1/10/2024 0 Comments Paina buffet nani mau![]() This record which the Hawaiian people have left of themselves is full and specific. ![]() The most telling record of a people's intimate life is the record which it unconsciously makes in its songs. Footnote 1: (return) It might be termed a handful of lyrics strung on an epic thread. The Hawaiian song, its note of joy par excellence, was the oli but it must be noted that in every species of Hawaiian poetry, mele-whether epic or eulogy or prayer, sounding through them all we shall find the lyric note. This epic 1 of Pele was chiefly a more or less detached series of poems forming a story addressed not to the closet-reader, but to the eye and ear and heart of the assembled chiefs and people and it was sung. Thus in the cantillations of the old-time hula we find a ready-made anthology that includes every species of composition in the whole range of Hawaiian poetry. The hula had songs proper to itself, but it found a mine of inexhaustible wealth in the epics and wonder-myths that celebrated the doings of the volcano goddess Pele and her compeers. Besides this, it kept the communal imagination in living touch with the nation's legendary past. Now, the hula stood for very much to the ancient Hawaiian it was to him in place of our concert-hall and lecture-room, our opera and theater, and thus became one of his chief means of social enjoyment. The descriptive portions have been added, not because the poetical parts could not stand by themselves, but to furnish the proper setting and to answer the questions of those who want to know. This book is for the greater part a collection of Hawaiian songs and poetic pieces that have done service from time immemorial as the stock supply of the hula. Oli and mele from the hula ala'a-papa-Yarndley The ukeké (as played by Keaonaloa)-Eisner Phyllodia and true leaves of the koa Acacia koa) Hawaiian musician playing on the uku-lele Woman playing on the nose-flute (ohe-hano-ihu) Hawaiian trumpet, pu (Cassis madagascarensis) Lehua (Metrosideros polymorpha) flowers and leaves Íe-íe (Freycinetia arnotti) leaves and fruit The music and musical instruments of the Hawaiians The halau the kuahu-their decoration and consecrationĬeremonies of graduation debut of a hula dancer It is expected that this Bulletin will be followed shortly by one comprising an extended list of works relating to Hawaii, compiled by Prof. Fortunately the publication of valuable data pertaining to Hawaii is already provided for, and the present memoir by Doctor Emerson is the first of the Bureau's Hawaiian series. Funds were not specifically provided, however, for prosecuting investigations among these people, and in the absence of an appropriation for this purpose it was considered inadvisable to restrict the systematic investigations among the Indian tribes in order that the new field might be entered. Previous to the year 1906 the researches of the Bureau were restricted to the American Indians, but by act of Congress approved June 30 of that year the scope of its operations was extended to include the natives of the Hawaiian islands.
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