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March 31, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Suo Oshima

The Seto Inland Sea is dotted with about 700 islands of various sizes, and Suo Oshima (officially Yashirojima), located in the southeastern part of Yamaguchi Prefecture, is the third largest island. (Kawai, JANM)

Situated off the coast of western Honshu is Suo Oshima, often noted English as “Suooshima” or “Suo-Oshima,” this rural part of Japan is one of the countless landmasses that can be found out on the Seto Inland Sea. Officially part of Yamaguchi Prefecture. (Kimball)

Seto Inland Sea is the largest inland sea of Japan and is surrounded by Honshu. Shikoku, and Kyushu.  Features of the Seto Inland Sea is fast tide due to a big difference of high and low tide There are high tides and two low tides twice a day.

Water level difference between high tide and low tide is called “tidal range” – here, it is 3-10-feet in the east and 10-13-feet in west. (International Environmental Management of Enclosed Coastal Seas (EMECS) Center)

Suo Oshima is home to a series of peaks that are collectively called the “Seto Inland Sea’s Alps”. Comprised of Mt. Monju, Mt. Kano, Mt. Genmeizan, and Mt. Dake, the heights of this mountain quadruplet are nearly 2,300-feet tall.

Back during the Edo Period (1603–1868), Suo Oshima was overpopulated. Due to the mountainous core of the goldfish-shaped island, residents had a hard time finding ample space to live. (Kimball)

“The population is now around 15,000, but at the beginning of the Meiji period there were about 70,000. At that time, politics was in chaos, and there were also natural disasters such as typhoons, so the islanders could not make a living.”

“At the same time, the island had a history of migrant workers, and it was common for people to go out on boats. At that time, the government talked about migrant workers (overseas emigration), and many people applied. For the islanders, it probably felt like going to a faraway place for a long period of time.” (Makoto Kimoto, JANM)

A shortage of laborers to work in the growing (in size and number) sugar plantations in Hawai‘i became a challenge.  The only answer was imported labor.

Starting in the 1850s, when the Hawaiian Legislature passed “An Act for the Governance of Masters and Servants,” a section of which provided the legal basis for contract-labor system, labor shortages were eased by bringing in contract workers from Asia, Europe and North America.

The first to arrive were the Chinese (1852.)  The sugar industry grew, so did the Chinese population in Hawaiʻi.  Concerned that the Chinese were taking too strong a representation in the labor market, the government passed laws reducing Chinese immigration.  Further government regulations, introduced 1886-1892, virtually ended Chinese contract labor immigration.

In 1868, an American businessman, Eugene M Van Reed, sent a group of approximately 150-Japanese to Hawaiʻi to work on sugar plantations and another 40 to Guam. This unauthorized recruitment and shipment of laborers, known as the gannenmono (“first year men”,) marked the beginning of Japanese labor migration overseas.  (JANM)

However, for the next two decades the Meiji government prohibited the departure of “immigrants” due to the slave-like treatment that the first Japanese migrants received in Hawaiʻi and Guam.  (JANM)

In March 1881, King Kalākaua visited Japan during which he discussed with Emperor Meiji Hawaiʻi’s desire to encourage Japanese nationals to settle in Hawaiʻi.

Kalākaua’s meeting with Emperor Meiji improved the relationship of the Hawaiian Kingdom with the Japanese government and an economic depression in Japan served as motivation for agricultural workers to move from their homeland.  (Nordyke/Matsumoto)

The first 943-government-sponsored, Kanyaku Imin, Japanese immigrants to Hawaiʻi arrived in Honolulu aboard the Pacific Mail Steamship Company City of Tokio on February 8, 1885.  Subsequent government approval was given for a second set of 930-immigrants who arrived in Hawaii on June 17, 1885.

With the Japanese government satisfied with treatment of the immigrants, a formal immigration treaty was concluded between Hawaiʻi and Japan on January 28, 1886. The treaty stipulated that the Hawaiʻi government would be held responsible for employers’ treatment of Japanese immigrants.

