The-long-leaf-of-Hua ruled on Hawaii as grandson of Kalapana descended on the Pili line. He was a restless and ambitious chief bent on the consolidation of the group under the rule of Hawaii, and his legend is not without interest for its bearing upon the resistance attempted by stubborn chiefs to the warnings of the priesthood. The incident of the magnanimous conduct of the chief of Kauai had a bearing upon later history, for even down to the time of Kamehameha, when chiefs consulted the memories of their archivists as to the conduct of the forefathers in like situations, the "peace of Ka-malo-o-Hua" was cited as precedent for securing a peaceful ending of hostilities.

It was during the time of Kakaalaneo of Maui that the division of lands is said to have taken place under a kahuna named Kalaihaohi‘a (Hew the bark of the ohia tree) which portioned out the island into districts, subdistricts, and smaller divisions, each ruled over by an agent appointed by the landlord of the next larger division, and the whole under control of the ruling chief over the whole island or whatever part of it was his to govern. Land reforms and other means of strengthening the power of the ruling chief and stabilizing control over a growing population were carried out on Oahu also at about this time by Mailikukahi, successor on the Moikeha line of the last ruling chief of the elder Kumuhonua line, who was forced to retire because of his unpopularity. The names of Mailikukahi, his son Kalona-iki, and his grand-daughter Kukaniloko are handed down in tradition as wise and just rulers. With Mailikukahi, Waikiki became the ruling seat of chiefs of Oahu. He carried out strict laws, marked out land boundaries, and took the firstborn son of each family to be educated in his own household. He honored the priests, built heiaus, and discountenanced human sacrifice. A raiding band from Hawaii and Maui he met at Waikakalaua gulch and pursued and slaughtered at Kipapa gulch. Punalu‘u was

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killed in the battle on the plain of that name. The head of Hilo, son of Lakapu, was stuck up at a place called Po‘o-Hilo in Hono-uliuli. ⁹

Legends gather about the name of the ruling chief of Maui, Kakaalaneo (Kukaalaneo, Kaalaneo), who lived in the present Lahaina district on the hill Keka‘a, owned fish-ponds in Hana district on the opposite end of the island, planted a famous breadfruit grove, and took to wife the Molokai chiefess whom Eleio found for him and who brought him the first feather cape seen on Maui, by whom he had the mischievous son Kaululaau who killed off the spirits on Lanai. In his day the old name of Lele became attached to Lahaina. ¹⁰ In the legend of the red-skinned kupua of Puna Kepaka-ili-ula, Kakaalaneo is represented as a skilful spearsman who "never misses a grassblade, an ant, or a flea," but in a contest for the favors of a lady (drawn direct from a tale from The Arabian Nights) he is worsted by the kupua and ignominiously slain. ¹¹ This way of aggrandizing one hero at the expense of another's traditional fame is no new thing in Hawaiian story-telling, but the treatment of the episode marks it as a foreign imitation.

Tradition places in Kakaalaneo's time the arrival of a party of strangers (haole) who played an active part in court life and whose names were, according to Kamakau, kept in memory as late as Captain Cook's day, for to the question whether Cook's party were gods or men, the kahunas expressed the opinion that they were "men from the land of Kaekae (Kakae) and Kukanaloa." After regular voyages between Hawaii and the southern islands had ceased, chance seems to have brought some boats to shore which had drifted from their course. One is said to have arrived off Mokapu point on Oahu and another in the time of Ka-malu-o-Hua to have been wrecked off the coast of Maui with five persons on board, one of them a woman whom "Wakalana" took as his

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wife and descendants of whom are said to be living on Maui and Oahu. A third party of strangers was brought back by Paumakua from one of his voyages. Kaekae and Maliu they are called, but a chant names them Auakahinu and Auakamea, or, in one version, Kukahauula and Kukalepa. They were priests, and it seems likely that the Kane and Kanaloa of the Haumea tradition have been here confused with Paumakua's people. ¹² But all these arrivals are described so much alike and in terms so similar to such incidents recounted in southern groups, where the chance of a drifting boat making land with women on board is much more plausible, that they must be regarded as traditional rather than historical narratives.

