Hongi Hika was a New Zealand Māori rangatira and war leader of the iwi of Ngāpuhi. He was a pivotal figure in the early years of regular European contact and settlement in New Zealand. As one of the f
Hongi Hika, a sketch of an 1820 painting
Chiefs Hongi Hika (centre) and Waikato meet with Kendall
Tā moko is the permanent marking or tattooing as customarily practised by Māori, the indigenous people of New Zealand. It is one of the five main Polynesian tattoo styles.
Hongi Hika
…nephew Waikato, and Kendall travelled to England on board the whaling ship New Zealander. He spent five months in London and Cambridge where his facial moko tattoos made him something of a sensation. During the trip he met King George IV who presented him with a suit of armour. He was later to wear this in battle…
Sketch of a Māori chief, 1773 engraving by T. Chambers based on a 1769 drawing by Sydney Parkinson, from the 1784 edition of A Journal of a Voyage to the South Seas
"Portrait of a young Maori woman with moko", by Louis John Steele (1891)
Portrait of Tāmati Wāka Nene by Gottfried Lindauer (1890)
Painting by Gottfried Lindauer of a moko being carved into a man's face by a tohunga-tā-moko (tattooist)