Many Japanese people living on Suo Oshima opted to move.  From 1885 to 1894, 3,913 people living on the island took advantage of the opportunity and moved to Hawai‘i (about 13.5% of the total of about 29,000 Japanese emigrants to Hawai‘i during that time).  Thus, many of the Japanese now living in Hawaii originally have roots that harken back to Suo Oshima. (Kimball)

After Hawai‘i was annexed by the US, many people from Suo Oshima went to Hawaii, and many Suo Oshima people were active in Hawaiian society. After the war, many donations and goods were brought from Hawaii to Suo-Oshima. (Japan Hawaii Immigration Museum)

To commemorate the connection between Suo Oshima and Hawai‘i, the Japan Hawai‘i Immigrant Museum was opened February 8, 1999 after four years of collecting materials.

Here is a link to the Museum website: https://suooshima-hawaii-imin.com/en

The building of the Japan Hawai‘i Immigrant Museum is a reproduction of the former Fukumoto residence built by the late Chouemon Fukumoto.

After returning to Suo Oshima in 1924, he built the Fukumoto residence, which is now the Japan Hawaii Immigrant Museum, in 1928. (Japan Hawaii Immigration Museum)

Many of the materials displayed in the Immigration Museum were donated by townspeople and their families who had returned from Hawaii. The museum also has historical materials, old documents, and a data search corner for information on the history of immigration to Hawaii. (Japan Hawaii Immigration Museum)

Kauai County and Suo Oshima established a sister city relationship which was signed in June 1963.  “The relationship between Japan and Hawai‘i is an integral part of our state’s historic, cultural, and economic well-being – just look at our food, our customs, and our people,” said Mayor Kawakami.

“Through our 60 years of friendship, we have come to share a mutual understanding of each other’s government, economy, agriculture, tourism, and community. And as we celebrate together this milestone, we continue our promise to pass along our customs with the next generation, keeping both Japan and Hawai‘i culture and tradition alive.” (Kauai County)

© 2025 Ho‘okuleana LLC

Filed Under: Economy, Place Names Tagged With: Sugar, Japan, Suo Oshima, Japan Hawaii Immigrant Museum, Hawaii

March 30, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sweet Lady of Waiāhole

Early in the morning, she would gather all her island fruits,
And pack them as she starts another day.
Carefully she makes her way beside the mountain stream,
As she sings an island chant of long ago.

Sweet lady of Waiāhole,
She’s sitting by the highway
Selling her papaya
And green and ripe banana
(“Sweet Lady of Waiāhole”)
(Written by Gordon Broad, performed by Walter Aipolani (Bruddah Waltah.))

“Legendary references to Waiahole suggest that agriculture was being practiced in the valley in the AD 1600s (calculated genealogically at a rate of 25 years/generation). For example, the warrior Kuapunohu is said to have dug up and burned the taro from a patch of four acres.”

“Fornander, in a variation of the same story, notes that because Kapunohu (his spelling) used the taro for firewood, the saying, ‘the hard taro of Waiahole,’ is known from Hawaii to Niihau.”  (Archaeological Resources in Waiāhole Valley, Tomonari-Tuggle, 1983)

“[K]uleana awards to commoners were spread out along the banks of the valley streams, from the coast to 2.3 miles inland.  Some parcels were situated on the Kaneloa terrace and along the base of the southern spur near the ocean.”

In general, the parcels along the stream edges were used for irrigated taro cultivation. The kula parcels were planted in a variety of crops, including potatoes, melons, sugar cane, awa, and bananas. Houses were usually located with the kula farms and described as being ‘separate and not enclosed.’”

“Awards in the upper gulches and in the delta area of Waiahole Steam did not have kula parcels. Within twenty years, however, subsistence agriculture was supplanted by commercial rice growing. Thrum writes that the rice industry took off with the decline of whaling in the early 1860s, and with such enthusiasm in some cases that good taro was pulled up and terraces replanted in rice.”

