11.

KAMOHO Hawaiian shark god who was the chief of the many lesser shark deities
in the Hawaiian pantheon. Kamoho was the brother of the fire goddess Pele and was
considered the guardian god of the Hawaiian Islands. He alone of all Peles relatives
tried to aid her when she was seeking to avoid her marriage to the boar god
Kamapuaa. Kamoho also ruled over the shark-men, or were-sharks as I call
them. These beings were greedy humans cursed by Kamoho to periodically transform
into sharks. They could be recognized by the large shark tattoos that Kamoho branded
onto their backs.
10. MILU - The goddess who ruled over the subterranean land of the dead which
shared her name. A cave led to her realm and the mouth of this cave was guarded by
two gigantic lizards. The association of lizards with the land of the dead came from the
way lizards often feed on flies and if theres one thing dead bodies do its attract flies.
She would punish the souls of the wicked by feeding them on flies and beetles,
then devour them after cooking them in her eternally burning oven. Some confusion
exists because Milu is depicted as male in some myths.
9. KAHOALI - The god of sorcerors and sorcery. His favorite drink was kava served
with a human eyeball in it (shaken not stirred, Im assuming). He could construct
wood, stone or coral figures and then bring them to life to do his bidding.
Kahoalis wife was Paluhu, the sorcery goddess of the island of Molokai. His priest
was always greatly feared and was permitted to eat with the chiefesses and one of his
priests was noted for his Rasputin-like influence over King Kamehameha I.
Kahoalis nemesis was the god Lono, the one deity who could cure all harm inflicted by
the sorcery god.
8. HAUMEA - Hawaiian mother-goddess who was prayed to by midwives attending at
the birth of children. The kinkiest myth about her involves the way she would take a
man as a mate, have children with him, then when those sons were old enough to
procreate she would restore her own youth and have children with those sons. She
would repeat the process with the sons she had through those children and so on and
so on, generation after generation. Sometimes she is associated with the primordial
Earth goddess Papa, the wife of Rangi the sky god. Another famous myth about her
involves her ownership of a grove of enchanted trees. One of them produced fish the
way other trees produce fruit. She gave this tree to humans with the warning to never
shake the tree to get fish to fall but instead wait for the fish to ripen and fall on their
own. Naturally this warning was ignored, the tree was shaken by impatient humans
and all the fish fell from the tree, escaping into the sea from which humans now have
to work to fish them up

7. KAMAPUAA - The warlike god of wild boars and the husband of the fire goddess
Pele. In his human form he was a handsome warrior armed with a mace but when the
battle- lust was upon him his snout became tusked and hog-like and he was virtually
uncontrollable. For a quick pop culture reference think of him as a combination of
Wolverine and the Incredible Hulk when hes enraged. Other qualities he shared with
the wild boars he was the lord of were the ability to use his snout to dig up edible roots
and find underground springs. The many myths in his saga involve his evil stepfathers attempts to have him killed as a child , his slaying of the dog-man creature
Kuilio and his wanderings from island to island, marrying the daughters of chiefs and
fighting their fathers enemies. Inevitably his volatile nature would antagonize his
fathers-in- law and he would flee to another locale. His final marriage was to the
goddess Pele. He bested all her other suitors at the contests held for her hand but she
still refused to marry him until her family intervened on his behalf.
6. LAKA - Fertility and reproduction goddess. This wife of the god Lono was also
considered the goddess of love and beauty. She is credited with inventing the hula
dance and is sometimes identified with Peles sister, the goddess Hiiaka but most
often is considered a separate deity. The red lehua blossom is sacred to Laka and
is among the flowers used to decorate her shrine, kuahu, in the halau temple. The
hymns sung during hula dances are also dedicated to Laka. To avoid confusion be
aware that in other Polynesian Island groups there is a Laka who is a male hero of a
popular epic myth. This male Laka is also known as Rata since consonant
pronunciation varies from island group to island group. That is why Kane
is also known as Tane, Pele is also known as Pere, Ku is also known as Tu, Hina is also
known as Sina, Lono is also known as Rongo, Tahiti is pronounced Kahiki in Hawaii,
etc.
5. KU The Hawaiian god of war. Ku wields a fiery mace that burns with the souls of
the gods, demons and mortals he has personally slain in combat. Ku, like his brothers
Kane and Lono, was a child of the sky god Rangi and the Earth goddess Papa. Kus
prowess in battle was responsible for saving all the deities in the Hawaiian pantheon
after the separation of Papa and Rangi caused a massive assault by the storm god
Apuhau. Next, when another of his brothers, the sea god Kanaloa (also called
Tangaroa in other Polynesian island groups) launched a war against his fellow deities
it was again Ku who prevailed against him (though the conflict caused the
submergence of Havaiki, the mythical home island of all the Polynesian peoples, an
event that supposedly caused their massive nautical migration to various island
groups). Human sacrifices were offered to Ku at heiau temples.

