I do not know what became of Aromaiterai and Tuiterai, or when they died, but they left behind them one of the most complicated puzzles in genealogy that ever perplexed a succession. I will try to finish with the Aromaiterais and clear them out of the way before going on with the main stream of our family history in the Tuiterais; but this is not easy, because the course of the main stream meanders freely between the two. No doubt Tuiterai did drive out Aromaiterai, about 1730, and when Wallis arrived, in 1767, Tuiterai’s son, Amo, or Tevahitua i Patea i Tooarai, still held the chiefs authority and headship over the whole island except a few districts; but Aromaiterai had married a wife, Teraha, and had two children: a daughter, Tetuanui, and a son, Aromaiterai who married his first cousin, sister of Amo. These two children carried on the elder branch of the family till it reaches us.

The daughter, Tetuanui, was the channel through which the Aromaiterai name and lands came back to us at last through my mother, Marama. The Table II shows how, in the failure of males, the line passed through Teraiefa of Maraetaata, wife of Marama of Haapiti, to their son Marama, and through him to his daughter, the greatest chiefess and heiress of her day, whose marriage to Tuiterai’s heir, Tapua taaroa of Papara, reunited the Aromaiterai and Tuiterai branches in myself, Ariitaimai, who am Aromaiterai and Tuiterai in one.

Indigenous Histories