Archive Note
Ta moko is the Maori tradition of permanent facial and body marking, and it is the most distinctive of the Polynesian marking practices because the Maori used an uhi, a small chisel struck with a mallet, to cut grooves into the surface rather than puncturing it, leaving a textured surface. Each moko is unique to its wearer and records whakapapa (genealogy), iwi and hapu affiliation, mana, and life history; senior men wore moko kanohi across the face, and women wore moko kauae on the chin. Europeans first documented it during Captain Cook's first voyage, when Joseph Banks and the artist Sydney Parkinson recorded moko-bearing Maori from October 1769 onward. Through the nineteenth century the practice declined under missionary pressure, introduced disease, the New Zealand Wars, and finally the 1907 Tohunga Suppression Act, which made traditional knowledge specialties a legal offense; by the mid-twentieth century full facial moko on men was rare and the tradition survived mainly as moko kauae among elder women. The Maori Renaissance of the 1970s set the conditions for a revival led by carvers such as Mark Kopua, Sir Derek Lardelli, Inia Taylor, and Te Rangitu Netana, anchored institutionally by Te Uhi a Mataora, the national ta moko committee formed around 2000. By the 2020s moko kauae had become publicly visible in civic life, worn by Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta, and in 2025 Te Papa Tongarewa hosted a public mokopapa with live moko sessions.