Cultural Narrative/ Local Histories

Whangārei-Te-Rerenga-Parāoa

The name Whangārei has a number of interpretations, one in particular is Whangārei-Te-Rerenga-Parāoa (the gathering place of whales) because whales gathered there to feed during summer, and in a Māori context, it translates to the gathering place for chiefs. Parāoa is Māori for the sperm whale and was highly regarded by Māori and symbolically the parāoa represented persons of chiefly status. 

As carved sculpture or painted motif it symbolises wealth, rich food and abundance. Its stranding heralds sacred events. As a place name Te Terenga Parāoa indicates an area rich in resources, land, food and people. To the old-time Māori the parāoa was an important gift from the gods. In large quantities it meant meat for food, oil to light lamps, massage limbs, mix coloured clay into paint, the hard bone fashioned into domestic utensils, weapons for war and items of chiefly adornment. In days past the parāoa frequented the waters outside Whangārei harbour in numbers, sometimes coming inside the harbour to strand on the outgoing tide.

Tribes living around the shore benefited from this gift. At other times tohunga, (priests) climbed pathways to rocky altars hidden on the mountain tops and performed powerful rituals attracting the parāoa, encouraging them to enter the harbour. In the early 1820s, Hongi Hika, the Ngāpuhi warlord returned from England and Australia bringing guns and ammunition for revenge against Ngāpuhi enemies. He called other chieftains of Ngāpuhi to mobilise their armies and meet at Whangārei harbour before taking to the war- trail. Seeing all the chiefs gathered here caused them to be referred to as the legendary parāoa, those ‘great fish of the ocean gathering in the harbour’.

Whangārei

The other meaning is related to Reitu and Reipae two sisters from the Waikato region. They both were aligned to marry a Chief called Ueoneone from the Te Rarawa region, during their travels on the back of a Kārearea from Waikato to Te Rarawa the sisters argued, Reipae insisted they land at the beach below them, which is now called Onerahirahi. Here she waited for her people and her brothers Te Kanapuiterangi and Kairangatira.

This event is remembered in the name Whangārei

“Ko te Tauwhanga a Reipae mo ona tungane mo Te Kanapuiterangi raua ko Kairangatira”

“The waiting place of Reipae for her brothers Te Kanapuiterangi and Kairangatira”