1. Contemporary Traditional Maori
Culture,part 2
The Maori Creation story:
The Separation of Heaven and Earth
By:JESSICA CEBALLOS.1/13/12
period1 Culture and GEOGRAPHY
George Grey,1956,Polynesian Mythology
(ed. by William W. Bird): Chrischurch,
Whitcombe and Tombs ltd., 250 p. (BL
2615.G843p 195); and Mr.Ruben Meza,
2012

2. All humans are desended from one pair of ancestors,
Rangi and Papa, who are also called Heaven and

3. In those days,Heaven and Earth clung closely
togethere, and all was darkness.

4. Rangi and Papa had six sons: (1) Tane-mahuta, the
father of the forest and their inhabitants

5. (2)Tawhiri-ma-tea, the father of winds and storms

6. (3) Tangaroa, the father of fish and reptiles

7. (4) Tu-matauenga, the father of fierce human beings

8. (5) Haumia-tik, the father of food that grows without
cultivation

9. (8) and Rongo-ma-tane, the father of cultivated food.

10. In the beginning these six sons and all other beings
lived in darkness for an extremely long times, able
only to wonder what light and vision might be like.

11. 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.

12. This is why today we are fierce and have war, why
we eat the plants and animals, and why there are
storms.