The Samoan Story of Creation

All nations have traditions or speculations as to their own origin, and these often include a Cosmogony, by which they endeavour to account for the existence of the world, or at least of their own land, and for the creation of men to be its inhabitants. Our own Australian blacks, whom some ethnologists wrongly describe as the lowest of human beings, speak of a great Creator, known by such tribal names as Baiamai, Punjil, Nuralli, who made them and all things, and who still lives in the heavens above; in the work of creation, he carried a great knife, with which to shape the toil of his hands; in this work he is assisted by a demiourgos whom the Kamalarai tribe call Dharamulan, and certain birds and animals are also associated with him as agents; Punjil first made two men each of a lump of clay, which he gradually fashioned from the feet upwards into the human form; and, as the figures grew in symmetry and beauty, he danced round them, well satisfied with his work; then he breathed very hard on them and they lived, and began to move about as full-grown men. The one had straight hair, and the other had curly hair. Punjil's brother had control of all waters, great and small; and so, one day, he brought up by a hook from a muddy-pool two young women, and they became the companions of the two men. Some time after, Punjil came down and visited the camp of the blacks; and, becoming very angry, he used his great knife on the men, women, and children there, and cut them into very small pieces, which still lived and wriggled about like worms; these he carried into the sky, and then dropped them wherever he pleased; the pieces became men and women, and peopled the whole land. Baiamai gave to the blacks their sacred songs and their social institutions.

There is not much of a Cosmogony in this tale, for it tells us only how men were brought into being, and how Australia came to be occupied by straight-haired and curly-haired blacks; but I have introduced it here, because it bears some relation to the Polynesian myth which I am now to make known to you.

The Polynesian race of the Eastern Pacific has an elaborate system of Cosmogony, which aims at explaining how the heavens were created and sustained, how gods and men came to be, how their own islands arose; but the details thereof vary much as given by the wise men in the various groups. Of the varying forms of the great Myth of Creation, the one I have here from S_moa seems to me to be the purest and the noblest, and to be the original from which the others have come. Any one who knows Polynesia would reasonably expect this to be so, for, in many respects, the S_moans are a nobler people than most of the other islanders; they have a strong claim to be considered the parents of the race; and their highest chiefs and priests were the depositories of the old traditions and beliefs. The present myth was communicated by one of these old chiefs, Taua-nuÔu of ManuÔa, and as Mr. Powell who got it had his full confidence, I have no doubt that this is a genuine and uncorrupted record. In estimating value, we must always bear in mind that natives consider their traditional records as property which ought not to be shared with stangers; if circumstances compel them to open their stores against their will to foreigners, they so abridge or mutilate the narrative that it is then of little value, and, only when there is mutual confidence and trust as between friends, will they consent to tell the tale in its fulness and purity. Now, it is evident that this condition of friendship existed between Taua-nuÔu and Mr. Powell. Hence my belief in the genuineness of this record.