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Introduction
Manono ~ Kanono
Kawariki
Karamū
The proto Eastern Polynesian word from from which the Māori tree name kawariki originated seems to have denoted the tropical "umbrella tree", Terminalia catappa, a meaning retained in cognate words in other Eastern Polynesian languages. The word seems to be derived from the Proto Polynesian words kau "wood, timber" and ariki "chief", and it is possible that one of the meanings still retained in modern Samoan, "a chief's word", was its original meaning. Be that as it may, the Terminalia's large leaves have a counterpart in those of the Coprosma species which received its name in Aotearoa.
Manono ~ Kanono
The names manono and kanono
(only Māori has the alternation of "m" and "k" for the initial consonant in this and a few other words)
are derived from a Proto Polynesian word, *manono, denoting a tree with medicinal properties, Tarenna sambucina, classified by botanists in the coffee family (Rubiaceae). The reflexes of this word have retained that meaning in many Polynesian languages; in some, like Māori and Hawaiian, they refer to other members of this same botanical family with similar attributes. The Tahitian and Marquesan forms refer also to other plants which are reminiscent of the Tarenna.
 Coprosma autumnalis, pictured left, grows in moist, sheltered places in the forest, and is found in the Three Kings Islands as well as the North and South Islands.
The leaves are large, up to 20 cm long and 10 cm wide. The tree itself reaches from 4 to 6 metres in height, much shorter than its tropical namesakes. Sometimes it will be a tree with a single trunk; other plants will be multi-stemmed shrubs. Manono is a common marginal and understory tree in forests, from coastal environments to the cloud forests. It flourishes in damp conditions.
A yellow dye was obtained from the bark; Murdoch Riley notes that scrapings of manono/kawariki bark were bound with harakeke (flax) around whalebone patus, which were then baked in a hāngi (earth oven) to give a yellow shading to the weapon. Like the tropical manono, an infusion of the inner bark in cold water was used to treat sprains and fatigued limbs. An infusion of bark and leaves was used to treat broken limbs; the leaves themselves were also employed for this purpose. The bark and sap were also effective in treating cuts, bruises and skin disorders.
The flowers of most Coprosma species are either male or female, and (unlike those of most of the Rubiaceae) small and wind pollinated. To help ensure polination, the male flowers have extra-long stamens which are easily blown about, helping to ensure that pollen is widely dispensed from the correspondingly large anthers. (Photographs of the male and female flowers respectively of Coprosma autumnalis, greatly enlarged, can be found in the gallery at the bottom of the page).
The fruit, like that of other Coprosma species, is edible, but was not particularly esteemed except in times of famine. However it was important enough to have been given a special name - kueo, and the whole tree had the alternative name karamū kueo.
Kawariki
The shrub also goes under the name kawariki, most commonly associated with the response of the Māori King Tawhiao when he did not receive the cooperation he asked for in building a social and economic order capable of resisting British imperialism and settler ambitions which is still remembered and recited by the Tainui people:
Māku anō tōku nei whare e hanga. Ko nga poupou o roto he māhoe, he patete, ko te tāhuhu he hīnau. Me whakatupu ki te hua o te rengarenga, me whakapakari ki te hua o te kawariki.
["I myself will build my house. The inner supports will be of māhoe and patete, the ridgepole of hīnau. Be nourished on the fruit of the rengarenga; be strengthened with the fruit of the kawariki."]
The message is that Tāwhiao will rely on ordinary people, and on the resources at hand, rather than on the rich and famous and external aid -- the three trees mentioned, patete (Schleffera digitata), māhoe (Melicytus ramiflorus) and hīnau (Elaeocarpus dentata), would only be used for building in the direst of emergencies. The rengarenga (Arthropodium cirrhatum) was a luxury food, but the kawariki was a food for hard times -- Täwhiao's followers thus had to become self-sufficient, and be prepared to take the hard times with the good. (Tāwhiao had an encampment adjacent to Te Māra Reo, and these proverbial plants are all growing here.)
Some (perhaps all) species of buttercup (Ranunculus) are known generically as "kawariki". In this case the name is probably simply a variant of other common names for these plants, raoriki and waoriki, and not derived from Proto Nuclear Polynesian *kaualiki.
Karamū
The kawariki/manono is one of the Coprosma species referred to as Karamū (this is a generic name in Māori -- all of the karamū have other, more specific names). These plants collectively had special spiritual and mystical significance. Among other things, branches or leaves of karamū were used in various cleansing and purification ceremonies. One of these, the takutaku rite, performed near flowing water, to drive away illness, is described in a quotation from Sir Peter Buck's thesis in Murdoch Riley's Herbal (p. 178). The tohunga touched the patient with a leaf of the karamū, and then floated it down the stream. The patient would also usually be sprinkled with water to facilitate the process of purification. The leaf would bear the demon causing the illness "away out upon the vast waters, where at the great whirlpool,Te Waha o Te Parata -- the mouth of the Parata -- situated in mid-ocean, it entered the portals of the underworld and there rejoined the spiritual powers which had sent it forth to punish the transgression of their tapu. When the takutaku ceremony had been performed, the demon departed and the patient recovered."
Karamū in Te Paipera Tapu
 The single occurrence of karamū in Te Paipera Tapu is rather puzzling. It could simply be a transliteration of the Latin word "Calamus" which has been used sometimes to translate the Hebrew kaneh hatov or knei bosem. The plants referred to in the Hebrew text are probably one or more of the fragrant grasses of the genus Cymbopogon. C. martinii, "Ginger Grass", is the one illustrated on the left, but there are many other possible candidates. However, in Te Paipera Tapu a different transliteration, karamuha, is used in one of the three instances where the King James Version uses "calamus" in the English translation:
Tikina mau he tino mea kakara, he maira pai, kia rima rau hekere, he hinamona reka, me hawhe tera, ara kia rua rau kia rima tekau hekere, me te karamuha reka, kia rua rau kia rima tekau hekere [Exodus 30:23]
Take thou also unto thee principal spices, of pure myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even two hundred and fifty shekels, and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty shekels, [KJV; aromatic cane is used in the RSV]]
and kākaho kakara "fragrant cane" is used in another:
I tuku taonga a Rana, a Iawana, he miro huruhuru, i roto i au hokohokonga: i au taonga hokohoko ko te rino kua oti te mahi, ko te kahia, ko te kakaho kakara. [Ezekiel 27:19]
Dan also and Javan going to and fro occupied in thy fairs: bright iron, cassia, and calamus, were in thy market. [KJV; calamus is also used in the RSV]
Karamū makes its solo appearance in the Song of Songs:
He nara, he hapirone, he karamu, he hinamona, me nga rakau parakihe katoa; he maira, he aroe, me nga mea nui katoa o nga kinaki kakara. [Song of Songs 4:14]
Spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense; myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices: [KJV; calamus is similarly used in the RSV]
This could be a case of a different transliteration by a different translator -- we have no way of telling whether the final vowel of "karamu" was supposed to be long, which would more certainly signify the use of the local plant name. However, the translators of Te Paipera Tapu have in other contexts deliberately used Māori plant names to make the Biblical texts more in tune with their readers' knowledge of the world, just as English translators have used the names of English and European plants for that purpose. Coprosmas, as plants with healing and spiritual qualities would fit in well with this context, fundamentally a list of plants and plant products used in religious ceremonial contexts, and the name karamū is appropriate poetically and analogically as well echoing the term used in the English translations.
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