pounamu

Pounamu is the Maori name for the nephrite jade and bowenite found primarily in the rivers and mountains of Te Wāhi Pounamu, the South Island of New Zealand. The stone, a dense, hard, lustrous green mineral, is found in forms ranging from translucent pale green to deep dark forest-green to mottled patterns of multiple greens. Maori recognise several distinct varieties, each with its own name and its own qualities: kawakawa (dark green, the most common), kahurangi (pale and translucent), īnanga (pearly, pale), and others. The word pounamu itself is specific to Aotearoa — it does not refer to jade generally but to the New Zealand stone in all its local varieties. Western mineralogy would classify pounamu under the broad category of greenstone or nephrite, but these terms flatten the distinctions that Maori vocabulary preserves.

In Maori culture, pounamu is not simply a precious stone — it is a taonga tuku iho, a treasure passed down through generations, and it carries the wairua (spirit) of those who have owned and worn it. A pounamu pendant given as a gift is understood to transfer something of the giver's identity and their ancestors' identities to the recipient; the stone is considered to grow in prestige and spiritual potency with each person who wears it. This means pounamu moves with people across generations and relationships, accumulating a kind of biographical weight that makes each piece unique beyond its physical qualities. The greenstone pendant your grandmother gave you is not interchangeable with another pendant of the same shape and quality, because your grandmother wore it.

Pounamu was the most prized material in pre-contact Maori society, used for weapons (the short club called a mere pounamu was a weapon of high-status warriors), tools (adzes for carving), and personal ornaments. The most famous pounamu ornament is the hei-tiki — the stylised human figure pendant that has become an iconic symbol of Maori culture worldwide. Other traditional forms include the hei matau (fish hook pendant), which represents abundance and safe passage over water, and various pendants representing birds, spirals, and abstract forms. The manufacture of pounamu objects was a skilled craft; the stone's hardness (6.5 on the Mohs scale) means it can only be worked through sustained grinding with abrasive materials, a process requiring great patience and technical knowledge.

Pounamu entered English usage through colonial New Zealand, initially in natural history and geological writing as a name for the local jade. The word was adopted into New Zealand English alongside the stone's increasing commercial value as a material for jewellery sold to tourists and exported as a cultural product. The New Zealand jade industry has grown significantly since the mid-twentieth century, and pounamu pendants, carvings, and objects are among the most widely exported New Zealand cultural goods. In 1997, the Ngāi Tahu settlement between the New Zealand Crown and the South Island iwi (tribe) included the formal recognition of Ngāi Tahu's authority over pounamu — the first time a natural resource of New Zealand was returned to Maori ownership through the Treaty settlement process. The stone's name is now legally its people's word for it.