“This industry made a tremendous impact on land use and settlement in Waiahole Valley, which was one of the primary rice growing areas in the islands throughout the industry’s life span.”

“Many taro fields were converted to rice cultivation, and Miyagi notes that rice farmers brought new areas into irrigated cultivation through the construction of more canals, particularly those which crossed the top of the Kaneloa terrace.” (Archaeological Resources in Waiāhole Valley, Tomonari-Tuggle, 1983)

“1917 saw the completion of the Waiahole Ditch tunnel by Lincoln Loy McCandless, which changed the valley forever by diverting stream water to the Ewa side of the island for sugar plantations” (Reppun)

“From the turn of the century, the rice industry began a decline which culminated with the final blow caused by the appearance of the rice borer insect in the late 1920s.  In Waiahole, rice fields were abandoned as early as 1910, although some rice was being planted as late as 1920.”

“Japanese replaced Chinese on the land during this period and truck farming replaced rice cultivation.” (Archaeological Resources in Waiāhole Valley, Tomonari-Tuggle, 1983)

“Throughout the decades of rice, pineapple, and truck farming, taro continued to be grown, though certainly at a lesser scale than pre-19th century Hawaiian land use. … The Waiahole Poi Factory operated continuously from 1904 to 1971, processing taro from the valley as well as from other areas.” (Archaeological Resources in Waiahole Valley, Tomonari-Tuggle, 1983)

“There were formerly lo‘i throughout the seaward lowlands of Waiahole. Some were in swampy lands, but most of them were irrigated by the stream from which the ahupua‘a takes its name. Groups of lo‘i adjoining Waikane were planted up into recent times.”

“Some kuleana a short way up the main stream, beyond its junction with Waianu, were still cultivated by Hawaiians living in the lower valley in 1935; and small terraces once went well up into what is now forest reserve.”

“There was also a sizable lo‘i section about half a mile up Waianu stream, with evidence of its having extended at least a mile farther inland along both the north and south branches of  Waianu.” (Handy, Handy & Pukui)

[In 1961, the “owner of the poi factory [said] that the Kauai taro was a better product because of its lower water content (possibly a result of the shipping time). Even after the factory closed in 1971, taro cultivation continued.” (Archaeological Resources in Waiihole Valley, Tomonari-Tuggle, 1983)

“[M]ost of the productive agricultural area in the Valley was owned by Mrs Elizabeth Marks [McCandless’ daughter] and leased to tenants, with one exception, on revocable leases. …”

“Most of the tenants want to keep the Valley primarily in agriculture and to retain the rural life style.”  (Agricultural Feasibility and Environmental Impact Waiāhole Valley Agricultural Park, HHFDC)

Here, one such farmer, Koji Matayoshi, an immigrant from Okinawa, and his father began cultivating undeveloped raw land with their bare hands & planted Okinawan sweet potato, and many other local produce. (Riveira)

Koji Matayoshi married Fujiko Shimabukuro and they wound up in Kahalu‘u, where they had eight children, five daughters and three sons. Fujiko was born in Kohala, Hawai‘i on March 18, 1914 and had moved to Okinawa when she was 3 and returned to Hawai‘i at 18. (McGrath)

They eventually moved from Kahalu‘u to the 10-acre plot of land at Waiāhole.  In addition to sweet potato, the Matayoshis grew papaya, banana, mango, watermelon and cucumber. (McGrath)

“After her husband died [February 18, 1966], Fujiko needed a way to support her children, so every day, she would gather all her fruits in a wheelbarrow and wheel them down to sell on Kamehameha Highway.” (McGrath)

“The neighbors, when they saw us, they would always say our mom was the kindest woman. She would make sweet potato tempura and give out to all the kids at the Waiāhole School basketball court.”

