In Māori mythology the primal couple Rangi and Papa appear in a creation myth explaining the origin of the world and the Māori people. In some South Island dialects, Rangi is called Raki or Rakinui.
Papa and Rangi held each other in a tight embrace
Tāne adorned Ranginui with stars
Māori mythology and Māori traditions are two major categories into which the remote oral history of New Zealand's Māori may be divided. Māori myths concern tales of supernatural events relating to the origins of what was the observable world for the pre-European Māori, often involving gods and demigods. Māori tradition concerns more folkloric legends often involving historical or semi-historical forebears. Both categories merge in whakapapa to explain the overall origin of the Māori and their connections to the world which they lived in.
Six major departmental atua represented by wooden godsticks: left to right, Tūmatauenga, Tāwhirimātea, Tāne Mahuta, Tangaroa, Rongo-mā-Tāne, and Haumia-tiketike.
Detail from a ridgepole (tāhūhū) in a Ngāti Awa wharenui. Believed to represent one of two ancestors: Tūwharetoa or Kahungunu.
First European impression of (Ngāti Tūmatakōkiri) Māori, at Murderers' Bay, 1642.