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August 15, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Camp McKinley

The Spanish-American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence.

William McKinley was president of the United States, and the causal event was the explosion of the battleship USS Maine in Havana Harbor, Cuba on February 15, 1898.

So, what does that have to do with Hawai‘i?

Well, back then, Spain had interests in the Pacific, particularly in the Guam and Philippines. Although the main issue was Cuban independence, the ten-week war was fought in both the Caribbean and the Pacific.

Likewise, US foreign policy advocated the taking of the Caribbean Islands and the Philippine Islands for bases to protect US commerce.

Meanwhile, Hawai’i, had gained strategic importance because of its geographical position in the Pacific. Honolulu served as a stopover point for the forces heading to the Philippines.

On August 12, 1898, the United States ratified the Hawaiʻi treaty of annexation. At the time, there was no assigned garrison here until August 15, 1898, when the 1st New York Volunteer Infantry regiment and the 3rd Battalion, 2nd US Volunteer Engineers landed in Honolulu for garrison duty.

The two commands were initially camped alongside each other as though they were one regiment in the large infield of the one-mile race track at Kapi‘olani Park. The initial camp in the infield at the race track was unnamed.

As more members of the regiment arrived, the camp was moved about three or four hundred yards from the race track to an area called ‘Irwin Tract.’ The Irwin Tract camp was named “Camp McKinley,” in honor of the president.

The site “was near the only ocean-bathing beach on the Island and the reported site of a proposed Sanitarium selected by the resident physicians in the immediate vicinity of the best residential quarter of the Island. In addition it had shade in the park, a drill and parade ground on the racecourse, city water, and was accessible.”

The troops used the bathing facilities at the Sans Souci Resort which was located on the beach at the southeast corner of the park.

Camp Otis was a short-lived camp of Philippine expeditionary troops who arrived on the troop ship ‘Arizona’ on August 27, 1898 and were left in Honolulu when the ship went on to Manila.

The soldiers camped inside the racetrack at Kapi‘olani Park. The camp was later moved east within the racetrack to a point “nearly opposite Camp McKinley.” The camp was named after Major General Elwell S. Otis, US Volunteers, the commanding officer in the Philippines in 1898-99.

Camp Otis was abandoned about November 7, 1898 when the ‘Arizona’ returned and the troops departed for Manila.

Owing to the prevalence of malarial and typhoid fever, they moved the regiment to a camp to Wai‘alae, on the north side of Diamond Head, about three miles from “Camp McKinley.”

They temporarily occupied the Paul Isenberg estate which stretched from Kapahulu Avenue to Kāhala Beach. A letter from one soldier camped there noted, “The tents are pitched on the sandy beach at Waialie (sic)…”

The 2nd Engineers ultimately built barracks and other buildings for the new Camp McKinley just north of Kapi‘olani Park, between Leahi and Kana‘ina avenues (it is now covered by businesses along Kapahulu Avenue and residences in the area.)

Local hospitals were used for the sick soldiers until Independence Park Hospital was established on August 15, 1898. The Red Cross also established a hospital for soldiers in the Child Garden Building on Beretania Street in June, 1898.

The Independence Park Hospital was located in a dance pavilion at Independence Park, southeast of the corner of Sheridan and King Streets.

In October, 1898, concern over conditions at Independence Park Hospital and the large number of sick soldiers required that additional hospital space be obtained. The Independence Park Hospital was closed in January, 1899.

The Nu‘uanu Valley Military Hospital (also known as “Buena Vista Hospital”) was located at the former John Paty home (known as Buena Vista) on the east side of Nu‘uanu Avenue at Wyllie Street. (That site is now covered by the Nu‘uanu-Pali Highway interchange, just north of the Community Church of Honolulu.)

Camp McKinley remained in existence until Fort Shafter was opened in late June, 1907. The garrison was either artillery or coast artillery troops during this period.

