Mo‘o and the Palikū Clan:

Aerial view of Kualoa. Palikū—"vertical cliff"—is the ancient name for Kualoa.

“Those who worship the mo‘o wahine are related to the Palikū clan,” Lilikalā explains. “The Palikū means ‘erect cliff.’ It’s the name of the great genealogy of Haumea. It’s the place name in Kualoa where the cliff stands straight up.

“In the story of Haumea, she stands on the top of the cliff and defeats her enemies with kukui nuts. There’s one woman, she has a kukui nut, she multiplies her body a thousand times. She throws them from top of the cliff to hit the warriors below on their foreheads, boom! and then they die. Those are the warriors of Kumuhonua.

“The Lono priests who teach about fertility of the land and peace, they are part of Palikū. That’s the same genealogy as Haumea. But the actual management of the water, this is what’s taught in the female temple in the Hale o Papa. Of course, women teach it to their sons and to their husbands, and Pākī comes from that line. That’s why he’s in charge of fishponds. That kind of knowledge actually is not taught outside those who are part of the mo‘o clan.

“I remember when I was young first learning how to chant, I was in a chant class with an older Hawaiian woman, Leana Woodside, and we were talking about chanting. We were talking about ‘aumakua: ‘Oh, my ‘aumakua is Pele.’ And she said her ‘aumakua was mo‘o. And I said, ‘Oh, really? I haven’t been able to find anything on mo‘o. Can you tell me about mo‘o practices and mo‘o temples?’ She said, ‘Oh, no. We’re not allowed to speak of that on pain of death.’ I was like, ‘Really?’

“And so, I was more curious. But over the last 30 years, I discovered that one part of my genealogy comes from a mo‘o clan that used to live by the fish pond. You know were in ‘Iwilei where Costco is, there was a huge fish pond there before. My tutus used to own land there.

“Here’s something else: because of the worship of Haumea, only in Hawai‘i are there female temples. There are no female temples anywhere else in Polynesia, and only women go there, and they learn female knowledge: knowledge of the moon. Haumea is a mo‘o wahine, a lizard woman. They learn the knowledge of water management: surface water management for the wetland taro fields, underground water management for the fish ponds.”

Pacific Worlds > He‘eia, O‘ahu > Footprints > Mā‘eli‘eli & Mo‘o