ORIGIN OF THE MOON - A myth from Philippines - from "Types of Prose Narratives" by Harriott Ely Fansler - 1911

THE  MYTH 

The traditional types - myth, legend, fairy tale, and nursery saga - are designated as primitive-religious in order to express the fact that they grew up in response to the reverent credulity of simple folk. The myths of all races are the embodiment of their highest prehistoric religious thinking. The legends are their semi-historical, semi-religious thinking. The fairy and nursery stories are modified forms of the other two. Consequently they all belong together in one group.

There are two general classes of myths: the primitive-tribal and the artificial-literary, or myths of growth and myths of art.

From the point of view of ethnology, the myth of growth is primitive philosophy, and represents racial anthropomorphic thinking concerning the universe. Anthropomorphic is a term derived from the Greek ἄνθρωπος, meaning man, and μορφἠ, meaning shape or form, and is used to describe the tendency of people to represent invisible forces as having human form (for example, the Deity), or natural forces like fire and wind as being animate, volitional agents. It is probably true that, at a very early stage in the development of both the individual and the race, every object is looked upon as having life; and later, if any distinction is made between animate and inanimate, spirits are yet regarded as agents controlling the inanimate and causing changes therein. A myth of growth is the verbal expression of this attitude of the mind of a people in its wider and deeper imaginings.

Doubtless after the first or second repetition of a myth, which some seer of a tribe chants in rude verse, the primitive listener is confused between fact and fancy. The non-essential incidents which the narrator adds from sheer love of making up a story are not distinguished from the incidents that really express the working of natural forces. So it happens that, in the time between the first starting up of the account and the analysis and explanation of it by some philosopher, a narrative handed down from father to son is believed in, word for word, as religious truth, though gaining details and losing its original meaning as it goes. As some one has said, it was because the Greeks had forgotten that Zeus meant the bright sky that they could talk of him as a king ruling a company of manlike deities on Mount Olympus.

There are many beautiful myths existing today in prose and poetry. In the tribal species, there is the great mass of Greek and Roman early religious stories and there are the Oriental and the Norse cycles. In the artificial group there are the later Greek and Roman myths like those devised by Plato and Plutarch, and there are our more modern beautiful creations with myth elements like Milton's "Comus" and many of the poems of Keats, where not only the incidents are newly made but the deities also. In prose we have the delightful "Wonder Book," which Hawthorne prepared for children. We have become so familiar with "Paradise Lost" that we hardly realize that it is essentially myth - a great seer's expression of the anthropomorphism of his people. Like a true bard of old, Milton added much also to his people's thinking on the universe. How much he added we see fully only when we deliberately compare the extension and concreteness of his account with the meagerness of the Hebrew Scriptures.

An error we are liable to fall into concerning myths is that of presuming that they are wholly things of the past; that nowadays nobody believes in them or tells them. In fact, many persons and many tribes believe in them and tell them. The myth age is not a past epoch, but a condition of thinking. It is always present somewhere and present to some extent always among all races. The primitive tribes of the Philippines believe implicitly in their myths. The Bontoc Igorots, for example, tell how the Moon woman, Kabigat, cut off the head of a child of the Sun man, 

Chal-chal, and thus taught head-hunting to earth people; some of them tell, too, how Coling, the Serpent Eagle, was made, and happens to be always hovering over their pueblo. Even the youngest child knows how the rice-bird came about, and why an Igorot never harms O-wug, the snake. These stories are being gathered today by American scientists and are being written down for the first time. The native college students of the Islands have joined in a movement to preserve the traditions of the more civilized tribes also, and are industriously putting into written form the stories of their people. Most of these are not beliefs that are past, but beliefs about the past, a distinction noteworthy to the student of myths. Little children of all races are naturally in a myth age, and many of their imaginings are as beautiful as those of the old Greeks, and, if made known, would be as contributive to literature, I dare say. Poets are but grown-up children to whom Nature makes a continued concrete appeal, and they are always thinking myth-wise, we well know.

So it happens that even the most learned man is willing to listen to a new myth. All the reader demands is that it shall be either a scientifically made record of some present tribal belief or a beautiful and philosophical interpretation of the workings of nature, such a one as a simple, early pagan, but poetic and essentially refined, mind might imagine. Plato's myths were advisedly artificial. He deliberately set out to modify and improve the government of his time by means of religious stories, and he begged the other philosophers to attempt the like also. He gave his magnificent "Vision of Er" as an example of what might be done.

