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Sāngone ( Samoan: , 'tribe', Fijian: , 'child'), was the name of a
turtle Turtles are an order of reptiles known as Testudines, characterized by a special shell developed mainly from their ribs. Modern turtles are divided into two major groups, the Pleurodira (side necked turtles) and Cryptodira (hidden necked tu ...
from divine origin and featuring in
Tonga Tonga (, ; ), officially the Kingdom of Tonga ( to, Puleʻanga Fakatuʻi ʻo Tonga), is a Polynesian country and archipelago. The country has 171 islands – of which 45 are inhabited. Its total surface area is about , scattered over in ...
n myths about the
Tui Tonga Tui or TUI may refer to: Places * Tui, Pontevedra, Spain * Tui, Iran, West Azerbaijan Province, Iran * Tui, North Khorasan, North Khorasan Province, Iran * Tui Province, Burkina Faso * Tuis District, Costa Rica * Tui railway station, New Zealand ...
king named Tuitātui in the beginning of the 12th century AD. Part of the history features prominently in a famous
lakalaka The lakalaka (walking briskly) is a Tongan group dance where the performers are largely standing still and make gestures with their arms only. It is considered as the national dance of Tonga and part of the intangible human heritage. It is the id ...
written by queen Sālote somewhere around 1940, when the shell, claimed to be the original one from Sāngone herself, was transferred to the
Tupou College Tupou College is a Methodist boys' secondary boarding school in Toloa on the island of Tongatapu, Tonga. It is located on the Eastern District of Tongatapu near the village of Malapo. The school is owned by the Free Weslyan Church of Tonga. Estab ...
museum.


Preamble


Version 1

The beautiful goddess Hinahengi from
Pulotu Pulotu is the resting place of those passed on in the Polynesian narrative of Tonga and Samoa, the world of darkness "lalo fonua" (as opposed to the human world of light). Tonga In the Tongan narrative, Pulotu is presided over by Havea Hikule ...
came to Mokotuu, a tract near Longoteme on
Tongatapu Tongatapu is the main island of Tonga and the site of its capital, Nukualofa. It is located in Tonga's southern island group, to which it gives its name, and is the country's most populous island, with 74,611 residents (2016), 70.5% of the nation ...
, to wash her hair with the clay and then to dry it. She fell asleep. Then a Samoan named Lekapai came along, saw her, and tied her hair to the trees. He woke her up, but she could not get up because her head was immovable in the bonds. Hina begged to be liberated, and Lekapai agreed if she would become his wife. They were married and lived together for a very long time.


Version 2

One day a great storm destroyed the plantation of Lekapai in Samoa. Lekapai swore revenge on the god of the winds and set out in his canoe. He arrived at an island, but there was no opening in the reef. The boat was turned over, but Lekapai made it alive to the shore. He went inland and came at a house where a beautiful girl was standing. She turned out to be the daughter of the wind god, who was sleeping at that moment. When the god slept it was calm; when he awoke there were storms. The girl told Lekapai to tiptoe to her sleeping father, to take a lock of his hair and to tie it to a big tree, then another lock to another tree, and so on. Next, the god was woken up and found himself powerless. Soon he and Lekapai came to an agreement. He would live here and marry the damsel, and the god himself would retire to some other premises in the bush. Lekapai and the girl lived together for a very long time.


Death of Sāngone

Lekapai desired to visit his family in Samoa. His wife acquiesced and said that he could travel on the back of her mother, who happened to be a turtle with the name Sāngone. She gave him instructions on what to do and not to do. Some say that Lekapai had a bunch of coconuts with him on his trip. Contrary to his wife's instructions, he broke one open on Sāngone's head and not on her shield. Others say that once he had arrived in Samoa, he directly went to see his relatives, leaving Sangone behind in shallow water, disobeying orders to leave her behind in deep water. Not only that, he also did not provide Sāngone first with fresh coconuts in a coconut leaf mat as he had promised. Next, either he, his family, or both, dragged Sangone out of the sea, killed her, cut her in pieces and ate her. Only the plates of her shield were wrapped in a fine mat and buried beneath a candlenut tree at Tuasivivalu, or a candlenut was thrown into the hole so that a tree would grow at that place. Loau Tuputoka (one of the many Loau in history), who was present, said to a young lad: "Lāfai, you will grow slowly (''pana''), and the day Sāngone is found, you will die." Since that time, the other was known as Lāfaipana ('Lāfai the dwarf'). Meanwhile, Lekapai had gone to sleep, and when he woke up, he found himself magically transported back into the house of the wind god. His divine wife knew everything, and angrily slew him. This part of the story has many parallels with the story of Kae who misused
Sinilau In Polynesian mythology, stories about Tinirau are found throughout the islands of Polynesia. He is a guardian of fish. Many themes recur in the various versions. Often he travels to another land in search of his wife, or his wife travels to anot ...
's whale in the same way.


