Nanaue

Nānaue is a figure from Hawaiian oral tradition, a man who could take the form of a shark. The story is part of the traditions of the islands and was written down in English in the early twentieth century, notably in Thomas G. Thrum’s collection Hawaiian Folk Tales (1907) and discussed by Martha Beckwith in Hawaiian Mythology (1940). It is a story to be understood in its cultural setting rather than as a cryptid hunt.

In the tale, the woman Kalei lived in Waipi‘o Valley on the island of Hawai‘i and bathed in the sea at night. The shark king, Kamohoali‘i, took human shape, married her and left before their son was born, asking that the boy never eat meat. Nānaue was born with a shark-like mouth on his back, hidden under clothing. When he was fed meat as a young man, he developed a craving for human flesh and, in shark form, killed swimmers.

Exposed, Nānaue fled to other islands, tried to change his ways, and relapsed. In the common endings, people on Moloka‘i trapped him in shark form and killed him, or he died in a fire. Some versions place his hiding place at Kaneana Cave on O‘ahu, and the story is told in different ways by different tellers.

Folklorists read the story as a reflection of the real danger of sharks and of the Hawaiian belief that some sharks are ancestors or guardians (‘aumākua), while others are threats. The tale is also about the dangers of breaking a taboo. Readers who want the meaning of shark stories should look to Native Hawaiian cultural sources.

A man who looked ordinary except for a shark’s mouth, with teeth, on his back; in shark form he was a huge man-eating shark.

The coast and sea around Waipi‘o Valley, Maui and Moloka‘i, and, in some versions, Kaneana (Mākua) Cave on O‘ahu.

Nānaue belongs to Hawaiian shark lore, in which sharks can be protective ancestral guardians or dangerous. The story has been retold in school and folklore collections and is today shared mainly through Native Hawaiian storytellers and cultural educators.