Languagle #76: Maori
He hono tangata e kore e motu
"Unlike a canoe rope, a bond between people cannot be severed."
What it means
A canoe's rope can snap, but the bonds between people, of family, friendship and alliance, cannot be cut. A saying about how lasting human ties are.
How to say it
heh HO-no TA-nga-ta eh KO-reh eh MO-too
Māori usually stresses the first syllable. The r is a light tap, close to a d, and ng is the ng in 'singer', even at the start of a word.
Word by word
- He hono heh HO-no: a joining, a bond
- tangata TA-nga-ta: people
- e kore e motu eh KO-reh eh MO-too: will never be cut (kore, not; motu, cut off)
Motu also means island: a piece of land cut off by the sea.
Where it was found
Māori calls a proverb a whakataukī. This one is from Massey University's te reo Māori resources.
Similar sayings
- English: Blood is thicker than water
How to recognise Maori
Māori uses only fifteen letters. Its giveaways are wh (said like an f) and ng, plus long vowels marked with a line on top: ā, ē, ī, ō, ū. Every word ends in a vowel. Hawaiian has the ʻokina and no r, Samoan uses g for the ng sound, and Tongan uses ʻ and h.
About the Maori language
Māori, or te reo Māori, is the Polynesian language of the Māori people of Aotearoa New Zealand, where it has been an official language since 1987. After decades of decline it has been revived through 'language nest' preschools (kōhanga reo), Māori-medium schools and broadcasting, and well over 150,000 people can now hold a conversation in it. It is written in the Latin alphabet, with macrons marking long vowels and wh said much like an English f.