Wairaka

"Wairaka was the daughter of Toroa, captain of the Mataatua canoe. It is said that when the Mataatua came adrift, she saved the canoe after uttering the words, ‘Me whakatāne au i ahau! (I must act like a man!), which gave Whakatāne its name. ..." (Taonui, 2005).

(Taonui, 2005).

"Wairaka was much impressed by the handsome appearance of one of the visitors to her marae and became determined to claim him as her husband. During the night Wairaka went to where the sleeping place of the man she liked and scratched his face in order to mark him for her own. The next morning Wairaka informed her father of her choice of a husband and explained how she had marked him for the purpose of identification by all. All her people collected in order to view her chosen man, and as they came forth from their house she was astonished to see him walk forth scratchless, with not a mark on him. But the next man to come forth was Mai-ure-nui, badly scratched, marked before the world as the chosen of the chief's daughter. He had swapped sleeping places with the man she wanted! Mai was a singularly ugly man. Upon realising the mistake that she had made, Wairaka cried, "He po a Wairaka i raru ai" (By darkness was Wairaka misled), a saying still heard among the natives. By Mai-ure-nui she had a son named Tamatea-ki-te-huatahi (Tamatea the only child). The name originated as follows: The child's father proposed to go out to sea fishing in order to satisfy his wife's desire to eat fish. Toroa said to his son-in-law, "Do not go to sea at this time. These are the nights of the Tamatea-kai-ariki, the ocean is too rough." The answer was, "Let me and the Tamatea-kai-ariki fight it out together." Several nights of the moon are known as Tamatea, and the Tamatea-kai-ariki is the eighth or ninth night of the moon's age. Stormy weather is said to mark this phase of the moon. However, our fisherman persisted in going and so lost his life, his canoe being capsized at sea. Soon after this occurrence the son of Wairaka was born, and was given the name of Tamatea, in memory of the Tamatea stage of the moon when his father was drowned. The term Huatahi (single offspring) implies an only child as his father had died." ([Summarised from cited authors text with intentional omissions without indicatiion.] Mitira, 1972).

'Toroa had a son named Ruaihona, who in turn fathered Te Tahinga-o-te-rā [Wairaka's nephew]" (Harvey, 2017). Wairaka married Te Tahinga-o-te-Rā and together they had Awanuiarangi II.

Sources

Harvey, L. (2017, March 1). Story: Ngāti Awa: Page 1. Origins. Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand.

Mitira, T. H. (1972). Takimtimu: Chapter twenty-one — Various ancestors: Tuhoe-Potiki. Reed Publishing (NZ).
https://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-MitTaki-t1-body-d2-d1...

Taonui, R. (2005, February 8). Statue of Wairaka, Whakatāne (3rd of 3). Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand.
https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/2332/statue-of-wairaka-whakatane