If one wishes to collect traditional myths among a primitive people, this is in general the way he proceeds: He calls to his aid the more elderly folk and the little children, those that have time and inclination to talk. If he can not speak their dialect, he obtains an interpreter, if possible, one very intimate and sociable with the tribe. Then he himself tries to get into good fellowship with all, and to induce free and natural talking. He asks for tales of the sun and moon, the wind and the rain, grasses, flowers, birds, clouds, mountain-systems, river-chains, lightning, thunder, and whatever else their gods have charge of. He asks about the relation of these gods with the deities of neighboring peoples, which, if any, are to be feared and why. Then he makes note of as many historical facts as he can about the tribe - where it first lived, what are the topographical features of the remote and the immediate places of abode, how powerful the warriors are, what respect they command from outsiders, what are considered most honored occupations, and so on. These facts are not to go explicitly into the story, but are to form the background of explanation if he cares to seek or give one. Then, too, they may aid him in making a happy translation of the primitive oral narrative. The aim of the collector, however, is accuracy rather than beauty, though beauty may be present in his versions.

The writer of an original myth, on the other hand, tries to make his diction as exquisite as he can without affectation. He proceeds somewhat differently, though with no less forethought. If he wishes to use gods and goddesses already known, he attempts not to violate the generally accepted notions of their characteristics. He bears in mind that the beings of myths are large, ample, superhuman, of the race of the infinite. Above mortals, they rule mortals or ignore them. The gods are never petty, though they may be trivial. They belong to the over-world. They are essential: they make day and night, the coming of the seasons, the roll of the ocean, the rising and setting of the constellations. Connected with them too, of course, he knows, are the lesser events of Nature's activity, the speaking of echo, the blooming of the slender narcissus at the edge of the pool, the drooping of the poplars. Hence the writer of a myth of art modifies or adds, but avoids making radical changes. If he chooses wholly to invent his deities, he picks out for each a definite phenomenon and keeps it steadily in mind in order that his created personage may be an appropriate one to perform the well-known actions of the natural force he is explaining. He makes the deeds of his beings far-reaching in result and does not forget to give them euphonious and suggestive names.

There is a difference between myth and allegory as narratives, although myth is fundamentally allegorical in the broad sense of the term. The actors of myth are rather representative than figurative. Being grander they are at once more simple and dignified than those of allegory. The gods are not thin abstractions raised to concreteness, but are powerful forces reduced to the likeness of men.

Pure myth is different from pure legend likewise, though legend may have gods in it. Legend is generally confined to a particular person or event, or is connected with a definite spot and a limited result; whereas myth deals with universal phenomena.

Working definition of myth

The collector or composer of myths, accordingly, posits for himself some such working definition as this: A myth is a story accounting in a fanciful way for a far-reaching natural phenomenon. The basis on which the narrator proceeds is emphatically not science, but imagination and philosophy. He pictures the activities of the universe as the conduct of personal beings, as gods and goddesses doing good or evil, creating and destroying, ruling man or ignoring him, punishing and rewarding.

TRIBAL MYTH

ORIGIN  OF  THE  MOON

translated and interpreted by  Emanuel Baja

South and east of Manila Bay stretches a piece of land, on which there used to be a large forest surrounded and fringed by the Sierra Madre mountains on the east, and guarded by the active Taal volcano on the south. This volcano, which is on a small lake, is said to be always looking toward the east, shouting with his big mouth the name of Buan Buan, a very beautiful nymph who dwelt once in this deep forest. The large trees formed towering pillars, the vines and moss that grew wild, together with the blooming flowers, were ornaments of her court. The birds, the insects, and all kinds of animals were her subjects.

The people who live now in this land say that in the beginning of the world there was no such thing as the moon that shines at night. They assert that the origin of the moon came in this wise:

Many thousands of years ago, when the beautiful nymph Buan was in her court, a warlike tribe settled on her land of enjoyment. The invaders began to cultivate the rich soil of this place. Buan, seeing that her flowers would be destroyed and her birds driven away, fled toward the west in grief. On the sea she saw a little banca into which she climbed and in which she drifted along until she came to an island near where the Sun sleeps.

One afternoon when the Sun was about to hide his last rays, he was met by the beautiful nymph, who at once said to him, "O Sun, bear me with you, and I will be your faithful wife forever." Without hesitation or doubt, the gallant Sun, who had been shining over the earth with open eyes looking for a wife, took Buan under his golden arm, and they together, as true lovers, departed.

The Arch-Queen of the Nymphs, ever quarrelsome and jealous, seeing the departure of Buan, sent lightning and hurled thunderbolts after the two fleeing lovers. Buan, who was peacefully slumbering on the breast of her lover, fell down into the water. The Sun in his fright ran away, and continued his course as usual. Pitied by the gods Buan did not drown, but floated on the foam of the sea. The Sun lighted the world the next morning with a great deal of heat and sorrow in his eyes, searching for his lost sweetheart. Buan, who was hidden in the foam that floated on the sea, did not come out until evening. By that time Sun had retired to his wonderful cave beneath the ocean. Buan wandered about until finally she saw a glittering light within the waves. In her fright she cried aloud. The Sun, who was suddenly awakened from his cave by her grief, saw her. With a satisfied heart he took her into his cave, where they dwelt for a whole night. They sat and talked about their love. The Sun taught her how to travel across the sky. However, he asked Buan not to follow him in any of his journeys.

