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Pōmare I (c. 1753 – September 3, 1803) (fully in old orthography: Tu-nui-ea-i-te-atua-i-Tarahoi Vaira'atoa Taina Pōmare I; also known as Tu or Tinah or Outu, or more formally as Tu-nui-e-a'a-i-te-atua) was the unifier and first
king of Tahiti The Kingdom of Tahiti was a monarchy founded by paramount chief Pōmare I, who, with the aid of British missionaries and traders, and European weaponry, unified the islands of Tahiti, Moʻorea, Teti‘aroa, and Mehetia. The kingdom eventually ...
and founder of the Pōmare dynasty and the Kingdom of Tahiti between 1788 and 1791. He abdicated in 1791 but remained in power as the guardian regent during the minority of his successor
Pōmare II Pōmare II (c. 1782 – December 7, 1821) (fully Tu Tunuieaiteatua Pōmare II or in modern orthography Tū Tū-nui-ʻēʻa-i-te-atua Pōmare II; historically misspelled as Tu Tunuiea'aite-a-tua), was the second king of Tahiti between 1782 and 182 ...
from 1791 until 1803. He is best known in the western world for being the ruler of Tahiti during the mutiny on the ''Bounty'' in 1789.


Name

''Outu'' is the phonetic English rendering of ''O Tū'', Tū being the name, o the nominal predicate meaning ''that is''. Older literature writes his family name as Tunuieaiteatua, which leaves incertainties about the proper pronunciation as Tahitian usually did (and does) not write macrons and glottals. Barring this incertainty, in the current proper orthography would be Tū-nui-ēa-i-te-atua meaning Great-Tū,-road-to-the-god. Tū (standing straight up) was a major Tahitian god. Ariitaimai claims that this Tū is a contraction of ''atua'' (god), but that is unlikely. The name Pōmare was adopted later. Pō-mare means "night cougher", a nickname he took, as was common in that time, in honor of his daughter Princess Teri’inavahoroa who died from tuberculosis in 1792.


Biography

Tu was the son of Teu, chief of Pare-'Arue, and his wife, Tetupaia-i-Hauiri (Tetupaia). Tetupaia was the granddaughter of Tamatoa II of Raiatea. Tu's great uncle was Tutaha, who acted as his regent. Born at Pare, ca. 1753, he initially reigned under the regency of his father and succeeded on the death of his father as Arii-rahi of Porionuu on November 23, 1802. Pōmare further succeeded in uniting the different chiefdoms of Tahiti into a single kingdom, composed of the islands of Tahiti itself,
Moorea Moorea ( or ; Tahitian: ), also spelled Moorea, is a volcanic island in French Polynesia. It is one of the Windward Islands, a group that is part of the Society Islands, northwest of Tahiti. The name comes from the Tahitian word , meaning " ...
,
Mehetia Meheti'a or Me'eti'a is a volcanic island in the Windward Islands, in the east of the Society Islands in French Polynesia. This island is a very young active stratovolcano east of the Taiarapu Peninsula of Tahiti. It belongs to the Teahiti'a-M ...
, and the Tetiaroa group. He thus became the first king of unified Tahiti in 1788. One year into his reign as Tahiti's king, Pōmare hosted the crew of HMS ''Bounty'' who had visited Tahiti to collect
breadfruit Breadfruit (''Artocarpus altilis'') is a species of flowering tree in the mulberry and jackfruit family (Moraceae) believed to be a domesticated descendant of ''Artocarpus camansi'' originating in New Guinea, the Maluku Islands, and the Philippi ...
plants for transportation to the West Indies. The subsequent mutiny on the ''Bounty'' caused the mutineers to return briefly to Tahiti, where they were under Pōmare's protection, until leaving the island and eventually relocating to Pitcairn. A small number of mutineers stayed behind and were later located by HMS ''Pandora'', to which Pōmare accepted British authority and allowed the mutineers to be arrested and taken back to England for trial. Pōmare's service as the first king of unified Tahiti ended when he abdicated in 1791. He was succeeded by Tū Tūnuiʻēʻaiteatua
Pōmare II Pōmare II (c. 1782 – December 7, 1821) (fully Tu Tunuieaiteatua Pōmare II or in modern orthography Tū Tū-nui-ʻēʻa-i-te-atua Pōmare II; historically misspelled as Tu Tunuiea'aite-a-tua), was the second king of Tahiti between 1782 and 182 ...
, who reigned from 1791 until 1821: however, though no longer monarch, Pomare remained regent of Tahiti during the minority of Pomare II, from 1791 until 1803. In 1792, HMS ''Providence'' visited Tahiti and Pōmare was reunited with William Bligh, the victim of mutiny four years earlier. Bligh interviewed Pōmare regarding the mutineers and subsequently wrote an account of where he suspected the mutineers may have escaped to following their departure from Tahiti.Tobin, George, "Captain Bligh's Second Chance: An Eyewitness Account of His Return to the South Seas", Naval Institute Press (April 2, 2007) Pōmare married 4 times and had three sons and three daughters. He died from thrombosis.


Dramatic portrayals

Due to Pōmare's role as King of Tahiti during the Mutiny on the Bounty, the character has subsequently been portrayed in every dramatic film about the incident since 1935. In both the original film, as well as the remake from 1962, he is known as "Chief Hitihiti" and played respectively by Bill Bambridge and Matahiariʻi Tama. In the 1984 film '' The Bounty'' he is known as "King Tynah" and is portrayed by New Zealand actor Wi Kuki Kaa. Historically, Tynah may have been a different individual from Pōmare, as he is mentioned in the Bounty log as a "Paramount Chief", a title separate from monarch.


Ancestry


References

*
Teuira Henry Teuira Henry (24/27 January 1847 – 23 January 1915) was a British Tahitian scholar, ethnologist, folklorist, linguist, historian and educator. She worked to reconstruct a lost manuscript on the history of Tahiti written by her grandfather, Engli ...
; Ancient Tahiti / Tahiti aux temps anciens *
Henry Adams Henry Brooks Adams (February 16, 1838 – March 27, 1918) was an American historian and a member of the Adams political family, descended from two U.S. Presidents. As a young Harvard graduate, he served as secretary to his father, Charles Fra ...
; Memoirs of Arii Taimai / Mémoires d'Arii Taimai {{DEFAULTSORT:Pomare 1 Pōmare dynasty Tahitian monarchs 1753 births 1803 deaths 18th-century monarchs in Oceania