Legends of Gods and Ghosts (Hawaiian Mythology) Collected and Translated from the Hawaiian

E-text prepared by Bryan Ness, Katie Hernandez, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by the Google Books...

Walking along carelessly as if to avoid suspicion, he drew near to the lands of the temple Wahaula. Soon a man came out to meet him. This man was an Olohe, a beardless man belon...

David Malo, a Hawaiian writer of about the year 1840, says, "The building of a canoe was a religious matter." When a man found a fine koa tree he went to the priest whose provin...

When Kupa returned they told him how the boys had beaten upon his sacred drums. Kupa was very angry, and ordered his mu, or temple sacrifice seekers, to kill the boys and bring...

Halulu cried out with pain and anger, and sent feather after feather into the prison. Soon one wing was entirely destroyed. Then the other wing was broken to pieces and the bird...

How could these ghosts be detected? They would certainly appear in human form and be carefully safeguarded. The chief sorcerer of Kauhi's family told Kauhi to make secretly a th...

A native writer says there was an antidote for the poison from Kalai-pahoa, and he thus describes it: "The war-god and the poison-god were not left standing in the temples like...

Then there was the opua-alii, cloud-chief with the name Ka-ao-opua-ola (the sharp-pointed living cloud). This was the sorcerer and astronomer, never weary, never tired, knowing...

Waka went on Ku's boat, Anuenue was with Hina. Ku and his friends looked back, the land was almost lost; they soon saw nothing until the mountains of Oahu appeared before them.

Ku-aha-ilo saw that he had failed in all these attempts to terrify Hiilei. His eyes flashed and he opened his mouth. His tongue was thrusting viciously from side to side. His re...

"Rise up! Let your strength look inland; Let your might look toward the sea; Let your face look upward; Look up to the sun over your head; The strange night has passed. Awake! H...

So they waited quietly, offering sacrifices. The priests told him to set apart a pig while he made a prayer. If the pig died during the prayer, he would not forget anything lear...

Hiku was proficient in all the feats of manly strength and skill upon which chiefs of the highest rank prided themselves. None of the chiefs of the inland districts could compar...

After a while he came to the place where his sister lived. When the young people threw their darts he threw his. Aha! it flew indeed and was lost in the distance. When the siste...

This applies to the four great gods, Kane, Ku, Lono, and Kanaloa. They are called the first of the ancestors. Each one of these was supposed to be able to appear in a number of...

Lovers of legendary lore may feast upon this collection of traditional tales of the Hawaiian people and their origin as first told by the old Hawaiians and sometimes touched up...