Nāmaka

Nāmaka (an abbreviated form of Nāmakaokahaʻi or Nā-maka-o-Kahaʻi, traditionally translated as 'The Eyes of Kahaʻi' or 'The Radiant Countenance of Kahaʻi') is the paramount primordial goddess of the open ocean, crashing surf, storm surges, and the sovereign domain of saltwater in Hawaiian mythology. Borne from the breasts of Haumea through her union with the celestial god Ku-waha-ilo (or, in alternative genealogical traditions preserved by Abraham Fornander and Martha Beckwith, the daughter of Kane-hoa-lani and Haumea in the mystical floating land of Kuaihelani), Nāmaka personifies the fluid majesty of the marine element in perpetual dialectical opposition to the volcanic fires of her younger sister Pele. In the celebrated heroic romance of Aukelenuiaiku, Nāmaka rules as supreme supernatural queen and master sorceress over the floating realms of Nuʻumealani and Kuaihelani, taking the errant voyager Aukele as her consort after subjecting him to severe trials of spiritual and magical discernment. When Pele arouses her furious jealousy by seducing Aukele or igniting uncontrollable volcanic blazes across their ancestral homeland, Nāmaka summons devastating tidal waves and marine inundations, driving the entire volcanic family into exile upon the sacred canoe Honua-i-a-kea toward the Hawaiian archipelago. Throughout their migratory course from island to island, Nāmaka ascends coastal headlands to spot the rising plumes of volcanic smoke where Pele strikes the earth with her digging stick (pāoa), repeatedly drowning her volcanic hearths across Niʻihau, Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, and Molokaʻi beneath mountainous ocean swells. The elemental struggle reaches its climax on the eastern coast of Maui, where Nāmaka crushes Pele's mortal body upon the cliffs of Kauiki, raising the famous red cinder hill known as Ka-iwi-o-Pele ('The Bones of Pele'), before witnessing Pele's incorporeal spirit ascend immortal and untouchable within the soaring calderas of Kīlauea and Mauna Loa on the Island of Hawaiʻi.

9 min read · Reviewed on September 28, 2026 · How we research

The waves, the tide, the sea foam and the salt water

Primary sources

• Beckwith, Martha Warren, Hawaiian Mythology. translation: New Haven: Yale University Press, 1940 (reprinted Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1970). read
• Emerson, Nathaniel Bright, Pele and Hiiaka: A Myth from Hawaii. translation: Honolulu: Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 1915. read
• Fornander, Abraham, Fornander Collection of Hawaiian Antiquities and Folk-Lore. translation: Memoirs of the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum, Vol. 4 (Story of Aukelenuiaiku), Honolulu: Bishop Museum Press, 1916–1917. read
• Westervelt, William Drake, Hawaiian Legends of Volcanoes (Mythology). translation: Boston: Ellis Press, 1916. read

Studies

• Kirch, Patrick Vinton, How Chiefs Became Kings: Divine Kingship and the Rise of Archaic States in Ancient Hawaiʻi. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010.
• Luomala, Katharine, Oceanic, American Indian, and African Myths of Snaring the Sun. Honolulu: Bernice P. Bishop Museum Bulletin 168, 1940. open
• Valeri, Valerio, Kingship and Sacrifice: Ritual and Society in Ancient Hawaii. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985. open