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Camp_McKinley_Kapiolani_Park-1898
Camp_McKinley_Kapiolani_Park-1898
Camp_McKinley-PP-56-11-007-00001
Camp_McKinley-PP-56-11-007-00001
Camp McKinley-PP-56-11-004-00001
Camp McKinley-PP-56-11-004-00001
Camp_McKinley_in_Kapiolani_Park-1898
Camp_McKinley_in_Kapiolani_Park-1898
Camp McKinley-PP-56-11-021-00001
Camp McKinley-PP-56-11-021-00001
Camp McKinley was set up in Kapi'olani Park, at the base of Diamond Head-NY_Volunteers-1898
Camp McKinley was set up in Kapi’olani Park, at the base of Diamond Head-NY_Volunteers-1898
Buena Vista Hospital, Honolulu, late 1898, looking east (US Army Museum)
Buena Vista Hospital, Honolulu, late 1898, looking east (US Army Museum)
William_McKinley_by_Courtney_Art_Studio,_1896
William_McKinley_by_Courtney_Art_Studio,_1896

Filed Under: Military Tagged With: Hawaii, Diamond Head, Camp McKinley, Annexation, Kapiolani Park

August 14, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hōlua

Certain pastimes were restricted to the chiefs, the most spectacular being hōlua sledding. A track of rock, layered with earth and made slippery with grass, was made for tobogganing on a narrow sled.

Hōlua sledding was the most dangerous sport practiced in Hawai‘i. The rider lies prone on a sled the width of a ski and slides down a chute made of lava rock.

The sled or papa consisted of two narrow and highly polished runners (three inches apart,) from 7- to 18-feet in length, and from two to three inches deep. The papa hōlua (canoe sled) is a reflection of the double-hulled canoe.

The two runners were fastened together by a number of short pieces of woods varying in length from two to five inches, laid horizontally across the runners.

“Coasting down slopes… Sliding on specially constructed sleds was practiced only in Hawaii and New Zealand,” wrote historian Kenneth Emory. “The Maori sled, however, was quite different from the Hawaiian… One of the Hawaiian sleds, to be seen in [the] Bishop Museum, is the only complete ancient sled in existence.”

“The narrowness and the convergence of the runners toward the front should be noticed. Coasting on these sleds was a pastime confined to the chiefs and chieftesses.”

The Reverend Hiram Bingham provides a descriptive account of this sport: “In the presence of the multitude, the player takes in both hands, his long, very narrow and light built sled, made for this purpose alone, the curved ends of the runners being upward and forward, as he holds it, to begin the race.”

“Standing erect, at first, a little back from the head of the prepared slippery path, he runs a few rods to it, to acquire the greatest momentum, carrying his sled, then pitches himself, head foremost, down the declivity, dexterously throwing his body, full length, upon his vehicle, as on a surf board.”

“The sled, keeping its rail or grassway, courses with velocity down the steep, and passes off into the plain, bearing its proud, but prone and headlong rider, who scarcely values his neck more than the prize at stake.”

The primary archaeological feature of Keauhou was its monumental Holua Slide, a stone ramp nearly one mile in length that culminated at He‘eia Bay.

In 1913, H.W. Kinney published a visitor’s guide to the island of Hawai‘i, including descriptions of the land at the time, historical accounts of events, and descriptions of sites and practices that might be observed by the visitor.

At Keauhou, he notes, “Mauka of the village is seen the most famous papa hōlua in the Islands, a wide road-like stretch, which was laid with grass steeped in kukui-nut oil so as to allow the prince and his friends to coast down in their sleighs constructed for the purpose.”

The Keauhou hōlua is one of the largest and best-preserved hōlua course. The remains are about 1290 feet long of the original that was over 4000 feet long. When in use, it was covered in dirt and wet grass to make it slippery.

Contestants reached treacherous speeds on their narrow sleds by adding thatching and mats to make the holua slippery. When the waves were large, crowds would gather on a stone platform at He‘eia Bay to watch as hōlua contestants raced against surfers to a shoreline finish.

A portion of the hōlua is visible on Alii Drive, directly mauka (inland) of the golf clubhouse entrance.

Kekahuna, who mapped and studied the Keauhou Hōlua notes, “The starting point is a narrow platform paved level, succeeded by a slightly declined crosswise platform 36-feet long by 29-feet wide, and is followed by a series of steep descents that gave high speed to the holua sleds.”

“Great care seems to have been exercised in the building of this huge relic of the ancients. Practically the whole slide is constructed of fairly large ‘a‘a rocks, filled in with rocks of medium and small-sized ‘a‘a. The base walls on the north and south vary in height according to the contour of the land. The width of the runway varies considerably.”

“The length of the slide, measured through the middle from the present lower end, is 3,682-feet. It may have extended about 3,000-feet farther, as it is said that in ancient days the now missing lower part extended along the point north of Keauhou Bay nearly to the Protestant open chapel by beautiful He`eia Bay.”

