Kereopa Te Rau

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Kereopa Te Rau (?-1872) was a Māori Warrior. The name Kereopa is the Māori pronunciation of the Biblical name Cleopas. He was also nicknamed Kai whatu, the eye ball eater. He was a leader of the Pai Marire or Hau Hau faith.

Kereopa was probably baptised by Father Euloge Regnier during the 1840s and may have served as a police officer in Auckland during the 1850s. He is known definitely to have fought for the King Movement during the Invasion of the Waikato in 1863. His wife and two daughters were killed in the massacre by government forces following the attack on Rangiaowhia near Te Awamutu, and his sister was killed in defence of the Hairini Line a few days later.

Shortly afterwards he met up with the prophet Te Ua Haumene and converted to the Pai Marire faith. In December 1864 he was sent on a mission to the tribes of the East Cape. His instructions were to go in peace and avoid confrontations with the Pākehā. However at Opotiki the missionary Carl Volkner, a suspected government spy, was seized, hanged and decapitated in what became known as the Volkner Incident. Immediately afterwards Kereopa preached a sermon from Volkner's pulpit during which he gouged the missionaries eyes out of his head and ate them. It should be pointed out that although this is abhorrent to modern thinking it was not inappropriate in the context of Māori warfare and gave Kereopa great mana or standing.

Kereopa and his Pai Marire followers then abandoned the people of Opotiki to the revenge of the Pākehā and retreated to the Urewera Mountains to preach their faith to the Tuhoe people. Later he tried to return to the Waikato but was repulsed by a war party of Ngāti Manawa and Ngāti Rangitihi. Following the resulting battle Kereopa is said to have eaten the eyes of three of the slain enemy. He then retreated to the Ureweras again where he found refuge and where he remained in hiding for the next five years.

However in the early 1870s the Ureweras were invaded by the government forces searching for Te Kooti and the Tuhoe were effectively conquered and subdued. Reluctantly they were forced to yield up Kereopa to Ropata Waha Waha. He was tried and hanged for Volkner's murder, 5 January 1872.

[edit] References

• Cowan, J. (1922) The New Zealand wars. New Zealand Government Printer.
• Lyall, A. C. (1979) Whakatohea of Opotiki. AH & AW Reed.
• Chapter 5: The Völkner and Fulloon Slayings, in The Ngati Awa Raupatu Report. Waitangi Tribunal, 1999.