Kamapuaa on Oahu and Kauai
Fornander says that Kamapuaa was sometimes called “the eight-eyed” and was also gifted with eight feet. He says, “This specialty of four faces or heads and of corresponding limbs is peculiar to some of the principal Hindoo deities.” The honorary designation of gods and even high chiefs in Hawaiian mythology was frequently maka-walu (eight-eyed), [[259]]to express their great endowment of divine powers. Fornander notes “coincidence as bearing upon the derivation of Polynesian myths and legends. The Kamapuaa stories, however, seem to have no counterpart in any mythology beyond the borders of the Hawaiian Islands.”
While he lived on the Koolau coast he was simply a devastating, brutal monster, with certain powers belonging to a demi-god, which he used as maliciously as possible. After being driven out to the Honolulu side of the mountains, for a time he led his band of robbers in their various expeditions, but after a time his miraculous powers increased and he went forth terrorizing the island from one end to the other. He had the power of changing himself into any kind of a fish. As a shark and as a hog he was represented as sometimes eating those whom he conquered in battle. He ravaged the fields and chicken preserves of the different chiefs, but it is said never stole or ate pigs or fish.
He wandered along the low lands from the taro patches of Ewa to the coconut groves of Waikiki, rooting up and destroying the food of the people.
At Kamoiliili he saw two beautiful women coming from the stream which flows from Manoa Valley. He called to them, but when they saw his tattooed body and rough clothing made from [[260]]pigskins they recognized him and fled. He pursued them, but they were counted as goddesses, having come from divine foreign families as well as Kamapuaa. They possessed miraculous powers and vanished when he was ready to place his hands upon them. They sank down into the earth. Kamapuaa changed himself into the form of a great hog and began to root up the stones and soil and break his way through the thick layer of petrified coral through which they had disappeared. He first followed the descent of the woman who had been nearest to him. Down he went through soil and stone after her, but suddenly a great flood of water burst upward through the coral almost drowning him. The goddess had stopped his pursuit by turning an underground stream into the entrance which he had made.[5]
After this narrow escape Kamapuaa rushed toward Manoa Valley to the place where he had seen the other beautiful woman disappear. Here also he rooted deep through earth and coral, and here again a new spring of living water was uncovered. He could do nothing against the flood, which threatened his life. The goddesses escaped and the two wells have supplied the people of Kamoiliili for many generations, bearing the name, “The wells, or fountains, of Kamapuaa.” [[261]]
The chief of Waikiki had a fine tract[6] well supplied with bananas and coconuts and taro. Night after night a great black hog rushed through Waikiki destroying all the ripening fruit and even going to the very doors of the grass houses searching out the calabashes filled with poi waiting for fermentation. These calabashes he dashed to the ground, defiling their contents and breaking and unfitting them for further use. A crowd of warriors rushed out to kill this devastating monster. They struck him with clubs and hurled their spears against his bristling sides. The stiff bristles deadened the force of the blows of the clubs and turned the spear-points aside so that he received but little injury. Meanwhile his fierce tusks were destroying the warriors and his cruel jaws were tearing their flesh and breaking their bones. In a short time the few who were able to escape fled from him. The chiefs gathered their warriors again and again, and after many battles drove Kamapuaa from cave to cave and from district to district. Finally he leaped into the sea, changed himself into the form of a fish and passed over the channel to Kauai.
He swam westward along the coast, selecting a convenient place for landing, and when night came, sending the people to their sleep, he went [[262]]ashore. He had marked the location of taro and sugar-cane patches and could easily find them in the night. Changing himself into a black hog he devoured and trampled the sugar-cane, rooted up taro and upset calabashes, eating the poi and breaking the wooden bowls. Then he fled to a rough piece of land which he had decided upon as his hiding-place.
The people were astonished at the devastation when they came from their houses next morning. Only gods who were angry could have wrought such havoc so unexpectedly, therefore they sent sacrifices to the heiaus, that the gods of their homes might protect them. But the next night other fields were made desolate as if a herd of swine had been wantonly at work all through the night. After a time watchmen were set around the fields and the mighty hog was seen. The people were called. They surrounded Kamapuaa, caught him and tied him with strongest cords of olona[7] fibre and pulled him to one side, that on the new day so soon to dawn they might build their oven and roast him for a great feast.
