Te Whatuiāpiti

[3][4] Through his father, he was a descendant of Rākei-hikuroa by his wife Pāpāuma; Kahungunu; Tamatea Arikinui, the captain of the Tākitimu canoe; and the early explorer Toi.

[5] Hinetemoa was a granddaughter of Ngarengare, the ancestor of Ngāti Ngarengare, a hapū of Ngāti Kahungunu based in Wairoa District,[6] who had fled south and married Te Hikawera after her people suffered a devastating defeat at the hands of Tama-te-rangi and Rakaipaaka.

He fled with some elders to his cousin Tumapuhia in the Wairarapa, abandoning his pregnant wife, Te Kuramahinono.

[10] When she subsequently gave birth to a boy, Rangiwawahia, she pretended that he was a girl, to prevent her captors from eating him.

[12] In Wairarapa, Te Whatuiāpiti developed his military skills by leading attacks on Waingawa (near Masterton) and Ōtaki (on the Kapiti coast).

This allowed him to establish a base of operations at Marotiri on the nearby Te Aho a Māui peninsula.

Te Whatuiāpiti responded by settling at Pohatunui a Toru in the Ruahine Range and sent a message to Pokia promising him a gift of forty women.

Pokia built a house called Mata Kakahi for these women at Tawhitinui, Lake Oingo.

Te Whatuiāpiti fled to Pohatunui a Toru, a fortress on top of a rock pinnacle in the Ruahine range, where Pokia was unable to reach him.

They found out that Pokia’s people were accustomed to go out to Otatara to dig fern root and gather pipi.

After picking off the men heading out of the fortress one-by-one, Takutai o Te Rangi was nearly empty and the war party quickly took it.

He pulled off his clothes and jumped into the water at Upokopoito, holding Te Whatuiāpiti’s atua, Parukakariki.

[2] Te Whatuiāpiti sent an envoy to Irakumia at Tāmaki-nui-a-Rua, whom he had defeated and made peace with the previous year, to ask him to come and help.

When Te Whatuiāpiti caught sight of her, he was struck by her beauty, and immediately ended the battle and made peace, even though he had been winning.

The story is considered one of the great Māori romances and has been compared to the more famous tale of Hinemoa and Tūtānekai.

E noho e tama i roto i to pa i Te Rotoatara, Hangaia to whare ko Pakewairangi.

Different sources also strongly disagree about whether Te Rangitaumaha also gifted large areas of land in the Heretaunga region to Wawahanga.

[13] Tiakiwai also recounted the gift of Te Rangitaumaha in 1889, but his version was challenged at the hearing by Meihana Takihi and Paora Kaiwhata.