Rangi and Papa
Videos
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
Tāne
Videos
In Māori mythology, Tāne is the god of forests and of birds, and the son of Ranginui and Papatūānuku, the sky father and the earth mother, who used to lie in a tight embrace where their many children
Rangi and Papa
…married Papatūānuku together becoming the primordial sky father and earth mother bearing over 500 children of male and female including Tāwhirimātea, Tāne and Tangaroa. Both Ranginui and Papatūānuku lie locked together in a tight embrace, and their sons forced to live in the cramped darkness between them…
A carving of Tāne-nui-a-Rangi sited at the entrance to the Auckland Zoo's forest aviary
New Zealand rainforest: the trees and birds are the children of Tāne.
Tāne Mahuta, "Lord of the Forest", in the Waipoua forest