Polynesian

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Polynesian

Pele

The Goddess of Volcanoes

Domain: Volcanoes, Fire & Land Creation
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
Element: Fire
Relics of Power: Digging Stick Pāoa

Speak with Pele

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5 sections of this entry are open to everyone: the summary, the people, the symbols, the lineage and the sources. The other 9 (Name and epithets, In the ancient sources, The myths, Worship and archaeology, How the god was depicted, What scholars debate, After antiquity, Did you know?, Codex relic) are part of the full Codex: PRO opens the whole study of all 500 deities, and without a subscription you can read one full entry a day, just like in the app.

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The People

People

Polynesian peoples

Region

Pacific islands

Period

c. 1000 BC – present

The Polynesian gods were worshipped by the navigators who colonized the Pacific islands, from Hawaii to New Zealand and Easter Island. They honored them on sacred platforms (marae) and through the concept of mana, spiritual power. Their myths, such as those of the hero Maui, are still told among the Maori and Hawaiians.

On the marae, sacred stone platforms, priests offered first fruits and invoked the gods before fishing and war. The kapu (taboo) system ruled what was sacred and forbidden, and in Hawaii the hula was born as a devotional dance to goddesses like Pele and Laka.

At a glance

Pele (Pele-honua-mea) is the passionate, volcanic and sovereign goddess of primordial fire, of incandescent lava, of volcanic eruptions, of geological creation and of the sacred hula dance in Hawaiian and Polynesian traditional mythology and religion. Born in the ancestral land of Kahiki, far overseas, she crossed the Pacific Ocean in her ocean canoe, driven by the magic digging stick Pa'oa, to escape the vengeful fury of her elder sister, the ocean goddess Namakaokahai. Digging deep craters from island to island across the whole Hawaiian archipelago — from Ni'ihau and Kauai to Oahu and Maui — she established her permanent home in the burning depths of the volcanic caldera of Halema'uma'u, at the summit of the active volcano Kilauea on the Big Island (Hawai'i). She embodies both the overwhelming destructive power that burns forests and consumes villages beneath rivers of red magma, and the supreme primordial creative force that builds new lands over the sea, demanding reverent respect for the forces of living nature. For this reason, in Hawaiian tradition, she is the lady of the volcanoes, honoured through the sacred dance of hula.

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

Sacred symbols

The lava, the Kīlauea volcano, the Pāoa stick and the flaming hair

Family

Parents

HaumeaKane-milohai

Siblings

NamakaokahaiHi'iaka

Pele

Unions

Kamapua'aLohiau

Genealogy according to Nathaniel B. Emerson, Pele and Hiiaka: A Myth from Hawaii de 1915; Martha Beckwith, Hawaiian Mythology de 1940; Cantos Tradicionais de Mele e Oli

Sources and further reading

Primary sources

Nathaniel B. Emerson, Pele and Hiiaka: A Myth from Hawaii. translation: Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 1915.
Martha Beckwith, The Kumulipo: A Hawaiian Creation Chant. translation: University of Chicago Press, 1951.

Studies

Martha Beckwith, Hawaiian Mythology. Yale University Press, 1940.
Davianna Pomaika'i McGregor, Na Kua'aina: Living Hawaiian Culture. University of Hawaii Press, 2007.

Name and epithets

The sacred Hawaiian divine name and title Pele-honua-mea is composed, in the traditional Polynesian language, of the concepts Pele (volcanic fire, eruption or incandescent lava), honua (the physical earth, the primordia…

In the ancient sources

Pele and Hiiaka: A Myth from Hawaii., 1915 (pre-colonial tradition).. Ethnographic masterpiece by Nathaniel B. Emerson documenting the ancestral chants of the epic of Pele and her sister Hi'iaka.

The myths

The Great Ocean Crossing and the Digging of the Islands with the Pa'oa Stick.. The ancient oral chronicles preserved in the mele chants relate that Pele was born in the mythical, sun-drenched ancestral land of Kahiki (T…

Worship and archaeology

The worship and spiritual reverence of Pele constitute a living, vibrant, continuous and sacred tradition throughout the state of Hawai'i and in the international Polynesian diaspora, maintained with extraordinary cultu…

How the god was depicted

The iconography of Pele in Hawaiian tradition — expressed in ancestral carvings in noble koa wood, contemporary oil paintings by native artists such as Herb Kawainui Kane, and sacred sculptures — is marked by a striking…

What scholars debate

Indigenous Spiritual Resistance and the Territorial Defence of the Kilauea Volcano.. Social anthropologists, indigenous rights jurists and historians of Polynesia such as Davianna Pomaika'i McGregor, Haunani-Kay Trask a…

After antiquity

In contemporary Hawai'i and in global artistic culture, Pele remains the most living, respected, fascinating and beloved tutelary figure of all Polynesia.

Did you know?

In the international scientific terminology of volcanology, two common volcanic rock formations bear official names derived from the Hawaiian goddess: 'Pele's Hair' (fine golden threads of volcanic glass blown by the wi…

Codex relic

Digging Stick Pāoa. A magic stick with which she digs craters and makes the lava gush from the depths of the earth.

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