“On completion of their slides the chiefs would have their close attendants (kahus) transport them and their surfboards by canoe to a point about a mile offshore and a little to the north, from where they would ride in He‘eia on the great waves of the noted surf of Kaulu.”

Kauikeauoli, born at Keauhou and later to become ruler of the entire island chain (as Kamehameha III,) was reportedly a great athlete and especially enjoyed hōlua sliding.

As Baker, in the 1916 Hawaiian Annual, wrote, “At Keauhou, on a pretty little bay part way between the other bays, is a well-preserved papa holua, a broad, well-built, undulating toboggan-like slide, built before his reign for Kamehameha III to slide down on sleds, with his friends, over the grass-covered slide made slippery with kukui-nut oil.”

“The slide used to pass out behind the chapel on the north arm of the bay. There the prince and his friends would take surf-boards and return by water to the head of the bay.”

“After the prince had started the sport, others might slide as well. Originally, the slide was over a mile long, about three-quarters of a mile still being in good condition. It is fifty feet wide for the entire distance, and across one it is raised ten feet.”

There are other hōlua in the islands. One, on Kaua‘i, has two slides crossing each other on a pu‘u, northwest of Kōloa; another is a well-preserved 400- to 500-foot long hōlua near Kapua, South Kona.

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  • Keauhou-Holua_Slide-(KeauhouResort)
  • Holua_at_Keauhou_Shopping_Village-(KeauhouResort)
  • Holua_Sled-(BishopMuseum)
  • Holua_Slide-(HerbKane)
  • Detail_of_Holua_Sled-(National Library of Medicine (NLM))

Filed Under: Hawaiian Traditions, Place Names Tagged With: Keauhou, Kekahuna, Hawaii, Holua

August 13, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sailors

“The longer a man is out of his own country, the more he feels the need of support. To a Parisian, then, every Parisian is a relative; to a Frenchman all Frenchmen are friends; to a European, any European Is a compatriot, a fellow citizen.”

“And a sailor extends even further this community of feeling. Any man whose name is inscribed on the master roll of a ship is a child of the same great family, almost a brother.”

“The sailor greets him, defends him, makes sacrifices for him, and, above all, will consider it shameful to be made use of in any way harm a man of his own craft.”

“It is in the months of October and November that the English and American whaling ships, having spent the summer off the coast of Japan, come to the Sandwich Islands to refresh their crews and put their vessels in shape to go back to sea …”

“… either to return home if their whaling is finished or to continue the work if they do not yet have a full cargo. And in fact there arrived many such ships belonging to these two nations.”

“One cannot help noticing a great difference between the one and the other.”

“The Americans do not use ships of more than four hundred tons; they all arrive here in a state of uncleanness and disrepair1hat indicates a lack of discipline and care.”

“The English ships, much larger and more difficult to maintain since they are almost all renovated warships, appear on the contrary pleasingly neat and orderly.”

“We saw American whalers that remained a week in the harbor without loosing their wet sails to dry and others that let them Rap in the wind for several days without furling them.”

“On the English ships the oil casks are stowed away as they are filled and not touched until arrival In England. The Americans have to heave theirs onto the deck at least once in order to reseal them; without this precaution they would lose half their contents.”

“The English have perfected their casks , while the ship owners of Boston and Nantucket follow an old practice that they do not wish to change.”

“But if the English show more order and capacity to manage their ships, once the whalers have reached the Sandwich lslands the two groups compete with each other in dissipation.”

“English and American officers and sailors, all display the same manners. As soon as set foot on land, the streets are full of drunken men, nothing is to be heard but quarrels and bickering.”

“What a spectacle for the islanders, you see them run shouting toward the places where the Yankees and Jhn Bulls dispute their differences.”

The Captains arrive, sometimes more drunk than the men, and would send them back on board; the latter resist; the captains strike, and sometimes the sailors strike back; all shout at the same time; the God damns and damnation are Iike thunder; kicks and blows of the fist come down like hail; black eyes shine like lightning.”

“It is late at night before the storm abates only to blow up again the next day.”

“Few of these ships complete their voyages without some kind of mutiny or revolt, but there is good reason to believe that if the captain and officers were more sober, the sailors would be more obedient and peaceable.”

“Every day the English consul finds it necessary to have some of them flogged.”

“In general and with very exceptions the foreigners who have settles in the Sandwich Islands are the dregs of all countries, and they have brought their vices with them.”

