He was born premature and cast into the ocean by his mother, where the waves formed him into a living baby. He was discovered by his grandfather and later went to live with his siblings. One day he followed his mother to the underworld where he met his father, Makeatutara, who baptised Māui incorrectly. As a punishment from the gods for this mishap, Māui and all of humanity were doomed to die.
Māui is credited with catching a giant fish using a fishhook taken from his grandmother's jaw-bone; the giant fish would become the North Island of New Zealand, known as Te Ika-a-Māui. In some traditions, his canoe (waka) became the South Island, known as Te Waka a Māui.
His last trick, which led to his death, involved the goddessHine-nui-te-pō. While attempting to win immortality for mankind, Māui entered her vagina, intent on leaving through her mouth while she slept. However, he was crushed by the teeth in her vagina, which were made of obsidian.
Māui te whare kino[citation needed] ("Māui the house of trouble")
Legends
The offspring of Tūmatauenga increased and multiplied and did not know death until the generation of Māui-tikitiki and his brothers.[6]
Birth
Māui is the son of Taranga, the wife of Makeatutara. He was a miraculous birth – his mother threw her premature infant[a] into the sea wrapped in a tress of hair from her topknot (tikitiki) – hence Māui's full name is Māui-tikitiki-a-Taranga. Ocean spirits found and wrapped the child in seaweed and jellyfish.[9]: 233 His grandfather Tama-nui-ki-te-Rangi then found the child on the beach,[8] covered by swarms of flies and gulls, and nourished him to adolescence.[3]: 13
Discovery of his siblings
When Māui became old enough, he travelled to his family's home and found his four brothers, Māui-taha, Māui-roto, Māui-pae, and Māui-waho, and his sister, Hina.[9]: 233 The brothers are at first wary of the newcomer.[3]: 11
Later at night Māui came to his relatives while they were gathered in the marae, dancing and being merry. He crept in and sat down behind his brothers, and soon Taranga called the children and found a strange child, who at first she does not recognise and attempts to cast him from the house, but he proved to be her son. Māui was thus taken in as one of the family.[2]: 449 Some of the brothers were jealous, but the eldest addressed the others as follows:
Never mind; let him be our dear brother. In the days of peace remember the proverb, 'When you are on friendly terms, settle your disputes in a friendly way; when you are at war, you must redress your injuries by violence.' It is better for us, brothers, to be kind to other people. These are the ways by which men gain influence – by laboring for an abundance of food to feed others, by collecting property to give to others, and by similar means by which you promote the good of others.
After Māui performed feats such as transforming himself into different kinds of birds, his brothers acknowledged his power and admired him.[9]: 233 He became vexed that his mother always left before dawn and returned the next night, he one day blocked the entrances and sources of light into their house to keep her there, and stole her clothes. With the sun up, he was able to see where she went every day, and it turned out that she'd pull a clump of tussock from the ground, and descend a large tunnel to the underworld.
Māui was encouraged to follow their mother to the underworld in the form of a
kererū. Once he arrived there he found a group of people sitting on a patch of grass in a grove of manapau trees,[b]
from which he dropped berries onto his parents' heads.
Upon Māui transforming back into a human, his mother recognised him as the child who used to live with her other sons. His father, Makeatutara, then took him to the water to give a baptism, but mistakenly rushed through it, which caused him to stress.
Māui slows the Sun
In former days, the sun used to travel quickly across the sky, leaving not enough daylight time for working and eating. Māui proposed to catch the sun and slow it down. Armed with the jaw-bone of Murirangawhenua and a large amount of rope, which is in some tellings made from his sister Hina's hair, Māui and his brothers journeyed to the east and found the pit where the sun-god
Tama-nui-te-rā slept during the night-time. There they tied the ropes into a noose around the pit and built a wall of clay to shelter behind. Tama-nui-te-rā was caught in the noose and Māui beat him severely with the jaw-bone until he surrendered and agreed to travel slowly across the sky.[10][9]
: 234
Māui fishes up the North Island
Māui's older brothers always refused to let him come fishing with them. One night, he wove for himself a flax fishing line and enchanted it with a karakia to give it strength; to this he attached the magic fish-hook made from the jaw-bone that his grandmother Murirangawhenua had given him. Then he hid away in the hull of his brothers' waka (canoe). The next morning, when the waka was too far from land to return, he emerged from his hiding-place. His brothers would not lend him any bait, so he struck himself on the nose and baited the hook with his blood. Māui hauled a great fish, known as Hāhau-whenua, up from the depths. Thus the North Island of New Zealand is known as Te Ika-a-Māui (The Fish of Māui).[9]: 234
When it emerged from the water, Māui left to find a tohunga to perform the appropriate ceremonies and prayers, leaving his brothers in charge. They, however, did not wait for Māui to return but began to cut up the fish, which writhed in agony, causing it to break up into mountains, cliffs and valleys. If the brothers had listened to Māui, the island would have been a level plain, and people would have been able to travel with ease on its surface.[11][9]: 234
In Northern Māori traditions of New Zealand, Māui's waka became the South Island, with
Te Waipounamu, another Māori name for the South Island is Te Waka-a-Māui, the canoe of Māui.[9]: 234 In southern traditions, the South Island is known instead as Te Waka o Aoraki[12] and predates Māui's expedition. Māui sailed a canoe called Mahaanui and after he had pulled up the North Island (Te Ika a Maui) he left Mahaanui on top of a mountain in the foothills behind what is now Ashburton. That mountain now bears the name Mahaanui,[13]
and the coastline between Banks Peninsula and the Waitaki River is called Te tai o Mahaanui (the tides of Mahaanui).