Maori Long-Handled Hatchet, New Zealand

James T. Hooper, Arundel, Sussex
Christie's, London, Hawaiian and Maori Art from the James Hooper Collection, June 21, 1977, lot 23
Lynda Ridgway Cunningham, New York, acquired at the above auction
Abraham Rosman and Paula Rubel, New York, acquired from the above on January 22, 1985

Steven Phelps, Art and Artefacts of the Pacific, Africa and the Americas: The James Hooper Collection, London, 1976, p. 60, pl. 28 (illustrated), p. 415, cat. no. 262 (listed)

The toki kakauroa, or long-handled axe, had no precedent in Maori mau rakau, the skilled use of weapons. Like its short-handled counterpart, the patiti, it arose from the introduction of trade-axe heads in the 19^th century. These triangular axe-heads, or toki, often ground down to make them lighter, were attached to a long-handled, or kakau roa, shaft, adapting that aspect of the taiaha and tewhatewha and creating a new weapon with a more obviously sinister edge.