Alphard was a pillar where debates were held - Ira and Makoi debated how names should be given:

... Then Ira spoke again: 'How did you name them, last-born?'  Makoi replied, 'This is what happened, this is how I gave the names. I wrote (ta) Te Manavai A Hau Maka on the surface of a banana leaf (kaka), and this is how I left it.' This is how Makoi remembered it. No sooner had he said this, when Ira gew angry and quarrelled with Makoi. He said the following (to him): 'You did not pay attention, last-born, and you did not give the (full) name. This is how it should be: the Manavai of Hau Maka of Hiva, in memory (mo aringa ora) of the father, of his dream soul.' Makoi replied, 'In Hiva the land belongs to him - this land here is mine, not his!' They stayed (there longer) ...

But on Hawaii, north of the equator, the quarrel at the turn of the year was not verbal but life threatening in character:

... A vestige of the practice of putting the king to death at the end of a year's reign appears to have survived in the festival called Macahity, which used to be celebrated in Hawaii during the last month of the year. About a hundred years ago a Russian voyager described the custom as follows: 'The taboo Macahity is not unlike to our festival of Christmas. It continues a whole month, during which the people amuse themselves with dances, plays, and sham-fights of every kind. The king must open this festival wherever he is. On this occasion his majesty dresses himself in his richest cloak and helmet, and is paddled in a canoe along the shore, followed sometimes by many of his subjects. He embarks early, and must finish his excursion at sunrise. The strongest and most expert of the warriors is chosen to receive him on his landing. The warrior watches the canoe along the beach; and as soon as the king lands, and has thrown off his cloak, he darts his spear at him, from a distance of about thirty paces, and the king must either catch the spear in his hand, or suffer from it: there is no jesting in the business. Having caught it, he carries it under his arm, with the sharp end downwards, into the temple or heavoo. On his entrance, the assembled multitude begin their sham-fights, and immediately the air is obscured by clouds of spears, made for the occasion with blunted ends. Hamamea (the king) has been frequently advised to abolish this ridiculous ceremony, in which he risks his life every year; but to no effect. His answer always is, that he is as able to catch a spear as any one on the island is to throw it at him. During the Macahity, all punishments are remitted throughout the country; and no person can leave the place in which he commences these holidays, let the affair be ever so important ...

... Cook's first visit, to Kaua'i Island in January 1778, fell within the traditional months of the New Year rite (Makahiki). He returned to the Islands late in the same year, very near the recommencement of the Makahiki ceremonies. Arriving now off northern Maui, Cook proceeded to make a grand circumnavigation of Hawai'i Island in the prescribed clockwise direction of Lono's yearly procession, to land at the temple in Kealakekua Bay where Lono begins and ends his own circuit. The British captain took his leave in early February 1779, almost precisely on the day the Makahiki ceremonies closed. But on his way out to Kahiki, the Resolution sprung a mast, and Cook committed the ritual fault of returning unexpectedly and unintelligibly. The Great Navigator was now hors catégorie, a dangerous condition as Leach and Douglas have taught us, and within a few days he was really dead - though certain priests of Lono did afterward ask when he would come back ...

... The brutes of spring caused the downfall of both Captain Cook and Julius Caesar. We are close to the key myth of mankind, that which explains the regeneration of sun and of growth. Once at least some people kept the tradition living. I became interested in what really happened at March 15 and reopened Henrikson to find out. Caesar was forewarned of the threat by the prophet Spurinna, who told him that a great threat was coming at Idus Martiae or just before. The day arrived and Caesar was still living, walking to his meeting with the Senate when he happened to encounter Spurinna and told him jokingly that he was still alive. Spurinna calmely answered that the day had yet not ended. The Romans divided their months in two parts and the dividing point was Idus, which in some way was connected with the full moon. March 15 was the midpoint of March, which is close to spring equinox. The old agricultural year defined the beginning of the year to the time when sun returned, and it was connected with Mars: