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Rongo, with his brothers Tū, Tāne, Tane Mahuta, Tāwhirimātea, Tangaroa and Haumia-tiketike, separated the primordial parents Rangi and Papa to allow daylight into the world. Tāwhirimātea, the god of storms, did not consent to this plan and afterwards attacked his brothers with unrelenting fury. Rongo and Haumia, the god of wild food, took refuge in the body of Papa, mother earth, who hid them until the storm passed.
In the Māori language, ‘rongo’ means peace. Rongo is generally portrayed as the creator of the kūmara, a plant associated with peace (probably because the intense cultivation it needed was best performed in times of peace). In Ngāti Awa traditions, Rongo is a son of Tāne and father of the kūmara, but a man named Rongo-māui travels to the star Whānui, obtains the kūmara and returns to Earth with it.
Small statues representing Rongo were once placed alongside kumara fields.
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