“There are always a number of them around the young king, corrupting and giving bad counsel. Among them are several who have escaped from Botany Bay having been branded for crimes in England.”

“The consul is aware of this situation but has no way to prevent It. For the honor of his country, however, he would not suffer the executioner (flogger) to be a compatriot of his.”

“The season that brings English and American whalers to this archipelago attracts also those ships that trade furs on the Northwest Coast of America, few of which wish to pass the winter on those frozen shores.”

“During the month of October there arrived four of them, all of which had failed to prosper in this business. One of them, the Louisa, out of Boston, staying through a winter and two summers, had been able to procure only eight hundred beaver pelts and one hundred twenty otter skins, and the latter had cost eight times what they were worth ten years before.”

“It appears that this commerce, formerly so rich, is now quite done for, and the natives have turned sour in their relations with the whites.”

“Continually at war among themselves, they have become more savage and intractable than ever; they now hunt the otter only for their own needs.”

“During the years 1827 and 1828 ten vessels have traded for fewer than half the otter skins that a single ship could once have done in three months, and the ones they did obtain have cost them four or five times as much.”

“All the ships that came to the Sandwich Islands during my stay in Honolulu were obliged to sell at public auction what remained of their trading goods. …”

“One cannot deny, however, that (the) American missionaries have contributed much to the civilization of the archipelago as we understand that word, and if the pure Christian doctrine is not the basis of their instruction, they have at least enabled these people to enjoy some of the benefits of Christianity in teaching them the ethics of the Gospels.”

“They have been able to adapt the English alphabet or a part of it to the Sandwich Island idiom and they have succeeded in teaching these people to read and write their own language. There is a printing shop where they print in the Sandwich language the works judged proper for the people to read. …”

“Through the influence of Kaahumanu they receive kapus from the king for everything they want: to build their churches, their houses, their cloisters, their walls, and the like. At such times all the people are required to perform the prescribed tasks. “

“Another kapu fills the schools. In addition to these kapus for the benefit of the missionaries others are used by the king, the queen and the chiefs to get work done for themselves.” (All from French sea captain Auguste Dehaut-Cilly who made round-the world travels between 1826 and 1829.)

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Filed Under: General, Sailing, Shipping & Shipwrecks, Economy Tagged With: Sailor, Hawaii, Sailors

August 12, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Female Seminaries

Hawaiian female seminaries grew out of the evolution of education of middle class white women in the US. Because the primary educators responsible for developing the education system of Hawai’i were Americans, the educational practices for Hawaiian girls tended to mirror, but not necessarily duplicate, what was taking place on the continent. (Beyer)

It was believed that women would have to be educated to understand domestic economy because they were to play the major role in educating the young, primarily in their homes, and later as the school population rose and there was a shortage of teachers, as school teachers.

The founders of the female seminaries were at first men who were committed to providing education for women, but as time went by, more of the founders were women. The financial backing for these seminaries were typically from private sources and the tuition charged the students. Enrollment varied between 50 to 100 students.

The men of the mission to Hawai’i were prepared for the work by education, work experience, and the sense of a calling. Their backgrounds were usually rural, and often farming had been the family livelihood. They were from the middle class. Their education had been preceded by engagement in various kinds of work: the employment with charitable or religious concerns; and traveling the northeast with tracts, Bibles, and the missionary message, or the call to revival.

The women of the mission were quick, efficient, and multi-talented. Also from rural, middle-class backgrounds, they were adaptable in terms of skills, worked to fund their own education, and were not accustomed to leisure or easy living. Most had secured their education at intervals, while supporting themselves by teaching, by farm labor, or skilled trade.

When the daughters of these missionaries or new recruits from the US took over the education of Hawaiian females during the last 40 years of the 19th century, many more were trained in the female seminaries of the US.

In the Islands, the first female seminary students were adult Hawaiian women. Patricia Grimshaw states: “… that (s)oon after their arrival in Hawai’i in 1820, and over the next three decades, New England missionary women embarked on an ambitious plan to transform Hawaiian girls and women to notions of femininity upheld by their culture.”

“The plan and design of the Female Seminary is to take a class of young females into a boarding school—away in a measure from the contaminating influence of heathen society, to train them to habits of industry, neatness, and order …”

“… to instruct them in employments suited to their sex, to cultivate the minds, to improve their manners and to instill the principles of our holy religion – to fit them to be suitable companions for the scholars of the Mission Seminary and examples of propriety among the females of the Sandwich Islands.” (Dibble)

In 1835, at the general meeting of the Mission, a resolution was passed to promote boarding schools for Hawaiians; several male boarding schools and two female boarding schools were begun.

