In Hawaiian mythology

Hawaiian mythology

Hawaiian mythology refers to the legends, historical tales and sayings of the ancient Hawaiian people. It is considered a variant of a more general Polynesian mythology, developing its own unique character for several centuries before about 1800. It is associated with the Hawaiian religion...

, Laka is the name of a popular hero from Polynesia

Polynesia

Polynesia is a subregion of Oceania, made up of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are termed Polynesians and they share many similar traits including language, culture and beliefs...

n mythology. (In other parts of Polynesia he is known as Rātā, Rata, Lata, Ata, or Lasa). Lengthy legends of his exploits extend throughout the islands, and the kings of Tahiti and Hawaii claimed him as their ancestor.

In the Hawaiian legend, Laka is the son of Wahieloa

Wahieloa

In Hawaiian mythology, Wahieloa is a hero associated with the Kaha'i and Laka epics. Variations of his name in other Polynesian languages include Wahieroa , Vahieroa , Va'ieroa , Fafieloa , and Vahie'oa ....

 and Hina-hawa'e. He plans to sail to Hawaii to avenge the murder of his father, but his canoe-building is thwarted by the little gods of the forest. Because of his offerings to the great gods, however, they give him two outriggers that he binds together for his long voyage. He and his companions successfully steal the bones of his father from the cave of Kai-kapu.

In Hawaii, Laka was also a deity identified with the hula

Hula

Hula is a dance form accompanied by chant or song . It was developed in the Hawaiian Islands by the Polynesians who originally settled there. The hula dramatizes or portrays the words of the oli or mele in a visual dance form....

 and the red lehua blossom and is a deity of fertility.

In the story of Hi'iaka

Hi'iaka

In Hawaiian mythology, Hiiaka is a daughter of Haumea and Kāne. She was the patron goddess of Hawaii and the hula dancers, and takes on the task of bearing the clouds - variously, those of storms and those produced by her sister's volcanos, and lived in a grove of Lehua trees which are sacred to...

, Laka is one of Pele's sisters and guardian of the woodland.

Sources:

• R.D. Craig, Dictionary of Polynesian Mythology (Greenwood Press: New York, 1989), 134.
• M. Beckwith, Hawaiian Mythology (Yale U.P.: New Haven, 1948), 263-75.

Hawai'i

Four deities of this name may be distinguished :-

• (1) Ku-ka-ohia-LAKA, male patron of the hula-dance;
• (2) Papa-o-LAKA, the 'aumakua world of Kumu-honua;
• (3) LAKA, goddess of forest growth;
• (4) LAKA, son of Wahie-loa

Marquesas

In the Marquesan version of the myth, Aka is a great voyager, grandson of Tafaki

Kaha'i

Kaha'i is a handsome Polynesian demigod whose exploits were popular in many Polynesian mythologies.-Hawaii:...

. He made a historic voyage to Aotona (Rarotonga) in what are now the Cook Islands

Cook Islands

The Cook Islands is a self-governing parliamentary democracy in the South Pacific Ocean in free association with New Zealand...

 to obtain the highly prized feathers of a red parrot as gifts for his son and daughter. The voyage was done in a great outrigger canoe named Va'ahiva that had 140 rowers. Of these, 100 die of hunger before they reach Aotona, where they capture enough parrots to fill 140 bags with their feathers.

Sources:

• R.D. Craig, Dictionary of Polynesian Mythology (Greenwood Press: New York, 1989), 6.
• E.S.C. Handy, Marquesan Legends (Bernice P. Bishop Museum Press: Honolulu, 1930), 130-1.

Samoa

In Samoa, where this hero's name is Lata, he is a great canoe builder originally from Fiji. He builds a huge out-rigger canoe on the island of Ta'u and sails to Savai'i

Savai'i

Savaii is the largest and highest island in Samoa and the Samoa Islands chain. It is also the biggest landmass in Polynesia outside Hawaii and New Zealand. The island of Savai'i is also referred to by Samoans as Salafai, a classical Samoan term used in oratory and prose...

, where a mountain is named after him. From there, he sails to Tonga where he teaches the inhabitants better ways to build canoes.

Sources:

• R.D. Craig, Dictionary of Polynesian Mythology (Greenwood Press: New York, 1989), 134.

Tonga

In Tonga

Tonga

Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...

, he is Lasa, who captures the chief of the forest elves, Haelefeke, and compels him to help him build a great canoe and pilot it to Fiji. En route, they are tested by various demons.

Sources:

• R.D. Craig, Dictionary of Polynesian Mythology (Greenwood Press: New York, 1989), 134.
• E.E.V. Collocott, Tales and Poems of Tonga (Bernice P. Bishop Museum Press: Honolulu, 1928), 15-16.

See also

• Rātā (Māori mythology)
  Rata (Maori mythology)
  In Māori mythology, accounts vary somewhat as to the ancestry of Rātā. Usually he is a grandson of Tāwhaki and son of Wahieroa. Wahieroa is treacherously killed by Matuku-tangotango, an ogre...
  
  
• Rata (Tahitian mythology)
  Rata (Tahitian mythology)
  Rata, in Tahitian mythology, is said to have become king of Tahiti when his uncle, king Tumu-nui, and his father Vahieroa are swallowed by a great clam while they are on their way to Pitcairn. When he reaches adulthood, Rata plans to avenge his father. As in the Tuamotuan version, Rata...
  
  
• Rata (Tuamotu mythology)
  Rata (Tuamotu mythology)
  In the Tuamotu islands, the telling of the full cycle of the legend of Rata takes several evenings to tell. The legend of begins with his grandfather Kui, a demigod who marries Puehuehu. Their son Vahi-vero was stolen by two wild ducks that carry him to a distant island where two witches Nua and...