The Ha‘a Ngata chiefs (Figure 1) initially dominated the western end of Tongatapu and some of them (Ata, for example, or Ve‘ehala) continued to be associated with western (hihifo) Tongatapu (Map 1). The children of the fourth Tu‘i Kanokupolu became geographically split, however. Mumui and his descendants were associated with central Tongatapu and the shoreline rather than the lagoon (Ellem 1981:60). Meanwhile, Maealiuaki and his descendants operated out of Hahake, the eastern district (ibid.:62). Historically Hahake is associated with the Tu‘i Tonga and the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua (Figure 1), titles that are superior to the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title. Hahake’s ranking town was Mu‘a,^[14] the seat of the Tu‘i Tonga. With respect to Hihifo, then, Hahake was a rival centre. Its chiefs “were traditionally opposed to the people of Hihifo … and regarded the assumption of kingship by the Tu‘i Kanokupolu, a Hihifo chief, as an usurpation of the rights of the Hahake chiefs, Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua and Tu‘i Tonga” (Rutherford 1971:14). Compounding this east-west split on Tongatapu was the north-south split between Vava‘u, referred to in poetic texts as tokelau or “north”, and Tongatapu, literally “sacred south”. Ellem dates the hostilities between the northern group and the southern island from the end of the eighteenth century (1981:62). In the nineteenth century, the principal chiefly name associated with the north was ‘Ulukālala (Figure 4) of the Ha‘a Ngata Tupu (Figure 1). Over the course of the history summarized in this section, the east of Tongatapu (Map 1) entered into alliance with the north of the archipelago (Map 2) and together east and north opposed the centre of Tongatapu. Herein follows a summary of this history.

The close of the eighteenth century was a turbulent era. Maealiuaki had been the 8th Tu‘i Kanokupolu, and some alleged he also held the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title (Bott 1982:14, Figure 3; Campbell 1982:186-187; Ellem 1981:451, Figure 2; see Figure 4). Maealiuaki and his son Mulikiha‘amea were associated with the eastern district of Tongatapu, Hahake (Map 1). Mulikiha‘amea was also a Tu‘i Kanokupolu, though sources disagree about whether he succeeded his father directly and whether he also held the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title, as his father apparently had.^[15] The principal rivals of the Maealiuaki line would come from central Tongatapu in the person of the chiefs of the Tupou Dynasty, beginning with Mumui (Figure 4). Mumui, the founder, was the 13th Tu‘i Kanokupolu (Bott 1982:14, Figure 3) and according to Bott he died two years before Mulikiha‘amea died. How did Mumui acquire the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title? The answer to this question concerns in part the exploits of one of the best known Tongan women, Tupoumoheofo.

Tupoumoheofo was the main wife or moheofo of the Tu‘i Tonga Paulaho and daughter of the seventh Tu‘i Kanokupolu and full sister of the ninth Tu‘i Kanokupolu. She was also father’s sister of an heir to the title (see Figure 4; Bott 1982:14, Figure 3; Gifford 1929:88; Herda 1987:203). There are many accounts of how Tupoumoheofo captured the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title. Some claim that Tupoumoheofo secured the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title for Mulikiha‘amea so that she herself could assume the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title (“Tonga: A Brief History”, BSP 4/5/8-9; “Discussions” 1:44). Still others report that it was Mumui and Tuku‘aho (Figure 4) who pressed for Mulikiha‘amea’s installation as Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua so that one or the other could assume the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title once he had vacated it (Herda 1987:205, 1988:100) (but see n.15). Gunson, meanwhile, envisions Tupoumoheofo as assuming the title after her brother Tu‘i Halafatai, the “effectual ruler” (Gunson 1979:39; see n.18), “retreat[ed] from political life and … retired to Fiji and Samoa” (Gunson 1979:40; see also “Discussions” 1:44).^[16] However the title became vacant, once it was vacant Tupoumoheofo named herself the successor and installed herself as Tu‘i Kanokupolu by sitting with her back against the koka tree in Hihifo that the Tu‘i Kanokupolu traditionally leaned against when being installed (Gifford 1929:88).