“Or she would give to the kids who swam in the swimming hole behind our house. Sometimes she’d make andagi with chocolate or sweet potato inside. She always had something for them to eat.” (Fujikos’ daughter, Nancy; McGrath)

Fujiko became known as the ”Sweet Lady of Waiāhole.” “Being a staple in her community and seen as a symbol of selfless acts of kindness, she was also supportive of grass roots efforts in preservation of their farm community.  ‘The Sweet Lady’ had grit and also a feisty side.” (Leilani Rivera) Fujiko passed away on March 30, 1985.

© 2025 Ho‘okuleana LLC

Filed Under: Place Names, Prominent People Tagged With: Hawaii, Waiahole, Sweet Lady, Fujiko Matayoshi

March 29, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Keanianileihuaokalani – Healing Stone of Wahiawa

Cultures collided at Keanianileihuaokalani.

Keanianileihuaokalani was a large tongue-shaped stone that has since been split into three pieces. Hawaiians view it as a healing stone; Hindus see it as an embodiment of the god Shiva.  (According to reports, they appear to have worked (working) out how they work together.)

Reportedly, originally found in Kaukonahua gulch by a Waialua Sugar worker, the 6-foot stone broke when it fell off a wagon while being moved.  (They are now situated at the lower end of California Avenue in Wahiawa.)

Hawaiians believe that the stone has sacred healing properties. It was believed that all children of royal lineage were thrice blessed and elevated to a higher status if born at nearby Kūkaniloko, the center of the earth.  (Reveria)

After childbirth, the new mothers would bath in the cool springs of Helemano. It was this mingling of blood and water that culminated into the healing mystic rains that fell upon the land, people and most importantly Keanianileihuaokalani giving the healing stone its healing powers.  (Reveria)

On the day of a royal birth, all work stopped in anticipation of the first healing rains generated from the blessed event. These rains were Waiʻihiawa, mystical rains tainted with the blood of royalty. This healing rain fell freely on the people who lived and worked in Kūkaniloko.  (Reveria)

“This rock being visited by people to worship these days is becoming something that truly is stirring the thoughts of some people here in Honolulu, and some who are living near Wahiawa are appealing to the Government and to the power of the Board of Health to move that rock from where it first stood, because in their opinion, this action by the people will cause an epidemic to grow here where all ethnicities are going and touching themselves against the bodies of others, and this will perhaps cause sicknesses to spread from one to another.”

“The Board of Health refused to step in and block this action by people who believe their ailments will be healed by touching the sick area to that rock of Wahiawa, and the birthing stones of the High Chiefs of this land in ancient times.”

“Some people have said that their weakness due to rheumatism by them going there and touching their areas of pain to that rock. Some say that their weak areas were not cured by touching the rock.”  (Hoku o Hawaiʻi, November 1, 1927)

According to practitioners, the stone should be anointed with Waiʻihiawa rainwater.  Appropriate and appreciated gifts are awa root, olena sprigs, herbs, lei and flowers.  (Reveria)

In 1971 the Wahiawa Community and Businessmen’s Association asked the Hawaii Visitors Bureau to put up a sign to again call public attention to the “Healing Stone of Wahiawa.”

Hindu, who assumed a caretaker role for the stone also revere it as a manifestation of their deity, Shiva (it is interpreted to have a phallic shape.)

The Hindu recognized it as a Shiva image in 1988.  At the time, the structure that enclosed the stones on three sides was a dilapidated concrete shed; a Hindu family turned the shed into a white marble shrine.

Hindus anoint themselves with smoke from sacred candles, part of the ceremonial cleansing of the stones.  In their ritual, the stone is bathed in milk, rubbed with honey and draped with lei.  (Reportedly, contrary to some claims, Hindus do not put oil or candle wax on the stone.)

