The bird-hunters of ancient Hawaii

Author:

Emerson, N.B.

Title:

The bird-hunters of ancient Hawaii

Periodical:

Hawaiian Almanac and Annual for 1895

Year:

1984

Pages:

p.101-111

Subject:

Birds Hawaii Hunting Hawaiians social life and customs

Summary:

When one considers the immense number of feathers required for the make-up of an ahuula, a mahiole, a lei, or a kahili, and bears in mind the diminutive size of Hawaii's avifauna and the fact that each bird supplied but a small number of tiny feathers suitable for the purpose, it is easy to believe the statement that "the patience and skill of generations were called into requisition to furnish the raw material for the robing, pluming and caparisoning of a court in ancient Hawaii". The kings of Hawaii constantly had men in their service who followed the vocation of bird catching, called kia-manu. The art of capturing the birds that furnished the plumage was a business by itself, as distinct from that of the artists who manipulated them into tasteful shapes. Bird catching was a most exacting profession, demanding of the hunter a mastery of bird-craft and of wood-craft attainable only by him who would retire from the habitations of men and make his home for long periods in the wooded solitudes of the interior. The feathers of Hawaiian plumage birds were divided into several classes by color: Pure yellow (taken from the o-o or the mamo), red (taken from the iiwi, the akakani, or the ula-ai-hawane), green (taken from the o-u or the amakihi) and black (obtained from the o-o, mamo, iiwi, and akakani). In addition, the koae furnished two long feathers from its tail, used in making kahilis. The methods used by one hunter in the capture of the birds differed from those used by another. They also varied somewhat, in different districts, on the different islands, at different seasons of the year and even in the different hours of the day but like every other serious enterprise of ancient Hawaii, a service of prayer and an offering to the gods was always first performed before the start of any bird-hunting campaign. However, the days of the bird catchers of ancient Hawaii are over. Their place has been taken by those who know not Kuhuluhulumanu and the other gods of the craft. In their hands is the deadly shot-gun. As a result, the birds that were once the pride of Hawaii's woods have to contend for their existence under conditions imposed by the marauding mynah and thievish sparrow, that seem to have been imported for their destruction.

URL:

http://hdl.handle.net/10524/660

Collection:

Monographs