What her intentions were is a matter of conjecture. Ellem suggests that her goal in becoming Tu‘i Kanokupolu was to pass this title on to her son, Fuanunuiava (Ellem 1981:61), who would eventually contend (Ellem claims [ibid.:62]) for the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title in 1797, when Mumui died (see, for example, Dumont D’Urville, 1989:114). Others speculate that Tupoumoheofo hoped to restrain the Tu‘i Kanokupolu by uniting the country under the Tu‘i Tonga again (“Discussions” 1:60). She could have been responding, among other things, to the failure of Maealiuaki to send his daughters to the Tu‘i Tonga but, rather, to send them to men of the Tu‘i Kanokupolu line instead (ibid. 1:69) and to the fact of the recent doubling of titles on the Kauhalalalo side, a single person holding both the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua and the. Tu‘i Kanokupolu titles (Figure 1). In fact, some claim that she attempted to install her son Fatafehi Fuanunuiava as Tu‘i Tonga while her husband was still alive. This occurred, according to Bott and Queen Sālote, at the ‘ inasi ceremony witnessed by Captain Cook (ibid. 1:44). (‘Inasi was the ceremony in which the annual prestation of tribute [also called ‘ inasi] was made.)^[17] That would have been a victory for the Kauhala‘uta side, although Tupoumoheofo could as well have unified the country under the Tu‘i Kanokupolu, thus favouring the Kauhalalalo side (Figure 1).^[18] As moheofo of the Tu‘i Tonga and full sister to a Tu‘i Kanokupolu, Tupoumoheofo was capable of operating across the divide between Kauhala‘uta and Kauhalalalo. Whatever her ambitions, Tupoumoheofo’s power and office were short-lived, for Tuku‘aho, Mumui’s son, mobilized an army on Tongatapu and defeated her and her supporters (ibid.); and he followed up this victory by naming his own father, Mumui, Tu‘i Kanokupolu.

However short-lived her term as Tu‘i Kanokupolu, Tupoumoheofo managed to overturn an achievement of another powerful chiefess, Fusipala. Fusipala has been mentioned before, as the wife of Fisilaumāli, the chief in eastern Tongatapu who was low in rank but powerful. Fusipala was the daughter of the fourth Tu‘i Kanokupolu and half-sister of Tuituiohu, founding ancestor of the Ha‘a Ngata Tupu, with which the ‘Ulukālala title of today is associated (Figure 4) (Bott 1982:140). She was also possibly the wife of the fourteenth Tu‘i Ha‘atakalua and mother of the fifteenth Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua (Bott 1982:138, ibid.:Figure 2, p.13, and Figure 23, p.138). Her son by Fisilaumāli was the first known Tu‘i Pelehake (Figure 3). Fusipala was therefore powerful (Herda 1988:93) — so powerful that she was able to depose Vuna Ngata, the Tu‘i Vava‘u (ibid.; Bott 1982:76; Map 2) and son of the fifth Tu‘i Kanokupolu. After deposing him, Fusipala installed Tuituiohu as Tu‘i Vava‘u, “establish[ing] herself as virtual ruler of Vava‘u” (Gunson 1987:159) in the process, though officially the Tu‘i Vava‘u was Tuituiohu (ibid.; also Bott 1982:76; Herda 1988:93, 110). Since Fusipala could count on the support of her full brother, the sixth Tu‘i Kanokupolu, “there were few in Tonga willing to cross her” (Herda 1988:93).

In this initiative, Fusipala was thwarted by Tupoumoheofo, now forced into exile in Vava‘u as a result of Tuku‘aho’s recapture of the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title. Tupoumoheofo apparently viewed Tuituiohu’s son Fīnau-‘i-Ma‘ofanga as a rival; and when she assumed the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title, she deposed him, restoring the Tu‘i Vava‘u title to her daughter’s husband in the Vuna line (Spillius n.d.; BSP 4/5/9; Gunson 1979:40). She thus overturned the work of Fusipala, who had at least momentarily succeeded in shifting the Tu‘i Vava‘u title from the Vuna to the ‘Ulukālala line. It was this daughter’s husband that gave her refuge in Vava‘u when she was first exiled there (Campbell 1989:153; Gunson 1979:41; Herda 1988:112, 114).^[19]

With Mumui’s accession, the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title was transferred to the Tupou Dynasty and incidentally from eastern to central Tongatapu. When Mumui died in 1797, Tuku‘aho despite his reputation for cruelty, was elected to replace him. Some claim that Mumui nominated Maealiuaki’s son Mulikiha‘amea (Figure 4) rather than his own son Tuku‘aho as his successor (Campbell 1982:187, 1989:153; Herda 1988:107), thus tacitly endorsing Hahake or eastern precedence. Bott attributes Tuku‘aho’s success to the support he received from his matrikin, for his mother was the daughter of Ata, ranking chief of the Ha‘a Ngata Motu‘a and effective ruler of the Hihifo district (“Discussions” 1:42; Bott 1982:146; see also Herda 1988:108-109; see Map 1).

The deposed Tu‘i Vava‘u, Fīnau ‘Ulukālala-‘i-Ma‘ofanga (Figure 4), was matrilateral half-brother of Tuku‘aho (Bott 1982:142, Figure 29; Gunson 1977: 99-100); and he supported Tuku‘aho for the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title with the expectation of receiving the Tu‘i Vava‘u title his father had briefly held. But once Tuku‘aho had achieved his goal, he confirmed the Vuna line in that office (Campbell 1989:153; Herda 1988:112), despite the kinship tie. ‘Ulukālala-‘i-Ma‘ofanga died several weeks after Tuku‘aho’s accession — of disappointment, some claim (Campbell 1989:153; Herda 1988:112) — but not without extracting a pledge from his son ‘Ulukālala-‘i-Feletoa to avenge Tuku‘aho’s insult (Campbell 1989:154).

Ostensibly because of his cruelty, though issues of revenge and rivalry unmistakably figured, Tuku‘aho was assassinated within two years of his accession. The principal conspirators and their supporters^[20] came from rival branches: Mulikiha‘amea from the Hahake Dynasty and ‘Ulukālala-‘i-Feletoa and his half-brother (Figure 4) (Bott 1982:112, 143; Martin [Mariner] 1981). The matter of Hahake control of the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title appears to have had some saliency (Campbell 1989:154; Herda 1988:113-114), yet the anti-Tuku‘aho faction was in fact led by ‘Ulukālala-‘i-Feletoa. In this venture, Mulikiha‘amea had two other important allies. One was Fuanunuiava, Tupoumoheofo’s son. Mulikiha‘amea and Fuanunuiava jointly directed troops marshalled to fend off the expected revenge attack (Campbell 1989:155; Thomas n.d.:2, Book 4, p.256). Tupoumoheofo was herself an ally. Though in Vava‘u, Tupoumoheofo was ‘Ulukālala’s enemy, she was sufficiently outraged by Tuku‘aho’s appropriation of the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title that she was willing to make common cause with ‘Ulukālala — some even claim, actively instigating the assassination of Tuku‘aho (Lātūkefu 1974:15; Gunson 1979:29; Herda 1987:206). In the civil war that followed the assassination, Tonga was split along geographical as well as dynastic lines: seeking revenge for Tuku‘aho’s death, Hihifo and central Tongatapu opposed Hahake, Mu‘a, elements of the Ha‘a Fale Fisi (Figure 1), and the ‘Ulukālala Dynasty of the north v. the south (Maps 1 and 2; Herda 1988: 114). There appears then to have been a three-way alliance among those the Tupou Dynasty had in one way or another displaced: the Hahake Dynasty, the ‘Ulukālala line, and the Tu‘i Tonga.^[21]

As the nineteenth century wore on, the schism between Hahake and northern groups, on the one hand, the Tupou Dynasty, on the other, would be played out as a confrontation between Tāufa‘āhau, Tuku‘aho’s son’s son, and Tungī Halatuituia, Mulikiha‘amea’s son’s son (Figure 4); and the ‘Ulukālalas would continue to demand a Vava‘u title.

Though the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title was retained by the Tupou Dynasty, and the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title was no longer appointed, the Hahake Dynasty continued to aggrandize power in eastern Tongatapu. Mulikiha‘amea’s son, Fatukimotulalo, who based himself at Mu‘a, was an ally of Fīnau ‘Ulukālala-‘i-Feletoa (Gunson 1979:44) and was also the host of the first Wesleyan Methodist missionary in the archipelago, Reverend Walter Lawry (Lātūkefu 1977:115). Despite Fatu’s early association with missionaries, he resisted conversion, dying “an unrepentant pagan” (“Tonga: A Brief History”, BSP 4/5/36). Fatu settled down in Mu‘a, where he was recognized as a local leader, despite the fact that he held no title.^[22] His first wife was the daughter of Tu‘i Kanokupolu Mumui and the patrilateral half-sister of Tuku‘aho (Bott 1982:88). The mother of this half-sister outranked Tuku‘aho’s mother; and this, together with the fact that sisters always outrank brothers, meant that her child outranked Tuku‘aho’s son’s son, Tāufa‘āhau (“Re Feudalism”, BSP 22/3).