One afternoon Buan was sitting before the door of the cave waiting for her lover. Longing and sentiment grew strong in her, and she remembered the past days when she had lived in her forest court. This state of mind made her come out of the cave, and she rode on the air by magic. For fifteen successive nights she did this, yet she could not see her old home. Finally she asked her husband to bear her across heaven in order that she might see her home. The next morning the Sun took Buan on his back, and they sailed across the sky. The world became dark, for the sun could not then well illuminate the earth. The gods were astonished. The Arch-Queen of the Nymphs sent a storm of wind and rain, which made Buan turn into a soft brilliant mass of light. She was to be with her husband but once every thirty days. She was also punished by not being allowed to show herself entirely every night. She could not sail across heaven for more than thirteen or fourteen days at a time.

CLAUDE MELLAN - ( 1598 – 1688) French engraver.

Incredible! This 17th century engraving depicting Jesus Christ wearing a crown of thorns is called "Sudarium of Saint Veronica", engraving by Claude Mellan in 1649. An ordinary drawing, close up, turns out to be an image created using a single line that is twisted in a spiral. All the details of the face and transitions of light and shadow are created using thickenings of this line. For the artist's contemporaries, his method of engraving remained a mystery, and no one was able to repeat it.

Self-portrait, engraving by Claude Mellan (1635)

Claude Mellan ( 1598 – 1688) was a French draughtsman, engraver, and painter.

Mellan was born in Abbeville, the son of a customs official.

His first known print (Préaud no. 288 ), made for a thesis in theology at the Collège des Mathurins, shows that he was in Paris by 1619. His first teachers have not been identified, but his early engravings are thought to show the influence of Léonard Gaultier.

In 1624 Mellan went to Rome, where he studied engraving for a brief time with Francesco Villamena, who died that year. He then studied under Simon Vouet, who had been in Rome since 1614. Vouet encouraged Mellan to draw, considering it essential for both engraving and painting. Mellan engraved some of Vouet's works and also began drawing small portraits from life. Many of his portrait drawings were never engraved. He developed a style that was simple and natural, that would be characteristic throughout his later career. Many of his engravings in Rome were reproductive works, including, for example, designs by Pietro da Cortona and Gianlorenzo Bernini. The few after his own designs include Saint Francis de Paul  and the Penitent Magdalene . The plates Mellan engraved in Rome were mostly executed in a conventional manner.

In 1637, after a period of time in Aix-en-Provence with Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc, he returned to Paris, where he adopted an idiosyncratic technique, in which, instead of creating shade by cross-hatching, he used a system of parallel lines, regulating tone by varying their breadth and closeness.

Particularly notable is his engraving The Face of Christ , also called the Sudarium of Saint Veronica (see Veil of Veronica), created from a single spiralling line that starts at the tip of Jesus's nose. (as I said few lines above).

During this later period in Paris, Mellan mostly engraved his own work. He was much sought after as a portrait artist, drawing from life and engraving the portraits. Among his subjects were members of the royal family of Bourbon. His drawings "reveal more variety of style and execution than he showed in the engravings." Two examples, for which both a drawing  and an engraving exist, are portraits of Marie-Louise de Gonzague-Nevers and Henri de Savoie, Duc de Nemours.

He also created large religious works with geometric layouts and poses. According to Barbara Brejon de Lavergnée, writing in The Dictionary of Art, Mellan's use of the single line gives "an abstract effect" and, "as an engraver he proved sensitive to the classical ideal developed by Nicolas Poussin, Jacques Stella and others in Paris in the middle of the 17th century." Among Mellan's reproductive engravings are two frontispieces for religious works after designs by Poussin  and Stella .

Anatole de Montaiglon catalogued 400 engravings by Mellan, and about 100 drawings are known. The latter are mostly in the Stockholm Nationalmuseum (via the collection of Carl Gustav Tessin) and the Hermitage, Saint Petersburg (via the Cobenzl collection). Several of Mellan's lost paintings are known from his engravings of them, including Samson and Delilah  and Saint John the Baptist in the Desert.  A few other paintings were attributed to him, beginning in the 1970s, but these have not been generally accepted.

Moon

ASNEHA, THE LEGEND OF THE OPAL - by Carlo De Fornaro

Utter a powerful song to Indra, which will be as sweet as butter and honey. - Rig Veda.

Once upon a time, in the land of Kasi, there lived a poor musician, who was also a poet and a most imaginative storyteller. He had lost his flute in a village brawl, and being too poor to buy a new instrument had to content himself in relating wonderful legends concerning the gods, and stirring tales about the jungle people.

