‘The resting home of Kings’: The significance of Taupiri Maunga
Wednesday, 4 September 2024
Taupiri Maunga will play a significant part in the burial of Kīngi Tūheitia.
The urupā on the mountain is where all Māori monarchs have been buried.
Kīngi Tūheitia will be sailed down the Waikato River to the mountain before being carried up to his final resting place.
Over the past few days, tens of thousands of people from across the motu have been making their way to Tūrangawaewae Marae in Ngāruawāhia to pay their final respects to the late Kīngi Tūheitia.
The Māori monarch and leader of the Kīngitanga will be laid to rest on Thursday, concluding his six-day tangi.
A central point of the funeral will be Taupiri Maunga, which is where the King will be buried.
Lying at the southern end of the Taupiri range in Waikato, the 288m-tall mountain overlooks the Taupiri township and is of utmost significance to both Waikato-Tainui iwi and the Kīngitanga movement.
Read this story in te reo Māori and English here. / Pānuitia_ tēnei i te reo Māori me te reo Pākehā ki konei._
Since 1881, the mountain has been the sacred burial ground for Waikato-Tainui and the Kīngitanga.
Initially a pā site built by Chief Te Putu, the maunga was home to the Ngāti Mahuta tribe.
However, in 1798, Te Putu was killed outside the pā on the banks of the Waikato River.
He was buried at the pā, with the site becoming tapu thereafter and abandoned.
All the Māori monarchs have been buried at the urupā that sits on the side of the mountain overlooking Great South Road.
The last monarch to be buried there was the Māori Queen, Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu in 2006.
In a funeral attended by tens of thousands, the Queen was sailed down the Waikato River on a waka before being carried up the mountain to her final resting place.
These scenes will be repeated on Thursday for Kīngi Tūheitia, with his journey from Tūrangawaewae Marae to the maunga likely to take two hours.
Tukoroirangi Morgan, the chair of Te Arataura, Waikato-Tainui’s executive board, told Stuff the maunga has always been sacred to Waikato.
“There is a tribal saying, when Te Wherowhero was acknowledged, he is acknowledged by his mountain, by his river, and by his tribe. Te Wherowhero is the man and Taupiri is the mountain. Taupiri has always been the sacred mountain for the people of Waikato since he was the king.”
The Māori monarchs are buried in the highest part of the urupā and traditionally their graves were left unmarked.
“Gravestones were not acceptable,” Morgan said.
“King Tāwhiao believed everyone should be equal in death and that headstones are not necessary. Headstones are a Pākehā invention. They are not a Māori invention.”
The exact site of Kīngi Tuheitia’s grave will be kept secret. “It’s not a park,” Morgan said.
“It’s not for any ordinary person to walk up that mountain. It is not a place where people can just wander around.
“There are things called respect and cultural pride,” Morgan added. “The reverence and respect that we have for Taupiri is the same for any other major burial site around the world.
“You treat it with reverence, you treat it with the utmost respect, and that is what we expect all New Zealanders to adhere to.”
Proceedings for the funeral of Kīngi Tūheitia will begin at 10am on Thursday.
Following tradition, the coronation of the new monarch will also take place, with the successor unveiled ahead of the funeral service.
A fleet of four waka will take Kīngi Tūheitia down the Waikato River to Taupiri Maunga.
He will be met there by members of the Tūrangawaewae and Taniwharau rugby league clubs, and rope handlers from Raungaiti Rugby Club who will carry the King to the summit for burial.