Tungī Halatuituia was the son’s son of a Tu‘i Kanokupolu, and he was the son’s son’s son (if not the son’s son [see n.15]) of a Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua. As discussed in the previous section, his father’s father, Mulikiha‘amea, had made common cause with ‘Ulukālala in assassinating Tuku‘aho, Tāufa‘āhau’s father’s father. However, the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title had now lapsed and a collateral branch of the descendants of the fourth Tu‘i Kanokupolu had captured the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title (Figure 4). Through his father’s marriages Tungī garnered resources and strengthened his claims to high title. Tungī would eventually base his claim not only to the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title but to kingship itself on his descent from Tuku‘aho’s half-sister, for Tungī’s strongest claim to these titles was arguably through his mother’s mother (“Re Feudalism”, BSP 22/3; Fusitu‘a 1976:17). Fusitu‘a speculates that it was Tungī’s high birth as a hako‘i fefine or descendant of a woman that encouraged Tāufa‘āhau, now King George Tupou I, to bestow ‘Ana Seini, the daughter of his half-sister Halaevalu Mata‘aho, on Tungī in 1853 (ibid.), thus reinforcing existing ties between the Hahake and the Tupou dynasties (see Ellem 1981:67). But Tungī was never firmly in Tāufa‘āhau’s camp. According to one missionary observer, Tungī nurtured “very lively expectations” of a reversal of fortunes and a coming to power as the descendant of the last Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua (Cummins 1980:118).

Tupou I ruled as the first constitutional monarch and as author of a number of codes, one of the most important being the Emancipation Edict of 1862. In effect, the Edict, promulgated by Tāufa‘āhau in a plenary meeting of chiefs and to some degree against their will, released commoners from traditional obligations. In theory chiefs could no longer require that their people work for them. Tungī was among those chiefs who opposed the reforms, viewing the Emancipation Edict “as but another move to strip the chiefs of their privilege, and of their source of labour and livelihood” (Fusitu‘a 1976:18).

He also led the opposition in Parliament to Tupou I’s choice of successor (Ellem 1981:84; Fusitu‘a 1976:18). Everything that made Tungī eligible to succeed to the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title also made his heir eligible. Not only was Tungī the son’s son of a Tu‘i Kanokupolu but his mother’s mother was the sister of the assassinated Tuku‘aho (Fusitu‘a 1976:17), and his personal or “blood” status was therefore high. When Tupou I bestowed upon him his adopted daughter ‘Ana Seini Tupou Veihola in 1853, he elevated Tungī even further in importance if not status. ‘Ana Seini was the great granddaughter of the Tamahā Lātūfuipeka and much higher in status than Tāufa‘āhau himself (“Re Feudalism”, BSP 22/3), and with this marriage the superiority of Tungī Halatuituia’s heir to any heir that Tāufa‘āhau could produce was assured (Fusitu‘a 1976:17-18). Tungī also had symbolically significant holdings: “the powerful and second part of the ancient town of Mu‘a, Tatakamotonga, as well as a great part of the more populous district of Hahake” (ibid.:18; see Map 1); and despite Tungī’s father’s lack of title Bott refers to Tungī’s father, Fatu, as “the ruler of Mu‘a” (“Re Feudalism”, BSP 22/3).

Despite Tungī’s credentials, the Constitution of 1875 named as Tupou I’s heir a son by a secondary wife. Furthermore, Ma‘afu, the son of the eighteenth Tu‘i Kanokupolu, and his heirs, not Tungī and his heirs, were named to succeed Tupou I in the event that his own line should fail. The same legislation awarded him the newly created title Tungī, which supplanted the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title (Bott 1981:22; Gifford 1929:84; Marcus 1980). The Constitution had replaced the Tu‘i Tonga with the Kalaniuvalu title, a title that was appointed by the King and that was ipso facto inferior to the royal title. By the same token, whereas the Tu‘i Ha‘atakalaua title was superior to the Tu‘i Kanokupolu title, Tungī, a position created by monarchical fiat, was inferior to the royal title (Gifford 1929:84). When Ma‘afu died in the early 1880s, Tupou I attempted to mollify Tungī by replacing Ma‘afu with Tungī and his heirs (Ellem 1981:94; Fusitu‘a and Rutherford 1977:175, Rutherford 1971:139-140).^[23] But, as events were to show, Tungī was hardly appeased.

The focus of Tungī’s opposition became an expatriate named Shirley Waldemar Baker, principal architect of King George’s constitutional monarchy, at least as it existed on paper. As if to add insult to injury, Tungī was passed over for the Premiership and Baker was named Premier instead in 1880 (Rutherford 1971:111). In my reading of the events of this period, opposition to the King was often masked as opposition to the white papālangi foreigner; and agitation against Baker was simultaneously, though unspokenly, agitation against the King. Baker’s arch papālangi rival, the Reverend J. Egan Moulton, attracted elements of the antiroyal faction (see Cummins 1980), thus marking the other end of a field that was largely polarized through national contestations.