One morning, feeling the necessity of communing with his spirit in quiet and solitude, he wandered into the jungle under a favorite cluster of bamboos.

His soaring imagination was checked in its flight by a song of so extraordinary a tune, so novel and strange to his ears that he fancied he had been carried up by unknown favor to Indra’s heaven. The heavenly singer was only a small bird with feathers like old gold, two eyes green as emeralds, and the beak and legs of the same color.

And the Golden Bird spoke to him: “Asneha! thou hast acquired great merit by thy devotion to matters spiritual, by thy kindness to animals and to human beings. Therefore, if thou wilt cut a reed within these woods they shall repeat my songs to thee.

“But have a care, thou must remain pure and not suffer to be deluded by the love of woman, and thou shalt conquer the world.”

He cut a flute in haste and pressed his lips to it to utter a song from it. And verily the music which flowed from its opening was divine and golden beyond description. Sometimes it sang softly as the moonbeam plays on a silent lake of emerald, dancing and trembling with so gentle a rhythm that only the soul of a poet could hear its melody; at other times it swelled its notes to the power of the roaring Maruts smiting against the unmovable Himalayas, as the wrath of Kali with the shiver of the cold snows from the eternal summits. Again, its melody dripped sweetly as the whitest of honey with the scent of a thousand flowers, of innumerable forms and shadings the most delicate. It wept, also, a song of despair and misery, so sadly, so pitifully, that it caused the tears to surge as readily as the Fountain of all the Sorrows.

So he incised on his flute this motto:

“Once upon a time the Golden Bird sang to me,

Now I shall sing a golden song to the gods.”

He went from village to village, from city to city, playing with the generosity of an inspired poet, followed by man, woman, child and beast alike, whenever he put his flute to his lips. They offered him their homes, their riches, their dearest possessions, but he scorned all, accepting only a little rice with spices, partaking of shelter with the humblest when the tempest-beaten jungle forbade his sleeping out of doors.

Quickly his fame had spread, and reached the ears of the Maharajah, who bade him appear at the palace, to vie with the court musicians, who were the most famous in the land. The court musicians, in their ignorance, eyed the half-naked poet with a defiant leer, as one by one they began playing, while nearby sat the Maharajah with his daughter, the fair Mahismati, and the courtiers around, all fairly laden with gems, appearing as enormous glistening scarabei.

They sang and drummed, they scratched their fiddles and twanged their guitars, they played the harps and clanked the cymbals to the admiring assemblage of noblemen, who wondered how this miserable, half-starved vagabond dared to compete with his wretched little instrument.

When the musicians had ended, Asneha got up, announcing the Song of Songs.

It began imperceptibly, but as insinuatingly as the language of a couple of loving eyes whispers to another loved pair; so indistinct to the ear that it was as the incipient melody in the mind of the composer.

Then it continued, soothing and muffled as the patter of small naked feet dancing the nautch on the marble flooring; rattled speedily as an incessant cascade of rubies, diamonds, sapphires, pearls and emeralds on a basin of gold. Steadily it flowed, like a Song of Desire and Voluptuousness, filling the hall with a scarlet inundation of light; heavy and numbing as the exhalation of soporific flowers.

But now it ascended to healthier altitudes like a Song of Victory and Exultation, direct and concise, in a blast of crystal trumpets, higher, slowly, in the manner of the eagle.

It rang forth agitated and sonorous as a gong, yet farther, solitary, inaccessible.

Then as if it had grown in magnitude by the ascent, it roared like a planet as it shoots into space to restore the equilibrium of the Universe, and suddenly, unexpectedly, in the fashion of the shooting star, it stopped short, carrying in its wake the exhausted assemblage of listeners to the floor as a mass of inert flesh.

One by one, as do the reeds after the violent gust of wind has blown over, they raised themselves, but not quite so erect as before. The musicians approached him humbly, and breaking their instruments, threw them at his feet, salaaming and promising never to play again from that day on.

Then Rajah Nila spoke: “Oh Asneha! Thou art indeed a great musician, and thou shalt be rewarded as befits a king; my riches, my kingdom, my daughter, are thine for thy choosing!”

“Oh, Rajah!” answered Asneha, “I am only a poor man and a musician by divine grace, but I am not a beggar, and have no desire for thy kingly gifts and thy fair daughter!”

The astonished Nila replied: “Assuredly thou art richer than am I, for thou art freed of all desires! But let me be a beggar for once, and entreat thee for another song!”

One day Pavana, the messenger of the gods, appeared to Asneha mounted on his white antelope, a flag in one hand, in the other an arrow, with a command from Indra to present himself immediately to the gods. So he mounted the antelope, and in less time than it takes to think it, he was carried to the eastern spur of the great Mount Meru, which is Swargra, in the City of Asmaravati, the heaven of Indra. All the gods had assembled there. Above all towered the great and mighty Indra, the Ruler of the gods and Lord of the Firmament, mounted on his elephant Airavata, at his right his dog Surana, and at his left his wife Indrani. Farther to the left was Surya, the god of the Sun, on his winged horse Tarkshya. Agni, the god of Fire, on a blue ram, and Varuna, the god of Waters, on his terrible Makara.

