MANUSCRIPT XLII: The Cry of Mata‘afa

Title: MANUSCRIPT XLII: The Cry of Mata‘afa
Creator: Hempenstall, Peter
Relation: Journal of Pacific History Vol. 57, Issue 4, p. 532-538
Publisher Link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00223344.2022.2108566
Publisher: Routledge
Resource Type: journal article
Date: 2022
Description: The ‘Cry of Mata‘afa’ is part of a long tradition of Sāmoan protests to international powers to be allowed to control their own lands and political destiny. It comes in 1899 as the Sāmoan islands are being partitioned between Germany and the United States. But it was not the end of resistance by Sāmoans to colonialist pretensions under both Germans and New Zealand. Mata‘afa Iosefo pleads for the three powers–Britain, Germany and the United States–to recognize his legitimate, tradition-sanctioned right to be proclaimed ‘King of Samoa’. He details how ‘evil men’ led Sāmoans astray and protests that he never promised to abandon his claim after the death of his main rival. Mata‘afa Iosefo describes the military conflicts with Britain and America and while he rejoices at the prospect of a new stable government, he requests compensation for damaged villages.
Subject: colonial history; German Samoa; imperial rivalry; tumua and pule; Samoan resistance; Wilhelm Solf
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1489202
Identifier: uon:52645
Identifier: ISSN:0022-3344
Language: eng
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