The 1880s offered several dramatic settings for Tungī’s opposition; and in these contexts, the coalition that was already in place at the end of the eighteenth century resurfaced. The first was the series of events stemming from the actions of a group of minor chiefs and matāpule who stood to lose most from Tupou I’s reforms (Rutherford 1977:165). Though Baker was the particular target of the group that convened at Mu‘a to oppose recent legislation failing to honour the customary land rights of this group, opposition to Baker was inseparable from opposition to the King. Tupou I certainly seems to have seen things that way, for he viewed every anti-Baker initiative, including those associated with what Baker pejoratively dubbed the Mu‘a Parliament, as acts of rebellion.

The Mu‘a group entered into coalition with nōpele titleholders who had their own reasons for opposing Tāufa‘āhau — in particular with Tungī and the Tu‘i Pelehake. Though Tupou I ordered Tungī to suppress the activities of the Mu‘a group, Tungī defied him and sided with the dissidents, most of whom were either Tungā’s relatives or his dependant minor chiefs (Rutherford 1971:111; see also Fusitu‘a 1976:18-19). The Mu‘a group petitioned first the King and when that did not work Queen Victoria herself to have Baker removed. Even though the Constitution had granted rights of petition, the King considered these actions seditious and brought the petitioners to trial.

Meanwhile, even though the bulk of the population, commoners, stood to gain from the Tupou-Baker reforms, the issues were more complicated than they seemed. Tupou I had unified the archipelago, but only precariously. Regional loyalties persisted, and in the eyes of many, Tupou I represented the oppressive military might of Ha‘apai and Vava‘u (Map 2) in the “north’s” attempt to dominate Tongatapu, the “sacred south”. Tāufa‘āhau rose to the Tu‘i Kanokupolu and eventually the royal titles as Tu‘i Ha‘apai and Tu‘i Vava‘u (Lātūkefu 1974:65-66); his helper in these campaigns was ‘Ulukālala Tuapasi (Figure 4). In the wake of these accomplishments, a united and centralized north confronted a still fragmented Tongatapu (ibid.:22). Based at Mu‘a in Tongatapu, Tungī represented not only the ancien regime, not only the insurgency of a senior line against its junior yet politically dominant branch, but Tongatapu resistance to Tāufa‘āhau-instigated northern hegemony (Rutherford 1971:116-117).

When in 1885 Tupou I announced his intention to establish a Free Church of Tonga independent of the parent Conference of New South Wales (Ellem 1983:170), civil war all but broke out. A rallying point for “Old” Wesleyans was Baker’s papālangi rival, the Reverend J. Egan Moulton, a staunch opponent of secession and also the person who had translated the petition the Mu‘a group had sent to Queen Victoria from Tongan to English. But the political landscape these two men divided was split by other tensions and rivalries. Whereas the north quickly embraced the “King’s Church”, resistance developed on Tongatapu. Among the Old Wesleyan sympathizers were Tungī and the Tu‘i Pelehake (Ellem 1981:132; Fusitu‘a 1976:27, 46). Tupou I’s own daughter, Sālote, who was married to the Tu‘i Pelehake (Figure 3), refused to convert and became a Wesleyan, joining others in exile in Fiji. In Hahake spokespeople for the Wesleyans included one Tōpui, a cousin of Tungī who had been the ringleader of the Mu‘a group. Other Mu‘a veterans were Wesleyans as well (Rutherford 1971:130).

Matters came to a head when an effort was made on Baker’s life. The plot was hatched in Mu‘a. Tungī’s cousin was among the would-be assassins. Rutherford thinks it probable that Tungī, his son Tuku‘aho, Tu‘i Pelehake, and even the Crown Prince were operating behind the scenes (ibid.:140; Rutherford 1977:169) — presumably as a shadow government awaiting its opportunity to usurp the key positions, Baker’s and the King’s included. Though the attempt aborted, the perpetrators were brutally punished. To teach Tongatapu a lesson, Tupou I unleashed his northern warriors on Tongatapu, where they ransacked Wesleyan holdings and killed rapaciously (ibid.).

As a result, the British High Commissioner, Sir John Thurston, intervened and decided to deport Baker, a British subject, in part on the basis of affidavits signed by Tungī, his son, and the Tu‘i Pelehake “declaring Baker to have been the sole source of Tonga’s troubles” (Fusitu‘a 1976:40). The new ministry Thurston established was stacked with opposition chiefs, including Tungī as chairman of Parliament and Minister of Lands, the Tu‘i Pelehake as Governor of Ha‘apai, and Tuku‘aho, Tungī’s heir, as Premier and Minister for Foreign Affairs (ibid.:42). This move would undermine the entire position of Tupou II (Fusitu‘a and Rutherford 1977:174; see Campbell 1992:ch. 7).