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Poukai
The pouakai or poukai is a monstrous bird in Māori mythology. Mythologies In some of these legends, pouakai kill and eat humans. The myth may refer to the real but now extinct Haast's eagle: the largest known eagle species, which was able to kill adult moa weighing up to , and which had the capability to kill even an adult human. History Haast's eagles, which only lived in the east and northwest of New Zealand's South Island, did not become extinct until around two hundred years after the arrival of Māori. Eagles are depicted in early rock-shelter paintings in South Canterbury. Large amounts of the eagle's lowland habitat had been destroyed by burning by A.D. 1350, and it was driven extinct by overhunting, both directly (Haast's eagle bones have been found in Māori archaeological sites) and indirectly: its main prey species, nine species of moa and other large birds such as adzebills, flightless ducks, and flightless geese, were hunted to extinction at the same time. See als ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Haast's Eagle
Haast's eagle (''Hieraaetus moorei'') is an extinct species of eagle that once lived in the South Island of New Zealand, commonly accepted to be the pouakai of Māori legend.Giant eagle (''Aquila moorei''), Haast's eagle, or Pouakai Museum of New Zealand: Te Papa Tongarewa. Retrieved 27 October 2010. It was the largest eagle known to have existed, with an estimated weight of , compared to the . Its massive size is explained as an evolutionary response to the size of its prey, the flightless , the largest of w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hakawai (mythology)
Hakawai, also Hokioi in the North Island, was to the New Zealand Māori people, a mythological bird that was sometimes heard but not usually seen. It is now associated with the nocturnal aerial displays made by ''Coenocorypha'' snipe. Mythology In Māori mythology the Hakawai was one of eleven tapu (sacred) birds of Raka-maomao, a god of wind. The Hakawai lived in the heavens and only descended to the earth at night. It was considered to be a gigantic bird of prey and was described (as the Hokioi) by a Ngāti Apa chief, to the Governor of New Zealand Sir George Grey, as: Hearing the Hakawai was considered to be a bad omen, traditionally presaging war. Ornithologists in New Zealand have wondered whether the myth related to a real bird, whether extinct or still living, with some claiming that the myth was inspired by the now extinct Haast's eagle (''Hieraaetus moorei''). Although mention of the Hakawai occurred in Māori mythology throughout New Zealand, since European set ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Folk Memory
Folk memory, also known as folklore or myths, refers to past events that have been passed orally from generation to generation. The events described by the memories may date back hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of years and often have a local significance. They may explain physical features in the local environment, provide reasons for cultural traditions or give etymologies for the names of local places. Purported folk memories Events * Landing at Cape York by Willem Janszoon, the first European to see the coast of Australia, 1606. * Myths from Native American and First nations groups about the 1700 Cascadia earthquake.Ruth S. Ludwin, Robert Dennis, Deborah Carver, Alan D. McMillan, Robert Losey, John Clague, Chris Jonientz-Trisler, Janine Bowechop, Jacilee Wray and Karen James"Dating the 1700 Cascadia Earthquake: Great Coastal Earthquakes in Native Stories". ''Seismological Research Letters'' (Volume 76, Number 2), March/April 2005. * The Tel Dan Stele (c. 870-75 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Māori Mythology
Māori mythology and Māori traditions are two major categories into which the remote oral history of New Zealand's Māori may be divided. Māori myths concern fantastic tales relating to the origins of what was the observable world for the pre-European Māori, often involving gods and demigods. Māori tradition concerns more folkloric legends often involving historical or semi-historical forebears. Both categories merge in to explain the overall origin of the Māori and their connections to the world which they lived in. Māori had yet to invent a writing system before European contact, beginning in 1769, so they had no method to permanently record their histories, traditions, or mythologies. They relied on oral retellings memorised from generation to generation. The three forms of expression prominent in Māori and Polynesian oral literature are genealogical recital, poetry, and narrative prose. Experts in these subjects were broadly known as . The rituals, beliefs, and ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Birds Of Prey
Birds of prey or predatory birds, also known as raptors, are hypercarnivorous bird species that actively hunt and feed on other vertebrates (mainly mammals, reptiles and other smaller birds). In addition to speed and strength, these predators have keen eyesight for detecting prey from a distance or during flight, strong feet with sharp talons for grasping or killing prey, and powerful, curved beaks for tearing off flesh. Although predatory birds primarily hunt live prey, many species (such as fish eagles, vultures and condors) also scavenge and eat carrion. Although the term "bird of prey" could theoretically be taken to include all birds that actively hunt and eat other animals, ornithologists typically use the narrower definition followed in this page, excluding both piscivorous predators such as storks, herons, gulls, skuas, penguins and kingfishers, as well as primarily insectivorous birds such as passerine birds (e.g. shrikes) and birds like nightjars and frogmouth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eagles
Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just 14 species can be found—2 in North America, 9 in Central and South America, and 3 in Australia. Eagles are not a natural group but denote essentially any kind of bird of prey large enough to hunt sizeable (about 50 cm long or more overall) vertebrates. Description Eagles are large, powerfully-built birds of prey, with heavy heads and beaks. Even the smallest eagles, such as the booted eagle (''Aquila pennata''), which is comparable in size to a common buzzard (''Buteo buteo'') or red-tailed hawk (''B. jamaicensis''), have relatively longer and more evenly broad wings, and more direct, faster flight – despite the reduced size of aerodynamic feathers. Most eagles are larger than any other raptors apart from some vultures. The smalles ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island country by area, covering . New Zealand is about east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and south of the islands of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. The country's varied topography and sharp mountain peaks, including the Southern Alps, owe much to tectonic uplift and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, and its most populous city is Auckland. The islands of New Zealand were the last large habitable land to be settled by humans. Between about 1280 and 1350, Polynesians began to settle in the islands and then developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman became the first European to sight and record New Zealand. In 1840, representatives of the United Kingdom and Māori chiefs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Island
The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman Sea, and to the south and east by the Pacific Ocean. The South Island covers , making it the world's 12th-largest island. At low altitude, it has an oceanic climate. The South Island is shaped by the Southern Alps which run along it from north to south. They include New Zealand's highest peak, Aoraki / Mount Cook at . The high Kaikōura Ranges lie to the northeast. The east side of the island is home to the Canterbury Plains while the West Coast is famous for its rough coastlines such as Fiordland, a very high proportion of native bush and national parks, and the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers. The main centres are Christchurch and Dunedin. The economy relies on agriculture and fishing, tourism, and general manufacturing and services. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Māori People
The Māori (, ) are the indigenous Polynesian people of mainland New Zealand (). Māori originated with settlers from East Polynesia, who arrived in New Zealand in several waves of canoe voyages between roughly 1320 and 1350. Over several centuries in isolation, these settlers developed their own distinctive culture, whose language, mythology, crafts, and performing arts evolved independently from those of other eastern Polynesian cultures. Some early Māori moved to the Chatham Islands, where their descendants became New Zealand's other indigenous Polynesian ethnic group, the Moriori. Initial contact between Māori and Europeans, starting in the 18th century, ranged from beneficial trade to lethal violence; Māori actively adopted many technologies from the newcomers. With the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, the two cultures coexisted for a generation. Rising tensions over disputed land sales led to conflict in the 1860s, and massive land confiscations, to which ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Canterbury
South Canterbury is the area of the Canterbury Region of the South Island of New Zealand bounded by the Rangitata River in the north and the Waitaki River (the border with the Otago Region) to the south. The Pacific Ocean and ridge of the Southern Alps / Kā Tiritiri o te Moana form natural boundaries to the east and west respectively. Though the exact boundaries of the region have never been formalised, the term is used for a variety of government agencies (e.g., the South Canterbury District Health Board) and other entities (such as the South Canterbury provincial rugby team). It is one of four traditional sub-regions of Canterbury, along with Mid Canterbury, North Canterbury, and Christchurch city. Geography South Canterbury's geography covers a wide range of different terrains, from alpine slopes across the glacier carved lakes Tekapo and Pukaki and high country basin of the Mackenzie Country to undulating lowland hills and the Canterbury Plains. Sheep farming is an import ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adzebill
The adzebills, genus ''Aptornis'', were two closely related bird species, the North Island adzebill, (''Aptornis otidiformis''), and the South Island adzebill, (''Aptornis defossor''), of the extinct family Aptornithidae. The family was endemic to New Zealand. A fossil species, (''Aptornis proasciarostratus''), is known from the Miocene Saint Bathans fauna. Taxonomy They have been placed in the Gruiformes but this is not entirely certain. It was also proposed to ally them with the Galloanserae. Studies of morphology and DNA sequences place them variously close to and far off from the kagu of New Caledonia, as well as the trumpeters. However, on first discovery of fossils, they were mistaken for ratites, specifically small moa. Its morphological closeness to the kagu may be the result of convergent evolution, although New Zealand's proximity to New Caledonia and shared biological affinities (the two islands are part of the same microcontinent) has led some researchers to suggest ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Finsch's Duck
Finsch's duck (''Chenonetta finschi'') was a large terrestrial species of duck formerly endemic to New Zealand. The species was possibly once the most common duck in New Zealand, a supposition based on the frequency of its fossils in bone deposits. Taxonomy The species was originally considered to be in its own genus, ''Euryanas'', but is now known to be closely related to the maned duck and recently derived from that species. Description The Finsch's duck was much larger than the maned duck, probably weighing twice as much (around ) and having larger legs. The wings were much reduced however, and it seems that flight was lost relatively quickly after the species arrived in New Zealand. Behaviour and ecology Little is known about the biology of the species, but its remains have been found widely in New Zealand and it does not seem to have been tied to water like many other duck species. This species was present in forests, shrublands and temperate grasslands. It is likely ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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