Chapter XVI
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of discipline to which he had been reduced by Terito, Pomare vahine, the Boraboran and Raiatean chiefs, the missionaries, and Tati himself, as this sacrifice made by a man who was best known for his greed, for the sake of recovering a part of what he had wasted. To secure himself as well as he could from the risk that the Papara family might again turn against him, he did what was usual in such cases; he claimed for his own the first child that Marama should have, and made a compact that the children from the marriage should marry Pomares. When I was born, I was the adopted child of Pomare, and both as Teva, Marama and Pomare, naturally a very great personage. I was not born till after Christianity was established and the Maraes had been abandoned; but my mother, Marama Arii manihinihi, who was born probably about 1800, was carried, after the old island custom, to all her family Maraes at birth -- thirteen of them -- in Moorea and Tahiti. She was Marama at Haapiti, in the island of Moorea; she was Terii vaetua at Faaa; she was Aromaiterai at Papara; she was Teriinui o Tahiti and Maheanuu i Farepua at Vaiari; she was Teriitua Teriiouru maona i Terai i Hitiaa; she was Tetuaraenui ahuri taua o te mauui i Fareroi in Haapape; and with each name she took the lands that belonged to it.
As I have told the story of the Papara family, I will tell that of the Maramas, from tradition, as it is handed down in Moorea. As usual, it begins with genealogy, for we have no history apart from genealogy. The story starts from Punaauia some thirty generations ago. The Punaauia family begins at that point with Nuu, and comes down ten generations to Terii mana, who took a wife from Eimeo, or Moorea, a girl named Piharii of Maraes Nuurua and Farehia. They had two children: a son named Punua teraitua who was chief at Nuurua or Varari, between the two bays on the north shore of the island; and a daughter, Tefeau, who married Tupuoroo, son of Marama, chief of the district of Haapiti on the southwest shore.
Four generations afterwards, the Nuurua chief was named Punua teraitua; the Haapiti chief was named Marama, or properly Terii o Marama i te tauo o te rai, and his Moua was Tahuara, his Outu was Eimeo, his Marae was Marae te fano.
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Indigenous Histories |  |
© Derived from the revised Paris edition of 1901 page 162, 2004
Published by kind permission of the Library
To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/-marua-162.html