King Tawhiao & The Tiwaiwaka

Excerpt from the Tiwaiwaka Book by Rob McGowan:

The context is Rewi Maniapoto and the Kiingitanga leaders had crossed the Aukati line for the first time. In the references, the author states this was a kōrero given to her in 1983 by Henare Tuwhangai.

“In the main street of the frontier town Alexandra (Pirongia), Tawhiao, Manuhiri, and their followers laid down their guns at the feet of Mair. This was, said Tawhiao, the end of the war between them. In the oral traditions it is told how he placed on the stack of guns, as an offering, pigeons, kaka, tui, and kokako. The joyful fantail, however, he kept for himself, a bird of peace for the future days when war would again come to the world. For Tawhiao crossing the border in 1881 was his return home.”

Maybe the time of war that Tawhiao predicted could be the wars that will inevitably happen when the earth’s resources are depleted so much that people once again have to fight to get what they need to survive?

Cf. “An illustrated History of New Zealand”. Judith Binney, Judith Bassett, Erik Olsen. Chapter 7, Judith Binney: “The Native Land Court and the Maori communities, 1865-1890”.
Page 154.Allen and Urwin 1990. ISBN 0 04 614010 1.