Matariki

The eyes of the god

Matariki is the Māori name for the Pleiades, the star cluster in Taurus. It is short for Ngā mata o te ariki o Tāwhirimātea, “the eyes of the god Tāwhirimātea”. In Māori tradition Tāwhirimātea, god of the wind and weather, was so enraged when his parents, the sky and the earth, were separated that he tore out his eyes and flung them into the heavens. The cluster is visible from New Zealand for most of the year, but it sets in the west in May and disappears for about a month. Its reappearance just before sunrise in late June or early July begins the first month of the Māori lunar calendar.

Traditions differ between regions and iwi. Some mark the new year by the rising of Puanga, the star Rigel, instead of Matariki, and others use other stars. According to Te Papa, the national museum, all Māori marked the new year by watching the pre-dawn rising of stars in winter.

Viewing, remembering, feeding the stars

The traditional ceremony had three parts. First the stars were viewed, over the three or four nights of Tangaroa to allow for winter weather: if they shone clear and bright, a warm season was expected, and hazy or twinkling stars foretold bad weather. Then the names of everyone who had died since Matariki last rose were recited with laments, and the dead were believed to be cast into the sky to become stars. Finally came whāngai i te hautapu, an offering of food: a small earth oven, a hāngī, was opened so that its steam rose to feed the stars. The ceremony ended at sunrise and was followed by days of song, dance and feasting.

A new holiday

Matariki celebrations had almost disappeared by the early twentieth century; the last traditional ones were recorded in the 1940s. A revival began in the early 1990s, led by iwi and organisations including Te Papa, and today schools, libraries and city councils celebrate with concerts, festivals of light and tree planting — Wellington moved its Guy Fawkes fireworks to a Matariki festival in 2018. Matariki became an official public holiday for the first time on 24 June 2022. Its dates, agreed by the Matariki Advisory Committee, have been published for decades ahead.