TUHOE: The Children of the Mist

by Elsdon Best
A. H. & A. W. Reed, $9.50
reviewed by E. W. Williams

What a pleasure it is to see again the familiar dust wrapper design (though in an undistinguished colour) of the greatest of our Maori tribal histories in this reissue for the Polynesian Society. It is the most important because it was collected and compiled by our greatest field ethnologist, from the personal communications of distinguished elders of Tuhoe and related tribes who had acquired their knowledge in the traditional way in the Whare Wananga, and who were actively concerned to see that knowledge was safely recorded.

I am not competent to review critically the substance of this volume, and I do not think there is anyone alive who could do so. My friends of Tuhoe recognise the work as authoritative and use it themselves for the teaching of the younger generation. The Tuhoe Maori Trust Board has bought numerous copies for presentation and other purposes. Of course there are matters on which some families have received from their forbears a differing version from that recorded by Best. As the proverb says: “Ehara i te tangata kotahi ano i oho ai i nehera” (there was more than one man awake in the times of old). This book contains all that could be learned about Tuhoe and associated Mataatua tribes by a skilled and enthuiastic worker dealing at close quarters over many years with the recognised experts of the district. It comprises just about every possible aspect of tribal knowledge as is set out in the long subtitle, ‘A Sketch of the origin, history, myths and beliefs of the Tuhoe tribe of the Maoris of New Zealand, with some account of the early tribes of the Bay of Plenty.’

As to the form of the book, there are times when in trying to track down some particular matter or event, one feels a danger of becoming lost in the complicated details of the different hapu histories. But this cannot be avoided. Certainly the book with its incorporated whakapapa is cast in a traditionally Maori form. If one has the dedication and can get access to Volume II (which I understand it is not intended to reprint) one can cross check persons and times in the great genealogical lattices contained in that volume.

There is today a tendency abroad to sneer at Best's ethnological work. It is true that some of his writing is inclined to a degree of grandiloquence unfamiliar to modern ears. It is also rather unfashionable perhaps in that it is forthright and clear and entirely free of the ‘barbarous neologisms’ with which modern ethnographers and anthropologists so often seem to discourage the general reader from participating in their thoughts. It must also be admitted (though it has no relation to the present work) that Best accepted some of the Te Matorohanga material which is now generally considered to have been much embroidered by some of those through whose hands it passed. But these points are relatively small ones. Best has stacked up in his works a pile of the riches of Maori knowledge which will serve for centuries as a quarry for lesser men. One may be sure that Sir Apirana did not give lightly the testimonial to Best's knowledge of Maori matters which is recorded on the jacket flap of this book.

Tuhoe is an essential book for any library which pretends to a reasonable New Zealand section. It is good reading for anyone at all interested in New Zealand history and the New Zealand Maori. Any member of Tuhoe or of other Mataatua tribes must read this and, if he possibly can, own it.