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Notas del editor
The most widely known kapu is the one that required men and women to eat separately, or `ai kapu. `Ai kapu were the laws that regulated food distribution, preparation and consumption `Ai kapu forbade men and women from eating together and also prohibited women from eating most of the foods offered as ritual sacrifices to the gods (for example, it was kapu for women to eat pork or bananas.) Men and women had separate eating houses but common sleeping house; women were forbidden from entering heiau temples or the men's house. Certain foods represented aspects of male gods, thus certain foods become sacred when specific meaning is attached to them. For example, pork was a symbol for the god Lono, coconut and the ulua fish were symbolic of Kū, and niuhi (white shark) was symbolic of Kāne. Because these and other foods symbolized the male gods, women were not only prohibited from eating these foods but were also prohibited from eating with men.
Kamehameha I passed in 1819. His son Liholiho (Kamehameha II) has succeeded him. Ka`ahumanu, high chiefess and a widow of Kamehameha is kuhina nui (executive “prime minister) They cast off the old gods and shattered the old system of religious social kapu Some welcomed the relief from laws they viewed as irrelevant while others feared the inevitable wrath of their ancestral spirits Though the influential ali`i had publicly broken with old gods and old beliefs, not everybody had accepted this severance Some unsuccessfully attempt to rebel against the ali`i and preserve the ways of old
Liholiho ordered that all heiau and ki`i be destructed. There is evidence that some kahuna refused to heed to Liholiho’s command to destroy the heiau and some even found ways to preserve the ki`i akua or temple images.
In ancient times, Hale O Keawe served as a royal mausoleum, housing the remains of deified high chiefs. Genealogies and traditional accounts indicate that Hale o Keawe was likely built either by or for Keawe-i-kekahi-ali'i-o-ka-moku around A.D. 1700. The earliest western accounts indicate that in the 1820's the structure was largely intact with thatched hale, wooden palisade, and multiple ki'i. This indicates that even after end of the kapu system and the general destruction of heiau throughout the islands, Hale o Keawe survived largely unscathed, and continued to function as a royal mausoleum.
Overall, `ai noa dramatized the end of Hawai`iʻs entire system of religion, laws the entire social structure built on and reinforced by a belief in the old gods. It caused seeds of confusion, doubt, and loss of a sense of personal identification with the culture to be planted