At Indra’s right was Yama, the god of Death, on a blue buffalo, with his twin sisters, the Yamunis, at their feet, the Sarameyas, their faithful watchdogs.

On Yama’s right was Kuvera, the god of Wealth, with his sister Kuveri, in their aerial car of jeweled lapis-lazuli.

Then Soma, the god of the Moon, on a white antelope, and Mangala, the god of War.

Also the goddess of Love, Radha, and all the lesser gods in magnificent array, in all their splendor, in all their beauty and power, watching silently Asneha.

Indra patted Airavata, and then spoke:

“Oh Asneha! Thou hast conquered the world with thy songs, and thou hast boasted to conquer the gods too! Now make thy boast good, or thou shalt go into the keeping of Yama!”

Asneha looked around, a little dazed by this gathering of Immortals; he then shook his long black hair, as if to conquer timidity, and then began his Golden Song.

Pure and exquisite as the breath of woman with teeth like pearls, as fragrant as the rose of Cashmere, it sang, now jocund, now sad, as the moods of love-sick Radha; plaintively yearning as an appeal to love in the stillness of the starless night; joyous and eager as the meeting of desirous lips; languishing as the woman’s heart fainting under the first kiss of the loved; it redoubled powerful, passionate as the march of the conquering male who has subdued. Abruptly it altered the rhythm as if awakening in readiness for battle, with the clamor of an army lusting for carnage, with the clank of swords, the discordant clash of shields, armors and spears, the dull thud of shattered bones and skulls, vehement imprecations, deep blasphemies, full of rancor, hatred and vengeance.

Then succeeded a silence, heavy, full of terrible signs, as of a silent flapping of wings, of a roaming of untold shadows, blacker than the night.

It repeated the death-song of the jackal and the hyena, with its harassing, fiendish chorus, pursuing in a mad dance with strange rhythms, the lively reel of the black scavengers on the silent and pale corpses. Then it died out, purling and gurgling as life ebbs out of a tortured body from a deep and crimson wound.

Pity and compassion returned to the song, gently, caressingly, as if nursing multiple wounds, infusing sympathy and life, like the wind, which laden with coolness and fragrance, sweeps over an arid and desolate valley.

It broke into a chant, strong and overwhelming, and so irresistible that it was as a strain of Perfect Joy; persevered tenfold, omnipotent, with a note so true, so deep and so infinite that it  was like a sip of the Amrita, blissful and oblivious.

All the gods encircled Asneha, instinctively, irresistibly, as the cobras surround the snake-charmer when he plays to them his captivating melody.

They stared at him fixedly as if to get the sound from its original source, and when he had ended they stood one instant stock-still, dumb, overflowing with admiration and ecstasy. Then they all pressed around him, speaking and shouting confusedly like ordinary mortals. But a hush fell over the assemblage as the great Indra slowly made his way to Asneha, and for a while stood absorbed and pensive, looking at the musician.

He then spoke with his clear, sonorous voice: “Asneha! Verily thou hast made thy daring boast good, therefore thou shalt become immortal too!

“I cannot offer thee what is earthly, for thou canst acquire all earthly things with thy song. But I have created a gem which comprises all the harmonies, all the melodies of music in color. It is ever changing, ever beautiful and imperishable as are your songs. Take it, and delight with it the mortals!”

To the kneeling Asneha he extended his palm, where scintillated, luminous and irradiating as a perfect song, the Opal.

Carlo de Fornaro (1871 - 1949)

Carlo de Fornaro described himself in his book, A Modern Purgatory, as "artist, writer, editor, revolutionary".

De Fornaro was an artist, writer, editor and revolutionary who lived in Mexico for three years where he became interested in politics and established a daily newspaper in Mexico City. On his return to New York in 1909 he published a book entitled 'Diaz, Czar of Mexico' criticising the regime of the general who served as Mexican President. The book created an immediate sensation with copies being smuggled over the border into Mexico, which ultimately led to de Fornaro being convicted for criminal libel. This work published in 1917 is a record of his experiences in the famous Tombs Prison in New York City, and in the New York City penitentiary on Blackwell's Island

PELE AND HIIAKA - A Myth From Hawaii - by Nathaniel Bright Emerson (INTRODUCTION)

According to Hawaiian myth, Pele, the volcanic fire-queen and the chief architect of the Hawaiian group, was a foreigner, born in the mystical land of Kuai-he-lani, a land not rooted and anchored to one spot, but that floated free like the Fata Morgana, and that showed itself at times to the eyes of mystics, poets and seers, a garden land, clad with the living glory of trees and habitations—a vision to warm the imagination. The region was known as Kahiki (Kukulu o Kahiki), a name that connotes Java and that is associated with the Asiatic cradle of the Polynesian race.

