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Introduction
The Polynesian Toa (and Toatoa in Aotearoa
Hawaiian Koa
Kahikātoa
The herbal Toatoa
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Proto Malayo-Polynesian *TeRzas is a very interesting word. It seems to have started off as a Malayo-Polynesian generic term for heartwood trees, and in Northern New Guinea became especially applied to the tree also now widely known as ipil or kwila, Intsia bijuga. This is a massive foreshore and lowland forest tree, found natively from Madagascar and India to the Philippines, Vanuatu, the Solomons and Samoa. It grows to 45 metres or more tall, with an extremely hard and durable wood, greatly esteemed for a variety of uses from house construction and furniture to slit-gongs and axe-handles. In Samoa as well as many parts of its range it is heavily logged as a valuable source of timber for building, making kava bowls and slit-gongs, and in the past also double-hulled canoes and war clubs.
By the Proto-Polynesian stage, its derivative word *toa seems definitely to have become the name for the ironwood, Casuarina equisetifolia, and it is used in that sense in most parts of Polynesia except Hawaii and Aotearoa. Although not related to each other or to the Casuarina botanically, the greeness of the Hawaiian koa and the Maori toatoa is shared with the tree to which the name seems to have been applied at an earlier stage of its evolution, the kwila, Intsia bijuga. Their flattened leaf-stalks functioning as leaves give the Hawaiian and Māori trees an extra dimension in common with each other, and with the Casuarina with its small, scale-like leaves. All these trees have the common property of a very hard, durable, and economically important timber.
(The name ipil, and its derivative kwila, is also Proto Malayo-Polynesian in origin (*qipil); as well as denoting hardwoods generally and Intsia bijuga (sometimes called Moluccan ironwood) in particular, in some Melanesian languages its reflexes too have come to designate the other ironwood, Casuarina equisetifolia).
The Polynesian Toa
The Polynesian toa (Casuarina equisetifolia) is native to Southeast Asia and Northern Australia, and possibly as far as Tonga in Polynesia. The tree grows to about 20 metres high, and thrives in littoral environments. It has a very hard red wood, with a variety of uses, from house timber to large fish hooks. In Tahiti it was the symbol of the god Oro, whose images were made from this wood. The dark red sap is the source of dye. Although it is not a legume, the roots of the tree fix nitrogen. In Tonga, an infusion of the bark is used to treat children's ear infections. It can also induce coughing or vomiting to bring up phlegm.
The toa also features prominently in Tongan mythology, as the tree which male human ancestor of the Tu'i Tonga, from who all Tonga's rulers have descended, climbed to reach his father, the god Tangaloa 'Eitumatupua. A beautiful woman, Va'epopua, attracted the god's attention, and in the course of time she gave birth to their son, 'Aho'eitu. The identity of his father was kept secret, but when he was a young man he persuaded his mother to reveal his father's identity. She pointed to a particular Casuarina that reached the sky and told 'Aho'eitu to climb to the top, beyond the clouds. There he would find his father waiting for him. There were further adventures in store after this meeting, but eventually Tangaloa commissioned 'Aho'eitu to return to earth and rule the people of Tonga on his behalf as Tu'i Tonga. (See the article "Exploring the Progression from Games to Gambling in Tonga" by Edmond S. Fehoko, Journal of the Polynesian Society 130.4, pp. 311-312, December 2021, for an extended account of these events.)
This tree was carried throughout central Polynesia by the early navigators, but the plant did not reach the extremities at that time. However the name did reach both Hawai'i, as koa, where it designates the native hardwood, Acacia koa, and Aotearoa, where in the reduplicated form toatoa ("like a toa") it designates three species of hardwoods from the genus Phyllocladus. The New Zealand trees are discussed on the linked page.
The toa underwent a name change in Tahiti, where, as elsewhere in Central Polynesia, it had been known as toa, in the mid-eighteenth Century, wnen the ruling Pomare family incorporated the title Vaira'a toa into their family name. This made the word tapu, and the tree name was consequently changed to 'aito; the new name was also adopted in the Austral Islands. When the tree was finally carried to Hawai'i by American residents in 1882 it was simply called paina (from English "pine"). It has since then been naturalized from cultivation throughout the Hawaiian Islands, including Midway and other attols and various shoals, and is commonly planted for windbreaks and shelter on beaches.
Hawaiian Koa
The Hawai'ian koa, Acacia koa, is one of the most ancient members of the Hawai'ian flora, although it may share a common ancestor with some even more ancient Australian species. In some ways this has proved a disadvantage, because the over the millennia the tree has become the centre of a complex ecosystem, the destruction of which for agriculture and pastoral farming has also endangered the survival of the remaining trees. It also has not taken happily to plantation forestry. Although the specific name "Acacia koa" probably covers several distinct strains which may be species or at least subspecies in their own right (see Wagner et al, Manual Vol. 1, pp.641-2 for more information about this), Acacia koa sensu stricto is a very large hardwood tree growing to 35 metres tall, with leaves reduced to phyllodes, and bearing pale-yellow flowers followed by brown, bean-like seed pods. Its strong, durable and seawater-resistant wood was superb for canoe building, shorter surfboards (longer ones were made from lighter wood) and canoe paddles. The bark was used for dyes.
 As in Aotearoa, the felling of trees such as koa was attended by ritual and strictly prescribed observances. These included offerings of 'awa (kava). After the tree was felled, the 'elepaio bird -- Chasiempis ibidis on O'ahu (photo on left), C. scalteri on Kaua'i and C. sandwicensis on Hawai'i -- as representative of the goddess Lea would check out the tree. If it found lots of bugs in the bark and wood, this was a sign that the tree was useless and should be left where it was to rot. This valuable and cheerful little bird was quite common on O'ahu when I first lived there in the 1960s, but is now rare and endangered; fortunately the related species on the other islands have managed to hold their own so far. Apart from the native insects and their larvae that may nibble at it, the koa is very susceptible to attack from introduced termites, which in some areas has slowed its regeneration and exacerbated the decline in the number of large trees, even where conservation practices have been adopted. Apart from the uses noted in the previous paragraph, the tree was used for making beautifully crafted bowls and storage containers, but these were rarely used for storing foods like poi because even with repeated use the wood imparted a bitter taste. These artifacts are still made for local and tourist trade. Despite its strength, the wood was used only occasionally for making spears -- these were generally fashioned from kauila (Colubrina oppositifolia, Rhamnaceae), a much smaller tree, the Hawaiian equivalent of mānuka.
Kahikātoa
Kahikaatoa, the alternative name for the Mänuka (Leptospermum scoparium s.l.), could be interpreted as kahika having qualities similar to the toa. Although this looks as if it could quite plausibly refer to the Casuarina, the toa in this case is most probably a reference to the potential of the wood for making weapons for a warrior, from Proto-Polynesian *to'a "courageous; warrior", inherited by Mäori also as toa. The alternative name for one of the species of the Phyllocladus known in Aotearoa as toatoa is tänekaha (P. trichomanioides), literally "strong man", which resonates with both *toa as a tree name, and, by coincidence, with toa as a reference to strength and warlike qualities.
The herbal Toatoa
The application of the name toatoa to the herb Haloragus erecta in Maori is a little puzzling on the surface, but probably also originates from Proto Polynesian to'a rather than the tree name. There is more about this tough little plant, one of the few New Zealand natives to be officially classed as a weed, on the page for Toatoa.
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