Kukanaloa and Kaekae are the leaders of the party said to have arrived in Kakaalaneo's day, and the legend of their arrival and the chant that follows in which their names are played upon in listing names of chiefs will illustrate the type rather than fix the event. The last allusion in the legend is a pun upon the chief Lolale of Oahu who abducted the pretty chiefess of Maui, Kelea, while she was out surfing and carried her away to Oahu in the uplands of Lihue. She deserted him for his cousin Kalamakua in Ewa, by whom she became mother of the high chiefess Laie-lohelohe (The drooping pandanus vine), who became in turn the wife of her Maui cousin Pi‘ilani. All these names appear in the chant linked with the coming of Ku-kanaloa, together with the names of a wife and son of Kakaalaneo. ¹³

LEGEND OF KUKANALOA

(a) The strangers land first at Keei in South Kona and then come on to Waihe‘e, Maui, and land at a place called Ke-ala-i-Kahiki (The road to Kahiki). They are exhausted and the natives clothe and feed them. In looks they are light with sparkling eyes. When asked after their homeland and parents they

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point to the uplands "far, far above where our parents dwell," and show themselves familiar with bananas, breadfruit, mountain-apple, and candlenut trees. The two leaders become Kakaalaneo's property. There is no tapu place closed to them. They marry chiefesses and some of their descendants are living today. Kani-ka-wi and Kani-ka-wa (Whistle and Flute) they are called, "perhaps because their speech was as unintelligible as that of the lale birds that live in the hills." ¹⁴

Puka mai o Kanikawi, Kanikawa,
O na haole iluna o Halakaipo,
Puka mai nei Kukanaloa,
Kupuna haole mai Kahiki
Puka mai nei Kakaalaneo
Me ke leo iki o Kakae,
O Kaualua ia, o Kaihiwalua
O Kelea, o Kalamakua,
O Pi‘ilani ia, o Laielohelohe. "Came Sharp-sound, Loud-sound,
The strangers above Halakaipo,
Came Ku-kanaloa,
The stranger forefather from Kahiki,
Came Kakaalaneo,
With the soft-voiced Kakae,
Kaualua (the wife), Kaihiwalua (the son),
Kelea (the wife), Kalamakua (the husband),
Pi‘ilani (the husband), Laielohelohe (the wife)."

Footnotes

377:1 For. Pol. Race 2: 272, 278; HAA 1912, 101-105.

378:2 Malo, 322-323; For. Col. 6: 319; Kamakau, Ke Au Okoa, October 14, 1869.

378:3 Ke Au Okoa, November 4, 1869; For. Pol. Race 2: 28-30; Kalakaua, 84-85; Malo, 323; Ellis, Tour, 270; Stokes, BPBM Oc. Papers 7: 4-5.

380:4 Kamakau, Kuokoa, December 1, 1866.

380:5 For. Pol. Race 2: 78-79 note 2.

381:6 Told by Sheriff Wahiako, Hana, July, 1930.

382:7 For. Col. 5: 514-519; Kalakaua, 155-173; Thrum, HAA 1924, 127-133.

383:8 Malo, 328-332; For. Pol. Race 2: 67-69; Kalakaua, 175-205; Cartwright, table 4.

384:9 For. Pol. Race 2: 89-91; Thrum, More Tales, 91-92; Kalakaua, 219-225.

384:10 For. Pol. Race 2: 82; Col. 4: 482-489; 5: 540-545.

384:11 Ibid. 4: 504-505; 5: 386-393.

385:12 For. Pol. Race 2: 24-26, 81; Col. 6: 247; J. Emerson, HHS Papers 5: 13; Kalakaua, 182-184; Kamakau, Kuokoa, January 19, 1867.

385:13 For. Pol. Race 2: 82-87; Kalakaua, 227-246; HAA 1921, 58-62.

386:14 Kamakau, Kuokoa, January 19, 1867.