If Polynesia needed a hero, it would be Māui. This clever, daring demigod is famous across the whole Polynesian triangle, from Tahiti to Hawai’i and Aotearoa (New Zealand).

He is credited with two feats. First, slowing the sun: the days were too short, the sun raced across the sky. Māui lassoed it and forced it to slow its course - giving people days long enough to work, fish and live. Then, fishing up the islands: with a magic hook, he is said to have pulled whole lands from the depths - an image that tells, in its own way, how the islands rose out of the ocean.

Māui is intelligence and daring in the service of people.