Pele’s mother was Haumea, a name that crops up as an ancestor in the hoary antiquity of the Hawaiian people, and she was reputed to be the daughter of Kane-hoa-lani.

Pele was ambitious from childhood and from the earliest age made it her practice to stick close to her mother’s fireplace in company with the fire keeper Lono-makua, ever watchful of his actions, studious of his methods, an apprenticeship well fitted to serve her in good stead such time as she was to become Hawaii’s volcanic fire-queen. This conduct drew upon Pele the suspicion and illwill of her elder sister Na-maka-o-ka-ha’i, a sea-goddess, who, fathoming the latent ambition of Pele, could not fail to perceive that its attainment would result in great commotion and disturbance in their homeland.

Her fears and prognostications proved true. Namaka, returning from one of her expeditions across the sea, found that Pele, taking advantage of her absence, had erupted a fiery deluge and smothered a portion of the homeland with aä.

It would have gone hard with Pele; but mother Haumea bade her take refuge in the fold (pola) of Ka-moho-alii’s malo. Now this elder brother of Pele was a deity of great power and authority, a terrible character, hedged about with tabus that restricted and made difficult the approach of his enemies. Such a refuge could only be temporary, and safety was to be assured only by Pele’s removal from her home in the South land, and that meant flight. It was accomplished in the famed mythical canoe Honua-i-a-kea.

The company was a distinguished one, including such godlike beings as Ka-moho-alii, Kane-apua, Kane-milo-hai and many other relations of Pele, the youngest, but not the least important, of whom was the girl Hiiaka, destined to be the heroine of the story here unfolded and of whom it was said that she was born into the world as a clot of blood out of the posterior fontanelle (nunoi) of her mother Haumea, the other sisters having been delivered through the natural passage.

The sailing course taken by Pele’s company brought them to some point northwest of Hawaii, along that line of islets, reefs, and shoals which tail off from Hawaii as does the train of a comet from its nucleus. At Moku-papápa Pele located her brother Kane-milo-hai, as if to hold the place for her or to build it up into fitness for human residence, for it was little more than a reef. Her next stop was at the little rock of Nihoa that lifts its head some eight hundred feet above the ocean. Here she made trial with the divining rod Paoa, but the result being unfavorable, she passed on to the insignificant islet of Lehua which clings like a limpet to the flank of Niihau. In spite of its smallness and unfitness for residence, Pele was moved to crown the rock with a wreath of kau-no’a, while Hiiaka contributed a chaplet of lehua which she took from her own neck, thus christening it for all time. The poet details the itinerary of the voyage in the following graphic lines:

Ke Kaao a Pele i Haawi ia Ka-moho-alii i ka Haalele ana ia Kahiki

Ku makou e hele me ku’u mau poki’i aloha,

Ka aina a makou i ike ole ai malalo aku nei,

A’e makou me ku’u poki’i, kau i ka wa’a;

No’iau ka hoe a Ka-moho-alii;

A’ea’e, kau i ka nalu -

He nalu haki kakala,

He nalu e imi ana i ka aina e hiki aku ai.

O Nihoa ka aina a makou i pae mua aku ai:

Lele a’e nei makou, kau i uka o Nihoa.

O ka hana no a ko’u poki’i, a Kane-apua,

O ka hooili i ka ihu o ka wa’a a nou i ke kai:

Waiho anei o Ka-moho-alii ia Kane-apua i uka o Nihoa.

No’iau ka hoe a Ka-moho-alii

A pae i ka aina i kapa ia o Lehua.

TRANSLATION

Pele’s Account to Ka-moho-alii of the Departure from Kahiki

We stood to sail with my kindred beloved

To an unknown land below the horizon;

We boarded, my kinsmen and I, our craft,

Our pilot well skilled, Ka-moho-alii.

Our craft o’ermounted and mastered the waves;

The sea was rough and choppy, but the waves

Bore us surely on to our destined shore

The rock Nihoa, the first land we touched;

Gladly we landed and climbed up its cliffs.

Fault of the youngster, Kane-apua,

He loaded the bow till it ducked in the waves;

Ka-moho-alii marooned the lad,

Left the boy on the islet Nihoa

And, pilot well skilled, he sailed away

Till we found the land we christened Lehua.

When they had crowned the desolate rock with song and wreath, Ka-moho-alii would have steered for Niihau, but Pele, in a spasm of tenderness that smiles like an oasis in her life, exclaimed, “How I pity our little brother who journeyed with us till now!” At this Ka-moho-alii turned the prow of the canoe in the direction of Nihoa and they rescued Kane-apua from his seagirt prison. Let the poet tell the story:

Hui iho nei ka wa’a a Ka-moho-alii

E kii ana i ko lakou pokii, ia Kane-apua, i Nihoa.

