Witi Ihimaera - The Parihaka Woman

‘Te Whiti came to see Horitana again and his eyes were steely. “If the Pakeha thinks he can still come onto our land as if he owns it, we will go onto his as if we own it. I want you to gather the men and go out, this time with ploughs. I want to plough the belly of the government, and see how they like it.”’

And so the Year of the Plough began, one morning when the wind was coming off Taranaki Mountain.

Erenora watched as Horitana inspected teams of ploughmen, fifty in all, waiting with their bullock teams for the order to move out of Parihaka; after all, Te Whiti had asked for a display that showed he meant business. Indeed, so eager had been the men they had begun assembling before dawn, talking amiably to one another. Some were watching the sacred mountain: it always inspired and guided them. Others, like Ruakere, Rangiora and Whata, were farewelling their families before they left for the sacred work.

Ripeka shivered and said to Paora, ‘You will be careful, won’t you?’ And Meri, close to her delivery, told Riki, ‘Don’t forget that you’re going to be a father.’

Erenora kissed Horitana on the cheek. ‘Are you sure I can’t come with you?’ she asked. How she wished she could be one of the ploughmen. ‘If I put my long hair up into a topknot, nobody would know.’

Laughing, he chided her, ‘But I would know.’ He put his hands on the back of her neck and pulled her into an embrace — and she winced. Where Piharo had used his whip on her the skin had broken. Now healing but still hurting, the weals were like a crusted necklace.

Erenora hid her pain. ‘Do your job, husband,’ she said, ‘and bring your brothers-in-law back to my sisters.’ She farewelled the bullocks too, calling, ‘And you, beloved companions, no shirking!’

The bullocks stamped and bellowed, wanting to get on with it. Breath jetted from their nostrils. What noble, strong beasts they were, etched against the sky as it faded, lightened and became streaked with red. And then, lo and behold, ka ao, ka ao, ka awatea, the dawn came over the horizon.

Horitana looked to Taranaki; it shone with morning light. ‘The mounga is watching,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

As the teams left Parihaka one of the ploughmen, Tonga Awhikau, began to sing a passionate waiata:

‘I te raa o mae’e ka iri kei te torona, ka mau taku ringa ki te parau e ’au nei te w’enua. Ka toro taku ringa ki te atua e tuu nei ko w’akatohe; ka puta te ’ae a te kaawana e tango nei w’enua e kore au e taaea, ’e uri noo Hoohepa, noo ngaa tuupuna. On a day in May I was suspended from the throne of God, my hand to the plough as it swept across the land. My hand, also extended to God, is resolute. The ill-feeling of the government emerges in the taking away of the land. It will not deter me, a descendant of Joseph by way of my ancestors!’

The men whistled and stamped, urging the bullocks forward, ‘Timata! ’aere tatou!’ Dogs were barking as, slowly but surely, the bullocks dragged the gleaming ploughshares across the river and into Pakeha land.

Te Whiti and Tohu’s ploughing campaign began. Dick Scott describes the reaction to that first ploughing, done at Oakura, in this way:

The settler could not believe his eyes. Long furrows broke his grassland and a team of silent ploughmen was steadily extending the area of upturned soil. This was land only seven miles from New Plymouth, it had been in undisturbed European possession since the wars, the original owners, long ago killed or hunted off, had been forgotten. Courtney, the outraged farmer, rushed to stop them. But the Maori ploughmen who started work before sunrise at Oakura on the morning of 26 May 1879, serenely continued till dusk. And the next day was the same, and the next, until twenty acres were turned under. [11] Scott, Ask That Mountain , p. 55.

In all of this we have to try to look into the prophet Te Whiti’s mind. Why provoke Premier Grey and Mr Bryce?

The prophet’s answer was, ‘You want to come onto our land? See how you like it when we come onto yours!’

Did the government have the right?

In Te Whiti’s eyes, no, it did not, and he wanted to test that right.

But was the prophet aware of the risk?

I like to think so. His biblical vision saw the future of Parihaka in the long term. For instance, back in 1869, when he proclaimed the Takahanga, Maori freedom from Pakeha authority, he also prophesied two crises that Parihaka would have to suffer before the final phase of the kainga’s resurrection and harvest.

The first of these was Akarama, otherwise known as the Aceldama, the transaction of Judas Iscariot, when Parihaka would be betrayed.

Was Premier Grey — or was Bryce — Judas Iscariot?

‘Every day,’ Erenora wrote, ‘our plough teams went out in the bright mornings and returned safe through the twilight. I could always tell, even before seeing the teams, that Horitana and our men were on their way home. How? Our beloved companions, eager to get back to the kainga, would set up a bellowing and trumpeting loud enough to deafen the world. And there would be our men, trying to keep them under control, laughing as the bullocks pulled them over hill and down dale.

‘As soon as they arrived, I would say to the tataraki’i, “Quickly, unyoke the bullocks from their traces and take them to the stream.” You had to be fast because those noble animals wanted to be fed and watered and never liked to wait. While the tataraki’i washed and scrubbed them, I moved among their number patting them and inspecting their hooves but also upbraiding them. “You are all becoming like my husband,” I growled at them, “accustomed to the pleasures of a bath after a hard day’s work.” Oh, how they loved being washed and brushed down and, just like Horitana, they shivered with sensuous delight. And they knew I didn’t mean my grumpy words. After all, did I not also whisper my thanks to them, reaffirm the w’akapapa between us and the times of travail when they sheltered the more’u while we were building Parihaka?

‘A week later, however, I saw that Horitana was becoming worried for the safety of the ploughmen. He came down to the stream one afternoon to stand beside me and wash the bullocks. The tataraki’i were clambering among the noble beasts, climbing onto their backs and diving into the stream. “We continue to take the Pakeha by surprise,” Horitana said, “but, now, they are beginning to arrive where we are ploughing to stop us.”

‘I pressed his hand. “They must have scouts watching the kainga,” I answered. “It won’t be long before …” I began to tremble. I did not want to think about the possibility of the Akarama or to show Horitana how afraid I was. Suddenly, I was sprayed with water as one of the children jumped close to me, and that saved me from showing my concern. “You meant that!” I laughed. But I couldn’t help fearing the coming of any conflict as Horitana and the teams expanded their ploughing.

‘They went onto settler-occupied land along the coast between Pukearuhe and Hawera. At Manaia the great chief Wiremu Kingi Te Matakatea and his Ngati Haumiti followers joined them. Now approaching his eighties, “The Clear-Eyed One” was sick of waiting for the government to give him back his land.’

The conflict mounted as Pakeha settlers demanded immediate action. They held boisterous meetings and organised vigilante groups, and Pakeha tempers soared sharply to war-mongering fever pitch.

One newspaper of the time wrote:

Perhaps, all things considered, the present difficulty will be one of the greatest blessings New Zealand ever experienced, for without doubt it will be a war of extermination … The time has come, in our minds, when New Zealand must strike for freedom, and this means the death-blow to the Maori race! [12] ‘The Historian’s View’, Taranaki Herald , 27 January 1903, cited in Rusden, History , vol. 3, p229.