Wailuku Female Seminary (or the Central Female Seminary, as it was first called) was the first female school begun by the missionaries (1837). It received support at a time when the missionaries were experimenting with both boarding schools and a manual labor system.

Fidelia Coan, the wife of Reverend Titus Coan, began Hilo Girls’ Boarding School in 1838. The Hilo school was opened for 20 girls from seven to 10 years old. Hilo residents helped erect and furnish the school building, and arranged to supply food for the pupils.

On January 16, 1860, the Privy Council authorized the chartering of the Makiki Family School. In family schools, young girls lived in the homes of the instructors; the instruction included both academics and domestic craft. It later closed, with the formation of Kawaiaha’o Seminary.

In 1862, Orramel Hinckley Gulick and his wife, Ann Eliza Clark Gulick began the Kaʻū Seminary on the Island of Hawai‘i. Both were the children of missionaries (Peter Johnson Gulick and Fanny Hinckley Thomas Gulick; Ephraim Weston Clark and Mary Kittredge Clark.)

Due to the isolated location of the seminary, it was difficult to attract many students to the school. In 1865, after struggling to fill the school, it was decided to move the school to Waialua, Oʻahu, on the Anahulu Stream.

“Honolulu Female Academy (is) another of the schools provided by Christian benevolence for the benefit of the children of this highly favored land. This institution will, it is hoped, supply a felt need for a home for girls, in the town of Honolulu, yet not too near its center of business.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, April 13, 1867)

In 1867, the Hawaiian Mission Children’s Society (HMCS – an organization consisting of the children of the missionaries and adopted supporters) decided to support a girls’ boarding school.

Miss Lydia Bingham (daughter of Reverend Hiram Bingham, leader of the Pioneer Company of missionaries to Hawaiʻi) became teacher and principal.

It was later named Kawaiahaʻo Female Seminary. In January 1869, Miss Elizabeth Kaʻahumanu (Lizzie) Bingham arrived from the continent to be an assistant to her sister. Lizzie later became principal.

The Kohala Girl’s School was Reverend Elias Bond’s last major undertaking. For 30-years prior to the 1874 founding of the Kohala Girl’s School, Reverend Bond ran a boarding school for boys. His decision to build a separate facility to educate native Hawaiian women in Christian living and housekeeping was made in 1872.

The last of the female seminaries that was begun by the missionaries was initially called the Makawao Family School. Later called Maunaʻolu Seminary, it was an out-growth of the “East Maui Female Seminary

At the end of the century, all the female seminaries in Hawai‘i began to lose students to the newly-founded Kamehameha School for Girls.

This latter school was established in 1894; it was not technically a seminary or founded by missionaries, but all the girls enrolled were Hawaiian, and its curriculum was very similar to what was used at the missionary-sponsored seminaries.

Above text is a summary – Click HERE for more information

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Waialua_Female_Seminary-_c._1865
Bailey_House-right-Seminary_-left-_painting-NPS-1880
Wailuku Female Seminary-Mission Houses
Wailuku Female Seminary-Mission Houses
Kawaiahaʻo_Female_Seminary-MissionHouses-400
Kawaiahao Female Seminary
Gulick_Home_expanded_to_house-Kawaiahaʻo_Female-Seminary

Filed Under: Buildings, Missionaries / Churches / Religious Buildings, Schools Tagged With: Hawaii, Waialua Female Seminary, Kawaiahao Seminary, Wailuku Female Seminary, Female Seminaries

August 11, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Caste Social Structure

During the period from about AD 1400 to European contact, Hawaiian society underwent a transformation from descent-based (its ancestral Polynesian system) to a state-like society.

The structure that came to characterize Hawaiian society – consisting of a high upper class supported by an underprivileged lower class – was somewhat suggestive of ancient Mediterranean and Asian civilizations, as well as of medieval Europe.

The Hawaiian concept of the universe embodied the interrelationship of the gods, man and nature. The former, although the ultimate controlling influence in this system, granted their direct descendants – the royalty – control over the land, the sea and their resources.

