Social Classes of Ancient Hawaii
There was a great difference between chiefs. Some were given to robbery, spoliation, murder, extortion, ravishing. There were few kings who conducted themselves properly as Kamehameha I did. He looked…
From: Unknown To: 1903 C.E.
Location: Hawaii
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From Hawaiian Antiquities by David Malo, 1903.
There was a great difference between chiefs. Some were given to robbery, spoliation, murder, extortion, ravishing. There were few kings who conducted themselves properly as Kamehameha I did. He looked well after the peace of the land.
On account of the rascality (kolohe) of some of the chiefs to the common people, warlike contests frequently broke out between certain chiefs and the people, and many of the former were killed in battle by the commoners. The people made war against bad kings in old times.
The amount of property which the. chiefs obtained from the people was very great. Some of it was given in the shape of taxes, some was the fruit of robbery and extortion.
Now the people in the out-districts (kua-aina) were as a rule industrious, while those about court or who lived with the chiefs were indolent, merely living on the income of the land. Some of the chiefs carried themselves haughtily and arrogantly, being supported by contributions from others without labor of their own. As was the chief, so were his retainers (kanaka).
On this account the number of retainers, servants and hangers-on about the courts and residences of the kings and high chiefs was very great. The court of a king offered great attractions to the lazy and shiftless.
These people about court were called pu-ali or ai-alo (those who eat in the presence), besides which there were many other names given them. One whom the alii took as an intimate was called ai-kane. An adopted child was called keiki hookama.
The person who brought up an alii and was his guardian was called a kahu; he who managed the distribution of his properly was called a puu-ku. The house where the property of the alii was stored was called a hale pa-paa (house with strong fence). The keeper of the king's apparel (master of the king's robes), or the place where they were stored, was called hale opeope, the folding house.
The steward who had charge of the king's food was called an 'a-i-puu-puu, calloused-neck. He who presided over the king's pot de chambre was called a lomi-lomi, i.e., a masseur. He who watched over the king during sleep was called kiai-poo, keeper of the head. The keeper of the king's idol was called kahu-akua.
The priest who conducted the religious ceremonies in the king's heiau was a kahuna pule. He who selected the site for building a heiau and designed the plan of it was called a kuhi-kuhi puu-one. He who observed and interpreted the auguries of the heavens was called a kilo-lani. A person skilled in strategy and war was called a kaa-kaua. A counselor, skilled in statecraft, was called a kalai-moku (kalai, to hew; moku, island.) Those who farmed the lands of the king or chiefs were kono-hiki.
The man who had no land was called a kaa-owe. The temporary hanger-on was called a kua-lana (lana, to float. After hanging about the alii’s residence for a time, he shifted to some other alii. TRANSLATOR) another name for such a vagrant was kuewa (a genuine tramp, who wheedled his way from place to place). The servants who handled the fly-brushes kahili, about the king's sleeping place were called haa-kue; another name for them was kua-lana-puhi; or they were called olu-eke-loa-hoo-kaa-moena.
Beggars were termed auhau-puka or noi (a vociferous beggar), or makilo (a silent beggar), or apiki.
One who was born at the residence of the king or of a chief was termed a kanaka no-hii-alo, or if a chief, alii no-hii-alo (noho i ke alo). A chief who cared for the people was said to be a chief of aau-loa or of mahu-kai-loa. A man who stuck to the service of a chief through thick and thin and did not desert him in time of war, was called a kanaka no kahi kaua, a man for the battle-field. This epithet was applied also to chiefs who acted in the same way.
People who were clever in speech and at the same time skillful workmen were said to be noeau or noiau. There are many terms applicable to the court, expressive of relations between king and chiefs and people, which will necessarily escape mention.
As to why in ancient times a certain class of people were ennobled and made into aliis, and another class into subjects (kanaka), why a separation was made between chiefs and commoners, has never been explained.
