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Painted rafter patterns that name a house.
Also known as: Rafter painting Maori
The Māori painted scroll patterns on the rafters of a meeting house.
Decorates the rafters of a meeting house in named repeating patterns.
Contexts: History, Public information
The patterns of a particular house relate to the ancestry and history of the people it belongs to, so the decoration is a statement of identity and not a decorative scheme chosen for effect.
Contexts: History, Public information
Named patterns belong to the communities that hold them and their use elsewhere is a matter for those communities.
Contexts: History, Public information
Repeating spiral and scroll figures painted in a band along the rafters, conventionally in red, black and white, each named pattern built to its own construction.