Page:Maori Division of Time.djvu/9

Rh dials of our timepieces. Twelve was a highly favoured number in Babylonia, as it also was with Polynesians, including our Maori folk. That predilection emanated from the study of astronomy and the division of the year into twelve months. The Egyptian year was also divided into twelve months of thirty days each, to which were added five extra days set apart for a ceremonial agricultural festival. Curiously enough, this usage reappears at the Hawaiian Isles in the northern Pacific, where the five intercalated days were devoted to exactly the same purpose.

Inasmuch as the Polynesian division of time was based on the movements of the moon, it behoves us to pay some little attention to that luminary, one of the leading members of what the Maori calls the Whanau Marama, or Children of Light. In some ancient mythological systems pertaining to barbaric folk the moon is masculine, on account of its supposed superior importance, while the sun-god is feminine. This was the case among the Accadians. Among the more highly civilized Semites of a later period the sexes of these orbs, or their personified forms, were reversed. Now, in Polynesian mythology we encounter the moon in both characters, as both male and female. This may represent racial admixture in the past, a commingling of two mythological systems. In Maori folk-tales the moon is distinctly alluded to as a male, as the husband of all women; but the moon has two personified forms, one of which is female and the other male. These two personified forms are also known far and wide across Polynesia.

The female personified form of the moon in New Zealand and Polynesia is known as Hina, Sina, and Ina, in sympathy with well-known letter-changes. The Maori replaces the s with h. The name of Sina carries the mind back to Sin; the moon-god of far Babylonia. The Maori has two forms of the name: Hina-keha (Pale Hina) is applied to the moon when bright, while Hina-uri (Dark Hina) describes it during the hinapouri or dark nights of the moon. She also appears as Hina-te-iwaiwa and Hine-te-iwaiwa, who is the female deity presiding over childbirth, the art of weaving, and women in general. The moon-goddess of ancient Egypt occupied exactly the same position.

In the name of the 28th night of the lunar month, Orongonui, we find the name of the male personified form of the moon. In the name of the 27th night, Otane, we find that of the personification of the sun. Rongo of the Maori is known as Rongo, Rono, Ro'o, Longo, Lono, and Ono in the various groups of Polynesia. Judge Fenton has stated in his Suggestions for a History of the Maori People that Rono was a Babylonian name for the moon; this has not been encountered elsewhere by the present writer. We do know that in that far region the moon was the measurer of time, and its personified form the god of agriculture. This position of the moon was a far-spread usage, and it reappears in New Zealand. The superior importance of the moon is a belief of which we see survivals in Maori lore, wherein Rongo appears as the elder brother of Tane. Again, in the peculiar double title of Rongo-ma-Tane, employed both here and in Polynesia, we note that the name of the personified form of the moon precedes that of the sun. A very brief study of Maori