The Naming of Ohau

Motutawa Island sits in the bay of Okawa, located north of

the Rotorua township. The name was also transferred to the

green lake by the great Tūhourangi chief Te Rangipuawhe, an

earlier occupant of the island located at Okawa. One day he

called his people from the surrounding citadels of Pungarehu

and Te Mitimiti and led them from Mourea to re-establishing

themselves at Rotokākāhī, The Green Lake. The island at

Okawa has seen much in its day.

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A long time ago, the warrior chief Te Takinga, a son of Pikiao

the second, was at war with the people of Taketakehikuroa,

slowly expanding his land boundaries and incrementally

overwhelming the strongholds that dotted the northern and

western headlands of lake Te Rotoiti. The loss of life was

significant, many chiefs were killed, and many more were

forced to find shelter elsewhere.

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But as Te Takinga, accompanied by his brothers, Hinekura, Te

Moho, and Te Rangiunuora, took time to lay plans for a final

push that would secure the entire lake region - Te Takinga

decided that he would leave the war assembly of chiefs.

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Te Tāiki is the name of the top of Motutawa, where these two

long-ago chiefs amicably ended the wars between their two

tribes. Motutawa was a well-fortified pā, described as a pā

whakairo; it was encircled by a great wall of solid palisading

that supported the many terraces manually fashioned to

protect the inhabitants.

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Lastly, a great network of trenches surrounded the entire

kāinga. Some of which can still be seen from the roadside

today. In the later time, it was abandoned when Hongi Hika

and his war party overwhelmed all Te Arawa with their

musket superiority in 1823; reoccupied after the invasion

of Hongi, it was re-strengthened when Te Arawa was

warring with the tribes of Ngai Te Rangi and the Ngāti

Hauā, Motutawa was one of a handful of great pā that

all hapū visited in the year 1835/36 before departing

to sack the strongholds of both Maketu and Te Tumu.

When the war-faring tribes of the East Coast wished to

cut through the boundaries of Te Arawa to meet with

the Kīngitanga in 1864, again, it was at the ancient

stronghold of Motutawa that the united chiefs of Te Arawa

met before travelling to repel the forces at Te Tūārae.

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Today, Motutawa is the last resting place for the

descendants of Te Takinga - the lone chief who was

mourning the death of his children and, incidentally, in his

grief, helped bring peace to the area.