Hawaiki
Hawaiki is the mythical island that the Polynesians trace their origins to. Polynesian legends say that the spirits of Polynesian people return to Hawaiki upon their death.
Spellings
The name "Hawaiki" is specifically Māori and figures in Maori legends about their arrival to Aotearoa (New Zealand). The same concept appears in other Polynesian cultures, and the name can also be spelled Hawaiiki, Hawai‘iki, Hawaii‘iki, Havai‘i, Hawai‘ti, Savai‘i, in the various Pacific island languages, though Hawaiki appears to be the most common variation used in English. (The ii, i‘i, ii‘i variants are attempts to phonetically reflect a long I sound, with a glottal stop in the middle replacing the "k" in some variants.)
The Polynesian island of Hawaii, written Hawai‘i in Hawaiian, some say, is named in commemoration of Hawaiki. Some pseudohistorical theories connect Hawaiki with the lost continent of Mu.
Legends
Legend has it that the Polynesians migrated from Hawaiki to the islands of the Pacific Ocean in open boats, little different from the traditional craft found in Polynesia today. The Maori people of New Zealand trace their ancestry to people who reportedly travelled from Hawaiki in about forty named canoes (waka).
Modern science and practical testing of theories
Until recently, many anthropologists had doubts that these legends described a deliberate migration, preferring to believe that the migration occurred accidentally because seafarers became lost and drifted to uninhabited shores. In 1947, Thor Heyerdahl sailed the Kon-Tiki, a balsa wood raft, from South America to show that Polynesia could have been settled from the east, with sailors using the prevailing winds and simple construction techniques.
However, DNA evidence indicates that the Polynesians likely originated from islands in eastern Asia, possibly from Taiwan, and moved southwards and eastwards through the South Pacific Ocean. The common ancestry of all the Austronesian languages, of which the Polynesian languages are a major subgroup, also supports this conclusion. This evidence indicates that at least some of the migration occurred against the prevailing winds and had to be deliberate rather than just accidental. The existence of uninhabited islands may have been predicted by observing migratory patterns of birds.
In recent decades, boatbuilders (see Polynesian Voyaging Society) have constructed ocean-going craft using traditional materials and techniques, and sailed them over presumed traditional routes using ancient navigation methods, showing that such deliberate migration was very possible.
External links
- Hawai'iki - The Ancient Land - Hawaiian Legend.
- Oceania history websites, profiled