The “healing stones” of Wahiawa drew hundreds of pilgrims in the 1930s, but few local people or tourists find their way to the off-the-beaten-path location these days.   (star-bulletin)

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

Filed Under: General, Missionaries / Churches / Religious Buildings Tagged With: Healing Stones, Keanianileihuaokalani, Hawaii, Oahu, Wahiawa

March 28, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Maui Alaloa

The canoe was a principal means of travel in ancient Hawaiʻi.

Canoes were used for inter-village coastal and interisland travel, while trails within the ahupuaʻa provided access between the uplands and the coast.

Most permanent villages initially were near the sea and sheltered beaches, which provided access to good fishing grounds as well as facilitating canoe travel between settlements.

At about the same time of Christopher Columbus crossing the Atlantic to America (he was looking for an alternate trade route to the East Indies,) Piʻilani was ruler of Maui.

According to oral tradition, Piʻilani unified the entire island of Maui and ruled in peace and prosperity, bringing together, under one rule, the formerly-competing eastern (Hāna) and western (Wailuku) multi-district kingdoms of the Island.

Piʻilani’s prosperity was exemplified by a boom in agriculture and construction of heiau, fishponds, trails and irrigation systems.  Famed for his energy and intelligence, Piʻilani constructed the West Maui phase of the noted Alaloa, or long trail (also known as the King’s Highway.)

Ancient trails facilitated trading between upland and coastal villages and communications between ahupuaʻa and extended families. These trails were usually narrow, following the topography of the land.  Sometimes, over ʻaʻā lava, they were paved with waterworn stones (ʻalā or paʻalā).

Pi‘ilani died at Lāhainā and the kingdom of Maui passed to his son, Lono-a-Piʻilani (Lono.) Pi‘ilani had directed that the kingdom go to Lono, and that Kiha-a-Piʻilani (Kiha – Lono’s brother) serve under him in peace.

In the early years of Lono’s reign all was well … that changed.

Lono became angry, because he felt Kiha was trying to seize the kingdom for himself.  Lono sought to kill Kiha; so Kiha fled in secret to Molokaʻi and later to Lānaʻi. When Kiha, with chiefs, warriors and a fleet of war canoes, made their way to attack Lono; Lono trembled with fear of death, and died. (Kamakau)

Kiha assumed power over Maui.  Like his father, the reign of Kiha was, “eminently peaceful and prosperous, and his name has been reverently and affectionately handed down to posterity”. (Fornander)

Kiha resumed what his father had started in West Maui.  Kiha laid the East Maui section and connected the island.  This trail was the only ancient pathway to encircle any Hawaiian island (not only along the coast, but also up the Kaupō Gap and through the summit area and crater of Haleakalā.)

Kiha connected the entire island with a network of trails to aide his people in their travels which gave him quick access to all parts of his kingdom.

Four to six-feet wide and 138-miles long, this rock-paved path facilitated both peace and war.  It simplified local and regional travel and communication, and allowed the chief’s messengers to quickly get from one part of the island to another.  The trail was used for the annual harvest festival of Makahiki and to collect taxes, promote production, enforce order and move armies.

Missionaries Richards, Andrews and Green noted in 1828, “a pavement said to have been built by Kihapiʻilani, a king … afforded us no inconsiderable assistance in traveling as we ascended and descended a great number of steep and difficult paries (pali.)” (Missionary Herald)

By the middle-1820s, significant changes in the Hawaiian Kingdom were underway. The missionaries, who arrived in April 1820, selected key stations generally coinciding with the traditional Royal Centers, which by this time, were also developing as trade points with foreign vessels.

The development of trails to western-style roadways was initiated to facilitate access to mission stations, landings, and key areas of resource collection.

Until the 1840s, overland travel was predominantly by foot and followed the traditional trails. By the 1840s, the use of introduced horses, mules and bullocks for transportation was increasing, and many traditional trails – the ala loa and mauka-makai trails within ahupuaʻa – were modified by removing the smooth stepping stones that caused the animals to slip.

