Māori taniwha traditions in George Grey’s Polynesian Mythology

Record summary

George Grey’s Polynesian Mythology, published in 1855, presents Māori narratives involving taniwha, atua, dangerous waters and named landscapes. It is a key nineteenth-century textual lead for research into anomalous-place traditions, especially where later writers recast taniwha as monsters or ghosts. The book is not a modern incident report and its contents reflect collection, translation, editorial selection and colonial publication practices. Comparison should include Māori-language materials and later scholarship rather than treating Grey’s English text as a transparent record of a single traditional worldview.