Menehune, myths, legends, and folktales

Aloha readers!

You’ve heard of the “Menehune”…

The so-called “little people” of Hawaii (and more specifically of Kauai) have a plethora of myths, legends, and folktales related to their existence. While there are modern-day interpretations of them as imp-like, similar to gnomes or dwarves (or even leprechauns), it is most fascinating to read what the oldest recorded stories about the Menehune have described these quasi-mythological people to be like.

While the number of books in-print about the Menehune is very scant, we are fortunate to have available to us readers this reproduction of the 1951 treatise by Katharine Luomala: “The Menehune of Polynesia and Other Mythical Little People of Oceania”, which wonderfully gives us the meat of the information most of us who are interested have been wanting to find.

The Menehune of Hawaii are covered in every available extent that the author could find, relating both the historical records of the mentions of their existence (such as the 65 self-identified Menehune dwelling in the “Laau” region of Wainiha during the census in the early 1800s) as well as any myths that were available at the time.

Covered in very good detail (including contrary reports) is an overview of their physical legacy: their stonework, to which many places today are still credited to their efforts.

What makes this work even more interesting is how Luomala brings together all of the other Polynesian myths which are related to the Menehune (even similarly-named such as the “Manahune”), showing how these myths may or may not be related and why.

For anyone wanting to find perhaps one of the best primers on the myths and mythological origins of the ever-elusive Menehune, we highly recommend this book.

Once we started carrying it in our bookstore, it has become one of our popular sellers!

Enjoy!

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Ed & Cynthia Justus are the owners of The Bookstore in Hanapepe.