wharepuni
(NZ) A large building in Maori communities for communal sleeping or for group meetings; a meeting house.
Definitions
(NZ) A large building in Maori communities for communal sleeping or for group meetings; a meeting house.
The dwellings of the chiefs are surrounded with enclosures of pole-fences; and the Whares and Wharepunis, some of them exhibiting very fine specimens of the Maori order of architecture, are ornamented with grotesque wood-carvings.
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Semantically related
- whare78%
A Maori house or other building.
- whare68%
(now, historical) A rough shack or hut built (by Europeans) using traditional Maori techniques; a workman's shack.
- whare wānanga65%
(NZ, historical) Formerly, a type of traditional Maori school.
- marae62%
(chiefly, NZ) The courtyard of a Maori wharenui or meeting-house, seen as a cultural and spiritual focal point; by extension the buildings and people around it; a spiritual or cultural centre.
- hapu60%
(NZ) A subtribe of an iwi or Maori tribe; the basic political unit within Māori society; a subtribe or extended family.