Basement Kahuna -New Maori Bone Pendant 3/04 - Tiki Carving

B bigbrotiki Tiki Socialite Tiki Island, above the Silverlake Joined: Mar 25, 2002 Posts: 11621	B bigbrotiki Posted posted on Sun, Apr 16, 2006 10:35 AM ...and be aware of all the taboos associated with the activity of carving a Maori ancestor panel (This is a true story): When Te Waru, chief of the Ngati Whaoa, did not heed the warnings of his Tohunga to put out his pipe while watching the carving of Rauru, the magnificent meeting house that he had commissioned in honor of his new wife, he broke the taboo. When his wife suddenly died, the work on the house stopped. After a period of mourning, and several years, Te Waru found a new wife, and resumed work on the house... Te Waru was a young, forward thinking man who did not want to believe in the tales of the elders, and it took the death of his THIRD wife and their child to finally abandon the project. For decades the almost finished panels and posts of the house lay in storage, until in 1897 a Swedish hotel owner from Rotorua acquired them, and had the house build by young Maori craftsmen, among them the grandson of the now deceised original builder. But in 1900 he put it up on the market, maybe because the two old Tohunga who had performed the exorcism of the curse that lay on the house had suddenly died. The Hamburg Museum of Anthropology accquired it for the back then enormous sum of 35.000.- Reichsmark and built it's own wing for it, where it has been standing since 1910. The curse must have evaporated over time and distance, because nothing bad happened to the British officers of the occupation forces that converted it into their casino for a time after WWII, making it Hamburg's first Tiki lounge. The moral: Don't smoke a pipe while you're carving, you might kill your wife...hmmm, does that work with ex-wives, too? PS: Don't forget my Marquesan toggle Tiki! [ Edited by: bigbrotiki 2006-04-16 10:37 ]

...and be aware of all the taboos associated with the activity of carving a Maori ancestor panel (This is a true story):

When Te Waru, chief of the Ngati Whaoa, did not heed the warnings of his Tohunga to put out his pipe while watching the carving of Rauru, the magnificent meeting house that he had commissioned in honor of his new wife, he broke the taboo. When his wife suddenly died, the work on the house stopped. After a period of mourning, and several years, Te Waru found a new wife, and resumed work on the house...
Te Waru was a young, forward thinking man who did not want to believe in the tales of the elders, and it took the death of his THIRD wife and their child to finally abandon the project.

For decades the almost finished panels and posts of the house lay in storage, until in 1897 a Swedish hotel owner from Rotorua acquired them, and had the house build by young Maori craftsmen, among them the grandson of the now deceised original builder.

But in 1900 he put it up on the market, maybe because the two old Tohunga who had performed the exorcism of the curse that lay on the house had suddenly died. The Hamburg Museum of Anthropology accquired it for the back then enormous sum of 35.000.- Reichsmark and built it's own wing for it, where it has been standing since 1910. The curse must have evaporated over time and distance, because nothing bad happened to the British officers of the occupation forces that converted it into their casino for a time after WWII, making it Hamburg's first Tiki lounge.

The moral: Don't smoke a pipe while you're carving, you might kill your wife...hmmm, does that work with ex-wives, too?

PS: Don't forget my Marquesan toggle Tiki!

[ Edited by: bigbrotiki 2006-04-16 10:37 ]

Post #226948 by bigbrotiki on Sun, Apr 16, 2006 10:35 AM