Perhaps in the earliest times all the people were alii and it was only after the lapse of several generations that a division was made into commoners and chiefs; the reason for this division being that men in the pursuit of their own gratification and pleasure wandered off in one direction and another until they were lost sight of and forgotten.
Perhaps this theory will in part account for it: a handsome, but worthless, chief takes up with a woman of the same sort, and, their relatives having cast them out in disgust, they retire to some out of the way place; and their children, born in the backwoods amid rude surroundings, are forgotten.
Another possible explanation is that on account of lawlessness, rascality, dishonorable conduct, theft, impiousness and all sorts of criminal actions that one had committed, his fellow chiefs banished him, and after long residence in some out of the way place, all recollection of him and his pedigree was lost.
Another reason no doubt was that certain ones leading a vagabond life roamed from place to place until their ancestral genealogies came to be despised, (wahawaha ia) and were finally lost by those whose business it was to preserve them. This cause no doubt helped the split into chiefs and commoners.
The commoners were the most numerous class of people in the nation, and were known as the ma-ka-aina-na; another name by which they were called was hu. (Hu, to swell, multiply, increase like yeast.) The people who lived on the windward, that was the back, or koolan side of any island, were called kua-aina or back-country folks, a term of depreciation, however.
The condition of the common people was that of subjection to the chiefs, compelled to do their heavy tasks, burdened and oppressed, some even to death. The life of the people was one of patient endurance, of yielding to the chiefs to purchase their favor. The plain man (kanaka) must not complain.
If the people were slack in doing the chief's work they were expelled from their lands, or even put to death. For such reasons as this and because of the oppressive exactions made upon them, the people held the chiefs in great dread and looked upon them as gods.
Only a small portion of the kings and chiefs ruled with kindness; the large majority simply lorded it over the people.
It was from the common people, however, that the chiefs received their food and their apparel for men and women, also their houses and many other things. When the chiefs went forth to war some of the commoners also went out to fight on the same side with them.
The makaainana were the fixed residents of the land; the chiefs were the ones who moved about from place to place. It was the makaainanas also who did all the work on the land; yet. all they produced from the soil belonged to the chiefs; and the power to expel a man from the land and rob him of his possessions lay with the chief.
There were many names descriptive of the makaainanas. Those who were born in the back-districts were called kanaka no-hii-kua (noho-i-kua), people of the back. The man who lived with the chief and did not desert him when war came, was called a kanaka no lua-kaua, a man for the pit of battle.
The people were divided into farmers, fishermen, house-builders, canoe-makers (kalai-waa), etc. They were called by many different appellations according to the trades they followed.
The (country) people generally lived in a state of chronic fear and apprehension of the chiefs; those of them, however, who lived immediately with the chief were (to an extent) relieved of this apprehension.
After sunset the candles of kukui-nuts were lighted and the chief sat at meat. The people who came in at that time were called the people of lani-ka-e, Those who came in when the midnight lamp was burning (ma ke kui au-moe) were called the people of pohokano. This lamp was merely to talk by, there was no eating being done at that time.
The people who sat up with the chief until day-break (to carry-on, tell stories, gossip, or perhaps play some game, like konane. TRANSLATOR), were called ma-ko'u because that was the name of the flambeau generally kept burning at that hour.
There were three designations applied to the kalai-moku, or counselors of state. The kalaimoku who had served under but one king was called lani-ka'e. He who had served under two kings was called a pohokano, and if one had served three kings he was termed a ma-ko'u. This last class were regarded as being most profoundly skilled in statecraft, from the fact that they had had experience with many kings and knew wherein one king had failed and wherein another had succeeded.
It was in this way that these statesmen had learned by experience that one king by pursuing a certain policy had met with disaster, and how another king, through following a different policy had been successful. The best course for the king would have been to submit to the will of the people.
Malo, David. Hawaiian Antiquities: (Moolelo Hawaii). Translated by Nathaniel Bright Emerson, Hawaiian Gazette Co., 1903.
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