Eventually, wider, straighter trails were constructed to accommodate horse drawn carts. Unlike the earlier trails, these later trails could not conform to the natural, sometimes steep, terrain. They often by-passed the traditional trails as more remote coastal villages became depopulated due to introduced diseases and the changing economic and social systems.

Sometimes, the new corridors were constructed over the alignments of the ancient trails, or totally realigned, thus abandoning – for larger public purposes – the older ala loa. In addition to these modifications in trail location and type due to changing uses, trails were also relocated as a result of natural events such as lava flows, tsunami, and other occurrences. The Hawaiian trail system was and will remain dynamic.

Hoapili is credited with improving the King’s Highway (in early 1800s – portions were called Hoapili Trail, initially built during the reign of Pi‘ilani.)  Hoapili commissioned road gangs for the work. The Rev. Henry Cheever noted that these road gangs were largely composed of prisoners who had been convicted of adultery; Cheever called it “the road that sin built.”  (Samson)

By the early 1850s, specific criteria were developed for realigning trails and roadways, including the straightening of alignments and development of causeways and bridges. This system of roadwork, supervised by district overseers, and funded through government appropriations – with labor by prisoners and individuals unable to pay taxes in another way – evolved over the next 40 years.

With the passing of time, emphasis was given to areas of substantial populations. Because of the on-going decline of the Hawaiian population, and the near abandonment of isolated communities formerly accessed by the ala loa and earlier alanui aupuni, segments were abandoned.

In the later years of the Hawaiian monarchy, the need to define and protect Hawaiian trails and roadways was recognized, particularly in support of native tenants living in remote locations. Often these native tenants` lands were surrounded by tracts of land held by single, large landowners who challenged rights of access.

In 1892, Queen Liliʻuokalani and the Legislature of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi signed into law an “Act Defining Highways, and Defining and Establishing Certain Routes and Duties in Connection Therewith,” to be known as The Highways Act, 1892.

“All roads, alleys, streets, ways, lanes, courts, places, trails and bridges in the Hawaiian Islands, whether now or hereafter opened, laid out or built by the Government, or by private parties, and dedicated or abandoned to the public as a highway, are hereby declared to be public highways.”

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

 

Filed Under: Ali'i / Chiefs / Governance, Hawaiian Traditions, Place Names Tagged With: Lonopiilani, Kihapiilani, Hawaii, Maui, Ala Loa, Trails, Piilani, Hoapili

March 27, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Nanaʻulu – Ulu

He aina loaʻa i ka moana
I hoea mai loko o ka ale
I ka halehale poi pu a Kanaloa
He Koakea i halelo i ka wai
I lou i ka makau a ka lawaia
A ka lawaia nui o Kapaahu
A ke lawaia nui o Kapuheeuanuu-la
A pae na waa, kau mai
E holo, e ai ia Hawaiʻi he moku
He moku Hawaii

A land that was found in the ocean
That was thrown up from the sea
From the very depths of Kanaloa
The white coral in the watery caves
That was caught on the hook of the fisherman,
The great fisherman of Kapaahu,
The great fisherman, Kapuheeuanuu
The canoes touch the shore, come on board
Go and possess Hawaii, the island
An island is Hawaii
(From the chant of Makuakaumana when Pāʻao’s invites a chief to come and live on Hawaiʻi.)

Papa and Wākea are the ancestors of the Hawaiian people. “Papa” in Hawaiʻi is “a word applied to any flat surface,” especially to those undersea foundation layers from which new lands are said to rise.

This probably relates to the successive generations of mankind born out of the vast waters of the spirit world and identified through their family leaders with the lands which they inhabit.