Pili aku nei ka wa’a o Ka-moho-alii i uka nei o Nihoa,

Kahea aku nei i ko lakou pokii, ia Kane-apua,

E kau aku ma ka pola o ka wa’a.

Hui iho nei ka ihu o ka wa’a o Ka-moho-alii

He wa’a e holo ana i Niihau,

Kau aku nei o Ka-moho-alii i ka laau, he paoa,

E imi ana i ko lakou aina e noho ai, o Kauai:

Aole na’e i loa’a.

Kau mai la o Ka-moho-alii i ka laau, he paoa;

O Ahu ka aina.

Ia ka ana iho nei o lakou i Alia-pa’akai,

Aole na’e he aina.

TRANSLATION

Ka-moho-alii turned his canoe

To rescue lad Kane from Nihoa.

Anon the craft lies off Nihoa’s coast;

They shout to the lad, to Kane-apua,

Come aboard, rest with us on the pola.

Ka-moho-alii turns now his prow,

He will steer for the fertile Niihau.

He sets out the wizard staff Paoa,

To test if Kauai’s to be their home;

But they found it not there.

Once more the captain sails on with the rod,

To try if Oahu’s the wished for land:

They thrust in the staff at Salt Lake Crater,

But that proved not the land of their promise.

Arrived at Oahu, Ka-moho-alii, who still had Pele in his keeping, left the canoe in charge of Holoholo-kai and, with the rest of the party, continued the journey by land. The witchery of the Paoa was appealed to from time to time, as at Alia-pa’akai, Puowaena (Punchbowl Hill), Leahi (Diamond Head), and lastly at Makapu’u Point, but nowhere with a satisfactory response. (The words of Pele in the second verse of the kaao next to be given lead one to infer that she must for a time have entertained the thought that they had found the desired haven at Pele-ula, a small land-division within the limits of the present city of Honolulu.) Let the poet tell the story:

Ke ku nei makou e imi kahi e noho ai

A loa’a ma Pele-ula:

O Kapo-ula-kina’u ka wahine;

A loa’a i ka lae kapu o Maka-pu’u.

Ilaila pau ke kuleana;

Imi ia Kane-hoa-lani,

A loa’a i ka lae o Maka-hana-loa.

He loa ka uka o Puna:

Elua kaua i ke kapa hookahi.

Akahi au a ike - haupu mau, walohia wale:

E Kane-hoa-lani, e-e!

E Kane-hoa-lani, e-e!

Aloha kaua!

Kau ka hokú hookahi, hele i ke ala loa!

Aloha kama kuku kapa a ka wahine!

He wahine lohiau, naná i ka makani;

He makani lohiau, haupu mai oloko!

TRANSLATION

We went to seek for a biding place,

And found it, we thought, in Pele-ula

Dame Kapo she of the red-pied robe

Found it in the sacred cape, Maka-pu’u;

The limit that of our journey by land.

We looked then for Kane-hoa-lani

And found him at Maka-hana-loa.

Far away are the uplands of Puna;

One girdle still serves for you and for me.

Never till now such yearning, such sadness !

Where art thou, Kane-hoa-lani ?

O Father Kane, where art thou ?

Hail to thee, O Father, and hail to me !

When rose the pilot-star we sailed away.

Hail, girl who beats out tapa for women

The home-coming wife who watches the wind,

The haunting wind that searches the house !

The survey of Oahu completed, and Ka-moho-alii having resumed command of the canoe, Pele uttered her farewell and they voyaged on to the cluster of islands of which Maui is the center:

Aloha, Oahu, e-e!

E huli ana makou i ka aina mamua aku,

Kahi a makou e noho ai.

TRANSLATION

Farewell to thee, Oahu!

We press on to lands beyond,

In search of a homing place.

Repeated trial with the divining rod, Paoa, made on the western part of Maui as well as on the adjoining islands of Molokai and Lanai proving unsatisfactory, Pele moved on to the exploration of the noble form of Hale-a-ka-la that domes East Maui, with fine hope and promise of success. But here again she was dissatisfied with the result. She had not yet delivered herself from the necessity of protection by her kinsman, Ka-moho-alii: “One girdle yet serves for you and for me,” was the note that still rang out as a confession of dependence, in her song.

While Pele was engaged in her operations in the crater of Hale-a-ka-la, her inveterate enemy Na-maka-o-ka-ha’i, who had trailed her all the way from Kahiki with the persistency of a sea-wolf, appeared in the offing, accompanied by a sea-dragon named Ha-ui.

The story relates that, as Na-maka-o-ka-ha’i passed the sand-spit of Moku-papápa, Kane-milo-hai, who, it will be remembered, had been left there in charge as the agent of Pele, hailed her with the question: “Where are you going so fast?”