“The condition of the common people was that of subjection to the chiefs, compelled to do their heavy tasks, burdened and oppressed, some even to death. The life of the people was one of patient endurance, of yielding to the chiefs to purchase their favor. The plain man (kanaka) must not complain.” (Malo)

At the time of European contact in 1778, Hawaiian society comprised four levels. People were born into specific social classes; social mobility was not unknown, but it was extremely rare. The Kapu System separated Hawaiian society into four groups of people:

  • Aliʻi, the ruling class of chiefs and nobles (kings, high chiefs, low chiefs) considered to be of divine origin who ruled specific territories and who held their positions on the basis of family ties and leadership abilities – the chiefs were thought to be descendants of the gods;
  • Kahuna, the priests (who conducted religious ceremonies at the heiau and elsewhere) and master craftsmen (experts in medicine, religion, technology, natural resource management and similar areas) who ranked near the top of the social scale
  • Makaʻainana, commoners (the largest group) those who lived on the land – primarily laborers, farmers, fishermen, and the like; they labored not only for themselves and their families, but to support the chiefs; and
  • Kauwa (or Kauā), social outcasts, “untouchables” — possibly lawbreakers or war captives, who were considered “unclean” or kapu. Their position was hereditary, and they were attached to “masters” in some sort of servitude status. Marriage between higher castes and the kauwa was strictly forbidden.

“As to why in ancient times a certain class of people were ennobled and made into aliis, and another class into subjects (kanaka), why a separation was made between chiefs and commoners, has never been explained.” (Malo)

The aliʻi attained high social rank in several ways: by heredity, by appointment to political office, by marriage or by right of conquest. The first was determined at birth, the others by the outcomes of war and political processes.

“The chiefs were anxious also to preserve the pure blood of their class by arranging marriages between chiefs and chiefesses. …”

The mating to a sister or near relative, which was not permitted to lesser chiefs or the relatives of chiefs, was considered desirable between very high chiefs in order to produce children of divine rank who carried the sacred fire (ahi) tabu.”

“Such a mating was for the purpose of bearing children, but the two need not become man and wife. Thus the chiefs multiplied, thrived, grew, and spread out over the land; but today we are taught that such practices are wrong.” (Kamakau)

“The makaainana were the fixed residents of the land; the chiefs were the ones who moved about from place to place. It was the makaainanas also who did all the work on the land; yet all they produced from the soil belonged to the chiefs; and the power to expel a man from the land and rob him of his possessions lay with the chief.” (Malo)

Power and prestige, and thus class divisions, were defined in terms of mana. Although the gods were the full embodiment of this sacredness, the royalty possessed it to a high degree because of their close genealogical ties to those deities.

The kahuna ratified this relationship by conducting ceremonies of appeasement and dedication on behalf of the chiefs, which also provided ideological security for the commoners who believed the gods were the power behind natural forces.

“If the people were slack in doing the chief’s work they were expelled from their lands, or even put to death. For such reasons as this and because of the oppressive exactions made upon them, the people held the chiefs in great dread and looked upon them as gods.” (Malo)

“Only a small portion of the kings and chiefs ruled with kindness; the large majority simply lorded it over the people. It was from the common people, however, that the chiefs received their food and their apparel for men and women, also their houses and many other things.” (Malo)

Commoners possessed little mana and were therefore prohibited from entering any of the sacred places where aliʻi and gods communicated, such as the heiau in which the upper class honored their gods. Outcasts, with no mana, could interact with commoners but not approach the upper class.

“The commoners were the most numerous class of people in the nation, and were known as the ma-ka-aina-na; another name by which they were called was hu (hu, to swell, multiply, increase like yeast.)” (Malo)

As Handy states: “It is evident that kapu determined and regulated the three castes. For the aliʻi (and kahuna,) the kapu of sanctity was at once a wall of protection and the source of prestige and authority.”

“The same kapu determined for the commoners their social and economic relationship to, and their reverential attitude towards their overlords. As for the kauwa, their segregation and exclusion from the social organism was due to a kapu of defilement.”

This social structure was reinforced by the kapu, the Hawaiian religious, political and social structure that lasted for 500-years. (Lots of information here from an NPS report, as well as others, as noted.) The painting is by Herb Kane – “Council of Chiefs.”

  • Council_of_Chiefs-(HerbKane)

Filed Under: General, Ali'i / Chiefs / Governance Tagged With: Hawaii, Kauwa, Makaainana, Caste

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Images of Old Hawaiʻi

People, places, and events in Hawaiʻi’s past come alive through text and media in “Images of Old Hawaiʻi.” These posts are informal historic summaries presented for personal, non-commercial, and educational purposes.

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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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