Quest of Fasiapule

Once upon a time Loau went to Tonga and reported the happenings to king Tuitātui, who expressed the wish to have these
relics In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains of a saint or the personal effects of the saint or venerated person preserved for purposes of veneration as a tangi ...
. According to other versions: Sāngone had been his pet turtle, but it had been stolen behind his back by the Samoans. He sent several envoys to get the shell. They all failed. Finally he entrusted the mission to his half-brother Fasiapule (in some versions he went himself). When the party arrived at Savaii, Fasiapule spoke thus: "No one will do the apportioning (the giving around of the
kava Kava or kava kava (''Piper methysticum'': Latin 'pepper' and Latinized Greek 'intoxicating') is a crop of the Pacific Islands. The name ''kava'' is from Tongan and Marquesan, meaning 'bitter'; other names for kava include ''ʻawa'' (Hawaiʻi), ...
at a royal kava ceremony), except me." And when the first toast was given he said: "Fainting alone in the bush, leaf screeching and whistling." The Samoan hosts had no idea what he was talking about, and quickly sought consult with the ancient and decrepit dwarf Lāfaipana who lived in the bush. The latter told them that a wild ''hopa'' (
plantain Plantain may refer to: Plants and fruits * Cooking banana, banana cultivars in the genus ''Musa'' whose fruits are generally used in cooking ** True plantains, a group of cultivars of the genus ''Musa'' * ''Plantaginaceae'', a family of flowerin ...
) standing lonely in the bush was meant, as ripe bananas bend down from the stalk, and that
taro Taro () (''Colocasia esculenta)'' is a root vegetable. It is the most widely cultivated species of several plants in the family Araceae that are used as vegetables for their corms, leaves, and petioles. Taro corms are a food staple in Africa ...
leaves picked by pulling them from the stem give a screeching sound. When the Samoans after that brought the Tonga party plantain bananas wrapped in taro leaves and cooked in the
umu Umu may refer to: * A variety of earth ovens in Polynesia, including: ** Māori umu tī, used to cook ''Cordyline australis'' and other varieties of Cordyline with similar large tap roots. ** Māori hāngi, also called umu in Samoa, especially in o ...
, Fasiapule knew that the riddle was solved. Then he brought out a new toast with this statement: "Growling and lying down." Lāfaipana said it was a pig, a pig so huge that it could not stand on it legs but lay down and grunted for food all day. So a pig was dressed for the oven and served. Fasiapule took the feet, the back and the head for him, and gave the rest to his hosts. In other versions, however, it was rather Lāfaipana who asked the riddles, and Fasiapule who had to answer them. The dwarf was extremely unwilling to reveal the burial place of Sāngone, because of the prophecy done to him. He only agreed to tell it to someone who would be clever enough to meet his wits. "Singing winds?", he asked. "A wild fowl flying low over the bush when startled", was the answer. "What gives dust when you clap your (cupped) hands?" Lāfaipana wanted to know. It was a bundle of dried kava roots which emits a cloud of dust when disturbed. When also Fasiapule showed that he knew how to apportion the kava at the congregation, Lāfaipana admitted defeat. Queen Sālote summarised the riddles in the following stanza from her famous
lakalaka The lakalaka (walking briskly) is a Tongan group dance where the performers are largely standing still and make gestures with their arms only. It is considered as the national dance of Tonga and part of the intangible human heritage. It is the id ...
''Sāngone'' as follows:


Obtaining the shell

Before he let the Tongans start digging under the then-dead candlenut tree, Lāfaipana had a personal request to make: he would like to have a branch for his dove to perch on. Fasiapule agreed, went to Niua, cut a toa tree and came back. "What is that?", Lāfaipana asked. "The perch for your dove", was the answer. "You fool, to cut a piece of wood for me to sleep with. I thought that if you can make riddles for me to solve, then you should solve mine. That dove is a woman for me." But now Fasiapule proceeded to dig up the shell, and as soon as it became visible, Lāfaipana shrivelled up and died. The shell of Sāngone was brought to Tonga and was kept as a precious heirloom by successive generations of Tui Tonga. Until
Laufilitonga Fatafehi Laufilitonga (24 August 1797 – 9 December 1865) was the 39th and last Tui Tonga, a dynasty of kings in Tonga during the Tui Tonga Empire. Biography Only little is known about Laufilitonga's life. Laufilitonga was the oldest son ...
, after becoming a Christian, sold it to a vessel, which sold it in Fiji. When king Maeakafa heard about it, he went to Fiji, searched for it and found some of the shell and brought it back to Tonga where it still is (see above). It is also said that the remainder was used to make a fishhook in possession of Tungī Mailefihi.


References

* I. F. Helu; ''Critical essays''; 1999; * O. Māhina; ''Ko e ngaahi ata mei he histōlia mo e kalatua o Tongá: Ke tufungai ha lea Tonga fakaako''; 2006; {{ISBN, 978-0-908959-09-9 * E.W. Gifford; ''Tongan myths and tales''; BPB bulletin 8, 1924 History of Tonga Tongan mythology Legendary turtles