In the South Seas, Papa is a goddess of earth and the underworld and mother of gods.  Wākea is god of light and of the heavens who “opens the door of the sun”.  (Beckwith)

“In the genealogy of Wākea it is said that Papa gave birth to these Islands. Another account has it that this group of islands were not begotten, but really made by the hands of Wākea himself.”  (Malo)

“Papa gives birth to a gourd, which forms a calabash and its cover. Wākea throws up the cover and it becomes the sky. He throws up the pulp and it becomes the sun; the seeds, and they become the stars …”

“… the white lining of the gourd, and it becomes the moon; the ripe white meat, and it becomes the clouds; the juice he pours over the clouds and it becomes rain. Of the calabash itself Wākea makes the land and the ocean.”  (Kamakau)

Hawaiian legends suggest the place to which Hawaiians frequently sailed for centuries was usually Kahiki or Tahiti, the old home of the family of ruling chiefs.    (Westerfelt)

Thirteen generations after Papa and Wākea, Kiʻi and his wife Hinakoula appear.  Kiʻi was king in the Southern Pacific Islands – at Tahiti, the chief island of the Society group.   (Westerfelt)  They had two sons, Nanaʻulu and Ulu – they came to the Hawaiian Islands and established a dynasty of high chiefs.

It has been suggested that Ulu remained in the southern islands and that Nanaulu alone found his way to Hawaii; but the frequent use of the name Ulu in the genealogies of the chiefs of the two large islands, Hawaiʻi and Maui, would support the position that the brothers, sailing together, found Hawaiʻi.  (Westerfelt)

Eleven generations from Nanaʻulu and Ulu, Nanamaoa, of the southern Ulu line, pioneered the first migratory influx to the Hawaiian Islands. He was a warlike chief who succeeded in establishing his family in power on Hawaiʻi, Maui and Oʻahu.  (Sands)

Later on Oʻahu, three major competing districts developed out of earlier small and independent political units. These districts were Kona, Koʻolau (later divided into Koʻolauloa and Koʻolaupoko), and Greater Ewa (the later districts of ʻEwa, Waianae and Waialua.)

About AD 1100, thirteen generations from Nanaʻulu and Ulu came Maweke of the northern Nanaʻulu line. Maweke is one of the main figures in the voyaging era of Hawaiian traditions.  With Maweke, the lineage of ancient Polynesia was transformed into a distinctly Hawaiian lineage.

Likewise, about this time on the Island of Hawaiʻi, the island was divided into competing district-sized chiefdoms. In general, there were three centers of power during this period:  Waipiʻo Valley in the windward region, Kona in the leeward area and Kohala on the northern end of the Island.

Pilikaeaea, the chief, brought by Pāʻao from Tahiti to rule Hawaiʻi, first established his reign in Waipiʻo Valley.  Through inter-marriage with descendants of the Nanaʻulu or Ulu line of indigenous rulers he established the Pili line of rulers in Waipiʻo, from whom Kamehameha ultimately descended.  (McGregor)

Kūkaniloko, the sacred place of birth on the central plateau may have been constructed by the late-AD-1300s.  A divine center for Nanaʻulu chiefs, to be born at Kūkaniloko signified legitimacy.  It is said that chiefs from other islands often sought greater prestige by marrying those with these strong ancestral lineages.

During the wars of interisland unification in the eighteenth century, the indigenous ruling Nanaʻulu chiefs of Oʻahu were practically exterminated, first by invaders from Maui, then by the warriors of Kamehameha I of Hawaiʻi Island.    (Klieger)

The image shows a general genealogical Chart from Papa and Wākea, to Kiʻi, to Nanaʻulu and Ulu, with several names noted.  (Emory)

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

Filed Under: Ali'i / Chiefs / Governance, Hawaiian Traditions Tagged With: Pili, Haloa, Kamehameha, Nanaulu, Kukaniloko, Ulu, Paao, Paka, Wakea

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Hoʻokuleana LLC

Hoʻokuleana LLC is a Planning and Consulting firm assisting property owners with Land Use Planning efforts, including Environmental Review, Entitlement Process, Permitting, Community Outreach, etc. We are uniquely positioned to assist you in a variety of needs.

Info@Hookuleana.com

Copyright © 2012-2024 Peter T Young, Hoʻokuleana LLC

 

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