Ke Kumu Aupuni: The Foundation of Hawaiian Nationhood (Paperback) by Samuel Kamakau, translated by Puakea Nogelmeier

Ke Kumu Aupuni: The Foundation of Hawaiian Nationhood embodies a monumental history of Hawaiʻi, from the beginnings and political rise of Kamehameha I, the negotiations and battles that would come to unify Hawai‘i’s islands and kingdoms, and the development of a single government that would endure, to be ruled by his son and heir, Liholiho, Kamehameha II. This narrative is an invaluable catalog of data about Hawai‘i, Hawaiians, and the nature of national and cultural identity in the Pacific. Offered here in both Hawaiian and English, this history gives rich detail regarding Hawai‘i’s lands, genealogies, gods, chiefs, sociopolitical climate, material culture, laws, agriculture, and social decorums, much of which still lingered in the memories of the living informants who were accessible to the original author, Samuel Mānaiakalani Kamakau. From this Hawaiian scholar, trained at the Lahainaluna Seminary in the 1830s, readers are given an extraordinary fabric of cultural and historical kno