| Manu
1. Bird; manu uru, bird figure (like the drawings or wooden
figures once found in caves and houses); manu va'e e-há,
four-legged bird (name given to the first sheep introduced to the
island. 2. Insect. manupatia, wasp. 3. Bird's egg: mâmari
manu. 4. Wild, untamed. 5. Song in which is expressed the desire
to kill someone, or in which a crime is confessed: he-tapa i te
manu .... Vanaga.
Bird; manu uru, kite; manu rikiriki,
insect. P Pau.: manu, bird, insect, brute. Mgv.: manu,
bird, beast. Mq., Ta.: manu, bird, insect. Manu nave,
great abscess, bubo. Churchill.
Manu i te raá =
comet. Barthel.
Manu vae eha, 'birds with four legs'.
Barthel 2.
| 'Several of the early missionaries
comment with a fine sense of humor upon the mistake the
islanders made in calling the cow when first seen a
bird. This is the word which led the good missionaries
into the error of their own ignorance.
Manu is as
wholesale in its signification as our word animal, it is
generic. In the paucity of brute mammalia the first
missionaries found this general term most frequently
used of birds, and it was their and not a Polynesian
mistake to translate manu into bird.
In the material here collected it will
be seen that the significations animal and bird are
widely extended. In the Paumotu insects are
included; the same is true of Mota, where manu
signifies beetle as well as bird.
Nor is its applicability restricted to
earth and air; it reaches into the sea as well. Samoa
uses i'amanu (fish-animal) for the whale ...'
(Churchill 2) |
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