David Simmons

The Carved Pare: a Maori Mirror of the Universe David Simmons

The pare is an important boundary between the world outside the meeting house and the world inside. It marks a tapu threshold into what is often called te poho, or the body of the ancestor who is the ancestor house, te whare tipuna. For the tribe and their visitors, to enter the house is to go into the body and, symbolically, to change one's state. The pare above the only entrance has an important role to play in that tapu threshold.

This unique book documents, for the first time, Maori pare (carved door lintels) from wharenui (meeting houses). Many have been sourced from around the world and are presented with appropriate descriptions, stories and waiata about the people whose houses they adorn.