Samuel Kamakau (1815-1876) wrote nearly 300 articles on the history and culture of his people. First printed in Hawaiian language newspapers, many of his articles were later translated into English, edited and published in Ruling Chiefs of Hawaii, The People
Samuel Kamakau (1815-1876) wrote nearly 300 articles on the history and culture of his people. First printed in Hawaiian language newspapers, many of his articles were later translated into English, edited and published in Ruling Chiefs of Hawaii, The People of Old, The Works of the People of Old, and Tales and Traditions of the People of Old. In Ruling Chiefs, Kamakau describes, from a Hawaiian perspective, the initial reaction on Kaua‘i to the coming of Captain Cook in January 1778.
He wrote that a man named Moapu, fishing at sea at the time, saw one of Cook’s ships sailing by in the dark off Waimea with lights on board. Later, when “Resolution” and “Discovery” lay off Waimea, someone on shore asked, “What are those branching things?” Another answered, “They are trees moving about the sea.”
Kamakau also states that Kuohu, a kahuna of Waimea, declared that the ship “… can be nothing else than the heiau of Lono, the tower of Keolewa, and the place of sacrifice at the altar.”
When some Hawaiians went aboard Cook’s ship, they said, “Oh, how much dagger material (pahoa) there is here!” (The Hawaiians did not produce iron, but they knew what it was, since pieces of iron had come ashore from time to time with driftwood).
When Cook’s men shot guns and skyrockets into the night, the Hawaiians called the rockets “the fires of Lono-makua,” the gun flash “the lightening,” and its report “Kane in the thunder.”
And according to Kamakau, Kaeo, the ruling chief of Kauai, “gave to Captain Cook his wife’s daughter Lelemahoalani, who was a sister of Kaumualii. . .,” and “Kaeo caused Lelemahoalani, the chiefess, to sleep on the heiau,” claims refuted by historian John F.G. Stokes in the Hawaiian Historical Society Annual Report for 1930.