“To destroy my enemy, to destroy Pele,” was her answer.

“Return to Kahiki, lest you yourself be destroyed,” was the advice of Kane-milo-hai.

Pele, accepting the gage thrown down by Na-maka-o-ka-ha’i, with the reluctant consent of her guardian Ka-moho-alii, went into battle single-handed. The contest was terrific. The sea-monster, aided by her dragon consort, was seemingly victorious. Dismembered parts of Pele’s body were cast up at Kahiki-nui, where they are still pointed out as the bones of Pele (na iwi o Pele.) (She was only bruised). Ka-moho-alii was dismayed thinking Pele to have been destroyed; but, looking across the Ale-nui-haha channel, he saw the spirit-form of Pele flaming in the heavens above the summits of Mauna-loa and Mauna-kea. As for Na-maka-o-ka-ha’i, she retired from the battle exultant, thinking that her enemy Pele was done for: but when she reported her victory to Kane-milo-hai, that friend of Pele pointed to the spirit body of Pele glowing in the heavens as proof that she was mistaken. Namaka was enraged at the sight and would have turned back to renew the conflict, but Kane-milo-hai dissuaded her from this foolhardy undertaking, saying, “She is invincible; she has become a spirit.”

The search for a home-site still went on. Even Hale-a-ka-la was not found to be acceptable to Pele’s fastidious taste. According to one account it proved to be so large that Pele found herself unable to keep it warm. Pele, a goddess now, accordingly bade adieu to Maui and its clustering isles and moved on to Hawaii.

He Kaao na Pele, i Haalele ai ia Maui

Aloha o Maui, aloha, e!

Aloha o Moloka’i, aloha, e!

Aloha o Lana’i, aloha, e!

Aloha o Kaho’olawe, aloha, e!

Ku makou e hele, e!

O Hawaii ka ka aina

A makou e noho ai a mau loa aku;

Ke ala ho’i a makou i hiki mai ai,

He ala paoa ole ko Ka-moho-alii,

Ko Pele, ko Kane-milo-hai, ko Kane-apua,

Ko Hiiaka - ka no’iau - i ka poli o Pele,

I hiki mai ai.

TRANSLATION

Pele’s Farewell to Maui

Farewell to thee, Maui, farewell!

Farewell to thee, Moloka’i, farewell!

Farewell to thee, Lana’i, farewell!

Farewell to thee, Kaho’olawe, farewell!

We stand all girded for travel:

Hawaii, it seems, is the land

On which we shall dwell evermore.

The route by which we came hither

Touched lands not the choice of Paoa;

’Twas the route of Ka-moho-alii,

Of Pele and Kane-milo-hai,

Route traveled by Kane-apua, and by

Hiiaka, the wise, the darling of Pele.

Pele and her company landed on Hawaii at Pua-kó, a desolate spot between Kawaihae and Kailua. Thence they journeyed inland until they came to a place which they named Moku-aweo-weo - not the site of the present crater of that name, but, situated where yawns the vast caldera of Kilauea. It was at the suggestion of Ku-moku-halii and Keawe-nui-kau of Hilo that the name was conferred. They also gave the name Mauna-loa to the mountain mass that faced them on the west, “because,” said they, “our journey was long.”

Night fell and they slept. In the morning, when the elepaio uttered its note, they rose and used the Paoa staff. The omens were favorable, and Pele decided that this was the place for her to establish a permanent home.

The people immediately began to set out many plants valuable for food; among them a variety of kalo called aweü, well suited for upland growth; the ulu (bread-fruit); the maiä (banana); the pala-á (an edible fern); the awa (Piper methysticum) and other useful plants.

The land on the Hilo side of Kilauea, being in the rain belt, is fertile and well fitted for tillage. The statement, however, that Kilauea, or its vicinity, became the place of settlement for any considerable number of people cannot be taken literally. The climatic conditions about Kilauea are too harsh and untropical to allow either the people or the food plants of Polynesia to feel at home in it. The probability is that instead of being gathered about Kilauea, they made their homes in the fat lands of lower Puna or Hilo.

Pele, on her human side at least, was dependent for support and physical comfort upon the fruits of the earth and the climatic conditions that made up her environment. Yet with all this, in the narrative that follows her relations to humanity are of that exceptional character that straddle, as it were, that border line which separates the human from the superhuman, but for the most part occupy the region to the other side of that line, the region into which if men and women of this work-a-day world pass they find themselves uncertain whether the beings with whom they converse are bodied like themselves or made up of some insubstantial essence and liable to dissolve and vanish at the touch.

Picture of Pele and Hi'iaka 

Nathaniel Bright Emerson (July 1, 1839 Waialua, Oahu – July 16, 1915, at sea) was a medical physician and author of Hawaiian mythology.