4. LONO - The god of cultivated, agrarian foods, especially the kumara or sweet potato.
In the early days following the separation of Rangi and Papa Lono used a net to fish up
the sun and the moon from the seas and set them in orbit. When it came time to
create humans he supplied the fertile soil to create them, his brother Ku sculpted the
bodies and their oldest brother Kane breathed life into them. Lono liked to descend
from the heavens on a rainbow and surf (Many figures in Hawaiian mythology surf.
How can you NOT love that?) which is how he met and married the mortal woman
Kaikilani. Her beauty was so intense that he was frequently jealous and on
one occassion was so convinced she had been unfaithful that he struck her down with
his godly powers. Repenting of this act he wandered the island mourning her and in
her memory instituted the Makahiki festival that lasts from October to February
rainy season. The rains are said to be Lonos tears over the loss of Kaikilani (though
other myths say they are Rangis tears over being separated from his wife Papa). He
later married the goddess Laka.
3. KANE - The chief of the Hawaiian trinity, which also consists of his brothers
Lono and Ku. In contrast to Lono being the deity of cultivated foods, Kane was the god
of wild foods and plants like trees, etc. He was also the god of the forests and jungles
with all their gifts like wood, medicinal plants and leaves, etc. When the close
proximity and constant lovemaking of Papa and Rangi was preventing the birth of all
the deities who had formed in Papas womb Kane was the god who separated them by
growing upward like the trees he is the lord of, keeping Earth and sky separated and
allowing himself and all his siblings to be born (though one lone deity, Luau, remained
in Papas womb and his stirring is the cause of earthquakes). After death virtuous
souls would go to Hunamoku, Kanes paradisal island in the clouds. In some myths
Hunamoku is also the home of all the heavenly gods, sort of like Asgard in TeutonoNorse myth and Mt Olympus in Graeco-Roman myth. Kane was a generally benevolent
deity and human sacrifices were never offered to him. Kane is the father of Pele and in
various myths owns a seashell which when placed in the water grows into a boat for
travel between the islands.
2. MAUI - Sort of a Polynesian Hercules in some respects, this mighty demigod is also a
trickster deity and a sun god. When Maui felt the sun that Lono fished up out of the sea
moved too quickly across the sky, making the days too short, he physically attacked the
sun, beating it and taming it like a beast and forcing it to move more slowly so that
humans would have longer days to finish their work in. (In some versions he first
lassoes the sun with vines from cocoanut trees) Other feats he is credited with are: a)
pushing the sky up even further above the Earth than it originally was when Kane first

separated Papa and Rangi , b) slaying a giant eight-eyed bat, c) giving humans fire by
stealing flames from the eternally burning oven of Milu, the death-goddess, d) fishing
up various Polynesian island groups with his massive strength, including the Hawaiian
island that bears his name, e) transforming his brother-in- law into the first dogs, f)
saving his sister, the moon goddess Hina, from the eel god Tetuna and his legion of sea
monsters, then marrying her himself and g) creating shrimp from his own blood.
Mauis final adventure involved his failed attempt to gain immortality for humanity.
This myth also has solar overtones and goes as follows: the sun that Lono fished up
was swallowed each night by Milu and traveled across her subterranean realm,
lighting it the way it did the Earth during the daylight hours. Each morning the sun
emerged from Milus vagina and started its journey across the Earth, and so on and so
on. Maui made a wager with Milu that if he could enter through her vagina right after
the sun emerged at daybreak and then race his way across her realm, emerging from
her mouth before the sun could set in it, then she would let human beings live forever.
The wager was accepted and Maui raced with the sun, fighting his way through many
perils and menaces in Milu. Unfortunately, before he could reach the mouth of the
land of death the sun was entering through it, bringing daybreak to Milu and waking
the goddess herself from her daytime slumber (in many versions the sunrise in the
land of the dead prompts a bird to sing, waking Milu up). Maui lost the bet, so humans
were still doomed to die, and in some versions Milu forced Maui to spend eternity with
her in her gloomy kingdom.
1. PELE The Hawaiian fire and volcano goddess, as dangerous and uncontrollable as
the elements she ruled over. I placed her at number one because she is the most truly
Hawaiian of deities, with no counterpart in other Polynesian island groups except in
Tahiti, where she is called Pere, and may have been unknown even there until the era
of European exploration of the Pacific Ocean. Her volatile nature prompted her father
Kane to dismiss her from the heavens, so she wandered the Earth, creating the worlds
volcanoes until finally establishing her home on Mount Kilauea on the Big Island.
Another indicator of Peles importance in the Hawaiian pantheon is the fact that
Mount Kilauea is the Axis Mundi in Hawaiian belief. (My fellow mythology geeks will
get the significance of that)
Pele and her sister Hiiaka were both in love with the mortal Prince Lohiau of the
island of Kauai in a famous epic myth. Peles mother was said to be Haumea in some
myths. Her father Kane at one point passed his sovereignty over the Menehune, the
Hawaiian version of elves and dwarves, to Pele. The fire goddess eventually married
the war-like wild boar god Kamapuaa, who had bested all her other suitors when her

father Kane offered up her hand in marriage in an attempt to settle her tumultuous
nature. Pele still refused to be married and fled, but none of her family would risk
Kanes displeasure by hiding her except her brother Kamoho, the shark god.
Eventually Kane, as chief of the gods, ordered Kamoho to stop shielding Pele. Pele
then attacked Kamapuaa personally when he came to claim his bride, but, with help
from Kane and other gods, Kamapuaa succeeded in surviving her attack and the
two were married. The union tamed both of their violent natures and they fell
deeply in love with each other. Their son, Opelu, the god of thieves and doctors,
became the ancestor of the ruling chiefs of the Hawaiian Islands.