Sex and war in ancient Polynesia.

Abstract

During the 19th century two Polynesians, Mamae of Mangaia and Rewi Rangi-amio from Aotearoa New Zealand, proudly narrated short accounts about their respective ancestors: Tkoke, a warrior leader of the Ng?ti Vara, and Taketake of T?hoe. These narratives focused upon the ancestors' displays of genitals at critical junctures in battle. In this paper the stories provide reference points by which we can better understand ancient Polynesian perceptions of the relationship between sex and war as practised by the chiefly classes. These particular incidents draw attention to the existence of other references in Eastern Polynesia, notably in Aotearoa, to displays, or misleading displays, of male and female chiefly genitalia in the context of aggressive acts. Taken together, these various references from islands as far apart as Aotearoa, Mangaia and Hawai'i show how in Polynesia chiefly genitals were able to manifest the potency of leaders. While principally examined in the particular context of Eastern Polynesia, these stories of genital displays are also discussed in relation to themes concerning aggression and power as played out in the ambivalent relations between men and women. The paper begins with Mamae's unpublished narrative about his ancestor, Tkoke, and then locates this story in the history and ethnography of Mangaia and other islands. The second half recounts the published versions of Taketake's feat before widening the discussion to consider other stories about male and female chiefly displays of genitals in Aotearoa. Mamae was a well known pastor and tribal historian who recorded much traditional knowledge for the Rev. W. Wyatt Gill, of the London Missionary Society, a resident on Mangaia for 22 years and a close colleague and friend. Among his various papers, Mamae wrote a manuscript which was subsequently copied and found its way, perhaps with the assistance of the Maori anthropologist, Te Rangi Hiroa (Sir Peter Buck), into the collection of Stephen Savage, a Cook Islands Government official and amateur lexicographer, who was himself descended from the New Zealand iwi, Te Wh?nau a Apanui (see Savage 1980:3). Mamae's text narrates key events in the history of the people of Mangaia and, in particular, the genealogies and narratives respecting notable ancestors of his own tribe, the k?p? of Ng?ti Vara or Te '?mama. Elsewhere in the manuscript Mamae noted the

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