Tangaloa

deity sky Polynesian corroborated · 8

Tangaloa (Tangaloa ʻEiki) is the child of Velesiʻi "Small Enticer" and Velelahi "Big Enticer". When Taufulifonua had become old and close to death, he divided the universe: Tangaloa got the sky to rule, Maui the earth, and Havea Hikuleʻo became the lord of Pulotu. Tangaloa's descendants would become later the (divine) Tuʻi Tonga starting with ʻAhoʻeitu.

↻ synthesized from 8 sources

When

First attested
900 CE
Attested period
1924 – 2020
Historical notes
Father of the first divine king of the Tuʻi Tonga dynasty.

Relationships

Expand to full subgraph →

Sources

Source passages

“And the next younger brother and sister, also twins who married each other, were Velesiʻi "Small Enticer" and Velelahi "Big Enticer", who brought forth Tangaloa (Tangaloa ʻEiki, that is). When Taufulifonua had become old and close to death, he divided the universe: Tangaloa got the sky to rule, Maui the earth, and Havea Hikuleʻo became the lord of Pulotu.”

#31438 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“Tangaloa”

#31807 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5

“All accounts, however, agree that 'Ilaheva became the wife of Tangaloa and mother of ʻAhoʻeitu, the first divine king of the Tuʻi Tonga dynasty in Tonga, around 900 AD. Her name was ʻIlaheva. She lived near Vaʻepopua in Tongatapu. Her chief or noble relative may have lived in Tongatapu, but perhaps also in Niutoputapu, Niue, or Samoa. ( E. W. Gifford, 1924)”

#32243 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“the god Tamapoʻuliʻalamafoa was the king of the sky, and he commanded some of the Tangaloa gods to tell the faʻahikehe (sub-god) Laufakanaʻa to go down to the realm of light”

#32311 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5

“Tangaloa, (or a variant of this name conforming to the local vernacular) is found in many other Polynesian mythologies. He may have exchanged functions with his cousins Hikuleʻo and Maui”

#32354 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5