'Awa Mōʻī

Kii:  Kawika Winters

Awa Mōʻī is a dark variety of Hawaiian 'awa that is also used as an offering to the akua, because of its dark color on the visual stems, like 'awa Hiwa. Its ancient use was for ceremonial practices for the akua, kahuna and the chiefs of Hawaii.

The word Mōʻī according to the Hawaiian Dictionary by Mary Kawena Pukui ,and Samuel H. Elbert means sovereign, monarch, majesty, ruler, queen. (Perhaps related to ʻī, supreme. According to J. F. G. Stokes, the word moʻī, king, is of recent origin and was first in print in 1832.) Temple image (Malo 162); lord of images (Malo 173); according to Kepelino and Kamakau, a rank of chiefs who could succeed to the government but who were of lower rank than chiefs descended from the god Kāne (For. 6:266). See ikū nuʻu. The term mōʻī was apparently not used in the Fornander legends collected in the 1860s nor in RC.

Black or 'ele'ele was the color usually reserved for the gods. The darker the color the better the offering.The Mōʻī stem is not as dark as the Hiwa and the internodes are also shorter in length than the Hiwa. The color of the Mōʻī stem can range from a black to dirty brown to a reddish tinge, with some green areas. The piko of the lau or leaf is dark like the stem.

The 'awa Hiwa, being a glossy black sometimes, is considered a much-prized offering over the Mōʻī due to its visual presentation and its name Hiwa, which means " completely black with no blemishes of flaws in color or traits, a choice variety ". Being the Hiwa variety, it is the highest form of 'Awa that can be offered, as is the hiwa form of the niu, or coconut, as with the pua'a hiwa or completely black pig (no blemishes or other color markings). Kamakau, a Hawaiian scholar and Historian of old wrote," the stems of the Mōʻī  [ variety] grow straight up, with sections like those of the Honuaʻula sugar cane or Kō.

Ko Honua'ula

Kii: Noa Kekuewa Lincoln

Journal of The Polynesian Society

Volume 57 1948 > Volume 57, No. 2 > Kava in Hawaii, ret Titcomb, p 105-171

KAVA IN HAWAII

BY MARGARET TITCOMB.

pg. 122

Vancouver (57, Vol. 2, p. 182): “His (Kahekili of Maui) age I suppose must have exceeded fifty, he was greatly debilitated and enervated, and from the colour of the skin, I judge his feebleness to have been brought on by excessive use of awa.” Ellis (15, Vol. 2, p. 168): “Their general drink is water or the milk of the coconut, but all the chiefs use the awa, and some of them to excess, as was very evident from their skins, which were rough and parched as can well be conceived, and their eyes red and inflamed.” Kotzebue (35, Vol. 2, p. 199): “How unhealthy the constant use of this root must be is proved by the many ulcers with which the inhabitants are afflicted.”

In the following chant, probably one of praise, the skin, evidently affected by awa indulgence in the kapu periods, is described. (21, IV, p. 242.) (Translation revised by Kawena Pukui.)

O Ka'ihikapu, 'ili manoa,

'Ili pepe'e, pepe'e i ke kapu,

Ka 'ili pe'e ku-e o ke 'ili o Mano,

No Mano 'ili 'oi, 'ili kalakala,

Ke kalakala o ka lau ea pu,

Ke kalakala o ka i'a 'ili e'e,

Ka 'ili 'e, o Mano, lae pohaku.

O Kaihikapu with the thick skin,

Crusted skin, crusted by the kapu.

The thick, coarse skin of the chief Mano,

Mano of the pimply rough skin, the gritty rough skin,

Like the roughness of the coarse, exposed leaf,

Like the roughness of the rough-skinned fish,

The peculiar skin of Mano, he of the hard forehead.