When they thought all was finished the hog suddenly burst his bonds, became invisible and leaped upon them, tore them and killed them as he had done on Oahu, then rushed away in the darkness. [[263]]
Again some watchers found him lying at the foot of a steep precipice, sleeping in the daytime. On the edge of the precipice were great boulders, which they rolled down upon him, but he was said to have allowed the stones to strike him and fall shattered in pieces while he sustained very little injury.
Then he assumed the form of a man and made his home by a ledge of rock called Kipukai. Here there was a spring of very sweet water, which lay in the form of a placid pool of clear depths, reflecting wonderfully whatever shadows fell upon its surface. To this two beautiful sisters were in the habit of coming with their water-calabashes. While they stooped over the water Kamapuaa came near and cast the shadow as a man before them on the clear waters. They both wanted the man as their husband who could cast such a shadow. He revealed himself to them and took them both to be his wives. They lived with him at Kipukai and made fine sleeping mats for him, cultivated food and prepared it for him to eat. They pounded kapa that he might be well clothed.
At that time there were factions on the island of Kauai warring against each other. Fierce hand-to-hand battles were waged and rich spoils carried away.
With the coming of Kamapuaa to Kauai a new [[264]]and strange appearance wrought terror in the hearts of the warriors whenever a battle occurred. While the conflict was going on and blows were freely given by both club and spear, suddenly a massive war-club would be seen whistling through the air, striking down the chiefs of both parties. Mighty blows were struck by this mysterious club. No hand could be seen holding it, no strong arm swinging it, and no chief near it save those stricken by it. Dead and dying warriors covered the ground in its path. Sometimes when Kamapuaa had been caught in his marauding expedition, he would escape from the ropes tying him, change into a man, seize a club, become invisible and destroy his captors. He took from the fallen their rich feather war cloaks, carried them to his dwelling-place and concealed them under his mats. The people of Kauai were terrified by the marvellous and powerful being who dwelt in their midst. They believed in the ability of kahunas, or priests, to work all manner of evil in strange ways and therefore were sure that some priest was working with evil spirits to compass their destruction. They sought the strongest and most sacred of their own kahunas, but were unable to conquer the evil. Meanwhile Kamapuaa, tired of the two wives, began to make life miserable for them, trying to make them angry, that he might have good [[265]]excuse for killing them. They knew something of his marvellous powers as a demi-god, and watched him when he brought bundles to his house and put them away. The chief’s house then as in later years was separated from the houses of the women and was tabu to them, but they waited until they had seen him go far away. Then they searched his house and found the war cloaks of their friends under his mats. They hastened and told their friends, who plotted to take vengeance on their enemy.
The women decided to try to drive the demi-god away, so destroyed the spring of water from which they had daily brought water for his need. They also carefully concealed all evidences of other springs. Kamapuaa returned from his adventures and was angry when he found no water waiting for him. He called for the women, but they had hidden themselves. He was very thirsty. He rushed to the place of the spring, but could not find it. He looked for water here and there, but the sisters had woven mighty spells over all the water-holes and he could not see them. In his rage he rushed about like a blind and crazy man. Then the sisters appeared and ridiculed him. They taunted him with his failure to overcome their wiles. They laughed at his suffering. Then in his great anger he leaped upon them, caught them and threw them over a [[266]]precipice. As they fell upon the ground he uttered his powerful incantations and changed them into two stones, which for many generations have been guardians of that precipice. Then he assumed the form of a hog and rooted deep in the rocky soil. Soon he uncovered a fountain of water from which he drank deeply, but which he later made bitter and left as a mineral-spring to the present day.
The people of Kauai now knew the secret of the wonderful swinging war club. They knew that a hand held it and an invisible man walked beside it, so they fought against a power which they could not see. They felt their clubs strike some solid body even when they struck at the air. Courage came back to them, and at Hanalei the people forced him into a corner, and, carrying stones, tried to fence him in, but he broke the walls down, tore his way through the people and fled. The high chief of Hanalei threw his magic spear at him as he rushed past, but missed him. The spear struck the mountain-side near the summit and passed through, leaving a great hole through which the sky on the other side of the mountain can still be seen. Kamapuaa decided that he was tired of Kauai, therefore he ran to the seashore, leaped into the water and, becoming a fish, swam away to Hawaii. [[267]]
