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SPINNING TOPS OF NEW ZEALAND.
A brief historical review by Brian Lemin
[This
article is based on the following work; ____ Games and Pastimes of the
Maori. Dominion Museum Bulletin No. 8. Wellington Dominion Museum. 1925.
pp 153-163. With grateful thanks to the Museum of New Zealand. Te Papa
Tongerewa]
INTRODUCTION.
New Zealand's spinning top heritage is really very rich. The generic term
for these tops is "Potaka". Tops are a part of the culture of Polynesia
and New Zealand and theses toys are known before the Western exploration
and colonization of New Zealand.
In Banks' journal of the first voyage of Cook, he records a whip top that
"resembled those our boys play with in England". Not only did they have
whip tops of a generic nature they also had an innovative "double headed"
whip top. This resembles an egg with a very slight cylindrical portion in
the centre, which was often decorated. The top was set spinning, and then
with dexterous use of the whip the top could be flipped over to spin on
the other point. They had a special name for a whip top that had a flat
top. Of course, they also had a humming top and humming tops made from a
gourd.
WHAT THE TOPS WERE MADE FROM.
I am beginning to think that the anthropological evidence relating to
South Pacific tops indicates that the original tops of these cultures were
those made from naturally occurring things from nature. As yet, I have
not found any evidence in the literature of seed tops in New Zealand but
certainly, the gourd top would have been amongst the early top forms.
Pumice stone is another material that is recorded along with stone, and of
course, wood. It is noted that the hard, weathered heartwood from the
Podocarpus dacridioides was a favoured wood for their construction. There
were often decorated with inlays of white shell.
One of the more interesting construction notes recorded is that the
humming top had an axle/shaft (called a "horn" in the early literature)
that was constructed integrally with the top as opposed to it being a
separate axle being fitted to the top. The string is wound around this
"horn". To launch it, the directions tell us that the axel was supported
with one hand and a piece of flat stick "held against" the axle, with a
finger curled around the "horn" for support, and the string pulled with
the other hand.
The whip was made by tying pieces of the Phormium leaf to a wooden handle.
[Just a note on the last sentence. I met a Maori today (Sept 14 1999) and
told him of my interest in Maori tops. I began by asking him what he knew
about them. Well, for start, he said they were more of a girls toy. His
sisters were the ones that played with tops. They had wooden whipping
tops and the whip was a few strands of flax tied to the stick. He said it
needed great skill to whip and you could whip them very hard and they
would jump. He will talk to his sisters about them and let me know what
he discovers!]
THE GAMES THEY PLAYED.
As in other Polynesian cultures, playing with spinning tops was not
confined to children only, though it appears that in New Zealand the
adults only played with them occasionally. Some of the whip tops used by
adults were quite large.
A special area was prepared for top spinning. It was called the "top
spinning ground".
There was a variety of whip top games that involved spinning the tops over
small ridges of earth that acted like hurdles for the spinner to get his
top over. One variation of the solo skill of "hurdling" the tops over the
ridges was when two boys faced each other and both whipped the same top
between two lines. The winner was the person that managed to whip the top
over their opponents line. Another game was to whip their tops until one
top knocked the other top over.
It is not clear how the wooden humming tops were constructed to hum. On
description of sharp longitudinal ridges cut into top, could have been a
source of the hum. My understanding is clear how the gourd tops hummed as
they had holes pierced in them to make them hum.
I would appear that the humming tops spun for a long time. They said that
a long spinner possessed a "long breath"! I rather like description.
Those with a long breath were often flipped uo on to the hand, carried for
some distance, even over a stream and put down to finish their spin. That
seems to be a pretty efficient top to me!
Humming top showing inlay of shell on the top
THE SONGS THEY SANG.
The songs recorded in the literature are in Maori and are not
translated, but we are told that they sang short "ditties" by the
spinners. Here is one of them:
Pikite wahine ki runga ki te rakua...e
Ka whatero i raro te he arero inawa... Hei! (No
translation available)
On the singing of the word "Hei", all the tops were spun. Other songs
were sung in differing areas of New Zealand, but most had the feature of a
signal word to start all the tops spinning at once.
It is also recorded that the mournful humming tops were also used in a
ceremony bewailing the dead.
A STORY ABOUT THE TOPS.
(The truth of which is not vouched for!)
It would appear that there was a meeting held to discuss the issue of
electing a Maori king. They decided that they would hold a "trial by
top". Each tribe would make a humming top and that the tribe whose top
hummed the loudest would have the privilege of electing one of their own
tribe as king. They all agreed.
All the tribes but one made their tops out of wood, which was the favoured
material for these tops, but the local tribe made their top out a gourd,
and it was reported that this tops spun so loudly that it easily won the
competition and thus the king Po-tatau was elected. (That has to be
better than our political election process! :)
PICTURES OF THE TOPS.
Here are pictures of the tops discovered in the last century.
NEW ZEALAND SPINNING TOPS. A
Bibliography
By Brian Lemin
The following books and articles are culled from may resources and are
reported to have references within them to New Zealand Spinning tops.
Except for those that I have obtained I can not vouch for the value of the
contents.
Best. Eldon, Maori Games. Transactions and Proceeding of the New Zealand
Institute, Vol 34 (1901) pp 55-58
I have this text. Maori Tops are well covered by this article, but there
are no illustrations.
____ Games and Pastimes of the Maori. Dominion Museum Bulletin No. 8.
Wellington Dominion Museum. 1925. pp 153-163
I have this article. It is very good indeed with some good scaled
illustrations, probably the best that I have seen on this topic.
Brown, J. Macmillan. Maori and Polynesian. London. Hutchinson 1907.
Not seen.
Hawkesworth, John. An account of the voyages undertaken by order of his
recent Majesty for discoveries in the Southern Hemishpere, Vol 2. London.
Strahan and Cadell. 1773. Chapter II. p 319. (New Zealand).
Not seen.
Hunt, Sarah, E. Games and Sports the World Round. 3rd Ed. New York.
Ronald Press. 1964 (Maori and Eskimo)
Not seen.
Reed, A.H. and A.W. An Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Maori Life. 1963
I have this page. It is short but quite informative.
Sutton-Smith, Brian. Games of New Zealand Children. Folklore Studies. 12.
Berkley. University of California Press. 1959.
Not Seen.
Taylor, Richard. Te Ika A Maui, or New Zealand and its Inhabitants.
London. Werteim and Macintosh. 1885.
Not seen.
Tregar,E. The Maoris of New Zealand. J. Of the Anthropological Institute
of Great Britain and Ireland. Vol 19. 1889. p115.
Not seen.
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